Hot take: I bought a $300 knee kicker from a guy at a flea market because it 'just needed a new pad'.

Turns out the whole tension spring assembly was shot, and fixing it cost me another $180 and two afternoons of my life. Anyone know a good supplier for reliable used tools in the Midwest?

4 comments

4 Comments

david_jones383mo ago

A flea market knee kicker is a serious gamble (I've been burned before too). The real kicker is the guy said it just needed a pad, that's a classic line. Spending almost two hundred more and losing a whole weekend on top of the first price is brutal. For used tools around here, I've had better luck at estate sales than flea markets, the stuff is usually from a real shop. Sometimes the local paper's classifieds turn up decent gear from retiring tradesmen.

patricia_gonzalez3mo ago

But what if the gamble is part of the fun? I love the hunt at flea markets, even with the risk. Sure, you get burned sometimes, but finding a tool you can actually fix up feels way more rewarding than just buying something ready to go. That weekend I spent fixing my last find taught me more about the tool than any manual could. Sometimes the story and the fix are worth the extra hassle.

ryan_shah383mo agoTop Commenter

Read a forum post about a guy who found a decent used table saw at a farm auction, said the key was getting there early to talk to the family running it. They told him exactly what was wrong with it, which was just a worn belt. That kind of honest info seems way better than the flea market guesswork.

lewis.finley1mo ago

Honestly, have you tried hitting up the Facebook marketplace pages for small towns within a couple hours of you? I found a guy liquidating his dad's old carpet biz and scored a barely used knee kicker for sixty bucks. The trick was driving out there to look at it in person and having a conversation with the son, he told me straight up what tools worked and which ones were junk. Way better than rolling the dice at flea markets where they'll tell you anything to make a sale.