Was looking to replace my old food saver lol with a better unit.  Was looking at the Weston's on Amazon but I was seeing mixed reviews.  Budget is around 500 or less.  Not wanting a chamber sealer.

I don't do a lot of game processing, just will do fairly large batches when buying bulk meats at one time.

True commercial grade machines aren’t going to be found in the $500 range.

OK so I used the term incorrectly.   I think my post still has enough info to make a recommendation instead of just nitpicking my title.  Unless you're just looking to up your post count.

Eta:  how about "prosumer" good enough?

Sensitive much?

There’s many considerations. How much, how often, how large.  Food saver has arguably the best of the affordable models, they have cheap and more real use style models. Next step up is probably VacMaster chamber style sealers but they kind of start in the $800 range.

I think there’s also three or four other active threads with a lot of info in them.

I've had a Cabelas commercial grade sealer for about 5 years now.  Works just fine. No complaints.  Can't speak to the updated models, but happy with mine.

Eta: Occasionally it needs to cool down, especially if doing an extended/double seal, but that doesn't bother me.

I have an Avid Armor chamber sealer that has done well for me.

The thing I like about it is that I don't have to let it cool off at all.  Sealed around 10 packages of chicken back to back with no break in-between and it handled it without issue.

Nvm

A cryovac is what you want. Watch auctions of restaurant  or food processing facilities. You might be able to find one under a grand.

+1 for Avid Armor. The A100 was reccomended here years ago and i picked one up. I have been very happy with it, works perfectly  for my needs. Havent had a single issue with it at all.

https://avidarmor.com/avid-armor-12-vacuum-sealer-model-a100/

Like everything else, it used to cost less. Iirc i picked mine up from their "open box" clearance section (looked closed box brand new).for about half the current price back in fall 2018..

So from reading online,  weston made the cabelas units which were reviewed very well.

Seems that the newer weston units have been having more issues and qc issues.

That led me to avid armor which is what I'm leaning towards.   The a100 is about $200  cheaper than the weston 3000 and seems that people like it better.

Ost.

We also have an Avid Armor unit after burning up a $50 Amazon special. Well worth the money. If you plan to do a lot of your own food/coffee/MRE/whatever preps, the Avid Armor is a solid choice. There may be better, but this has worked well for us.

Lem products is what we have, works great. https://www.lemproducts.com/category/vacuum-sealing

If you want something to work, don't buy a fucking POS Foodsaver.

1st experience:  Not really bad, had it for 10 years, used very infrequently, finally the vacuum motor wouldn't hold or make a vacuum; junked it.  Not really really a negative due to the time we had it but I still thought for the number of times we used it, it should have lasted longer.

2nd experience:  Borrowed my SIL's FS V850 this weekend to vacuum seal some Buckboard Bacon I had spent quite a bit of time on making.  The V850 does not have a "Seal Only" option.  Hence, it has to run the vacuum to seal one end of an open ended bag.    On the third bag, the vacuum would run but the seal never came on.  This is with virgin new bags, open on the both ends.  I had to use my wife's stand alone sealer to seal the bags on the one end.  I started vacuuming the rest of the bags and I started noticing the bags reinflating before sealing.  Of 9 bags, four sealed nice and tight.  Five bags were shit.

New bags, repacked, tried again.  All failed.

3rd experience:  Asked my other SIL to borrow her vacuum sealer, another Foodsaver (shit!).  Drove 12-14 miles to get it and brought it back.  Sealer sealed two bags then the sealer wouldn't work anymore.  Had to use the stand alone sealer again.  Repacked all the bags to make sure they were clean etc. and did the vacuum sealing.  Went all right except this model you have to feed the bag in a slot in the machine (like a vending machine for a dollar bill), no laying the bag down making it flat then closing the top on it.  If the bag isn't perfectly lined up and flat going in, then you had to fish it in to finally get it to feed.

Two machines, had to drive 12-13 miles and instead of taking 30 minutes took most of the afternoon.  What fucking POSs!

As soon as they are back in stock, I'm ordering an Avid Armor chamber vacuum sealer.  I was planning on buying a Weston 2300, but the price is now +$400 which is pretty close to chamber territory, so fuck it, Buy Once, Cry Once.

If you spend anything over $100 for a vacuum sealer don't buy the POS Foodsaver.  If you spend less than $100, don't buy a POS Foodsaver!

Oh, one other thing:  When the V850 wouldn't seal anymore, I went to their website to get their Owner's/User's Manual.  Nope no manual for this machine.  What kind of company doesn't have User Manuals for a machine they used to make?  A POS company, that's who!

Fucking afternoon wasted because I had to use fucking two POS foodsavers plus a stand alone sealer to vacuum and seal these five bags!  

Fpni if you want a true commercial grade you have to pay for it.
I use a vacmaster now and will never go back to the food saver crap

I know in the initial post you did not want a chamber vac, but if you are sealing lots of bulk food, a chamber vacuum machine will take less time, and the chamber vac style bags are quite a bit less money per each.

For example, a pack of 3 mil 50 count 8" x 12" external style bags will cost you about 12 cents each from a wholesale suppler, they will run about 20 cents or so from a retail store.

A pack of 3 mil 1000 count 8" x 12" chamber bags will cost you 6 cents each from the same supplier.  

The savings in time may be more valuable to you than the cost of the bags.  My chamber vacuum has about a 45 second cycle time at a 99.9% vacuum, It will seal between 2 to 6 bags a cycle depending on the size of the bags.  

The poster with the couple bags in the above pictures, that is about 3 cycles, or about 3 minutes of actual machine processing time including loading & unloading the machine.  It would not include the time packing the bags.

The difference in bag cost wold take about 30,000 to 40,000 cycles to pay for a $ 2,000 minimal duty commercial chamber vac machine (wholesale costs used in estimate).  Not that many in a commercial situation, but again the savings in labor expense will be more important in that situation.

It may not worth it to you, but it never hurts to know your options.

https://www.webstaurantstore.com/vacpak-it-vmc10op-chamber-vacuum-packaging-machine-with-10-1-4-seal-bar-and-oil-pump/186VMC10OP.html

I said fuck it and bought this, based on the price and research.  It works GREAT so far!!!

Got this plus 500 chamber bags on the way!


Fuck Foodsaver and their POS sealers!

I got a mid range Westin. Pretty happy with it so far. Did several deer hogs and lots of ducks so far.

TY OST