What brand makes an inexpensive electric grinder, under $200 please.

Just looking to make burger and chili meat. Gotta make a processing area in garage soon to save money, rather than the processor.

Should be a good but inexpensive grinder.

I have had the smaller 1/2 horse one from Cabelas for 5-6 years. It works great if you just do an animal or 2 - year. Making 10-20 lbs of sausage is pretty easy with it. They are around $150 bucks.

and don't look back..... if you wait a month or two they will be on sale.

http://www.academy.com/shop/pdp/lem-8-mighty-bite-grinder#repChildCatid=1251768

This is what we use

Weston makes a small heavy duty grinder for around $120. I think it is a size #8.

Someone was selling one on the classifieds here

whitewing maniac do your research on it. You'll probably wind up with a 1/2 hp unit but that's OK. If you are having to decide between models, metal gearing is the winner, then duty cycle, then attachments.

That's where the homework comes in. Get a list in order and then wait till the sales.

I shopped for a long time. Finally got a good deal on the LEM Big Bite #12, 3/4hp. I've heard too many horror stories about guys burning up the little ones. I spent a little over $300 but I feel like it was worth it. This thing is extremely stout.

Gota agree I got one it grinds faster than I can feed it..One great Machine

If you live near a cabela's, go check their bargain cave. I have a cabela's commercial line stainless 1 hp that I got for around $200. I was looking for a vacuum sealer to use with the 1/2 hp I had bought two days before when I found the 1 hp for same price as the 1/2 hp. Swapped them out and love it!

How often to these things need to be maintained? i.e. Blades sharpened, parts replaced, etc?

I have 2 grinders, both manually cranked, one came from my parents that is over 65 years old, the other is a larger one that is about 40 years old. Either one is more than enough unless you are commercial processor.

I 2nd that cabelas grinder. It's fast and easy. It doesn't bog down at all. You can even grind fat instead of cubing it. I ground a huge hog in 30min yesterday. Throw everything in the dish washer and be done. Very nice.

Bought a Toray years ago as I couldn't afford a Hobart. You can't keep up with it. Ground up the meat from a 2000#+ wild brahma in less than an hour and filled several 100 quart ice chests with packaged meat. It's not hard to clean up but we usually wait until we have several deer to do before we drag it out. Chunk up all the meat first and be ready to grind. It's all over in a few minutes.

Northern Tool has one on sale for $95, plus I had a 10% off coupon in the mail. It's a #12 grinder, and works really good. I grounded over 40 lbs of venison with it yesterday in a matter of minutes.