Table Saws

SpitfireIV

Howdy guys,

Looking for a small table saw for a small workshop, havent got that much money to fork out at the moment so I'm in the 'economy isle' as it where, perhaps almost in the bargain basement :rolleyes:

I need something that I can store away and take out when needed as my workshop is a bit tight on space, but I have a large shelf under my main bench where I can store it.

I've been looking at various 10" table saws and as far as I can tell they are a much of a muchness, just different colors and different branding! I know the old line 'you get what you pay for' and in reality I should be handing over four or five hundred euro for a decent table saw, but, for now I cant really afford to do so, maybe I could...........maybe, if the table saws I was interested in were utterly hopeless.

Anyway, heres the line up:


http://www.rutlands.co.uk/cgi-bin/psProdDet.cgi/F36522



http://www.rutlands.co.uk/cgi-bin/psProdDet.cgi/F36527



http://www.sipuk.co.uk/acatalog/info_SIP01321.html


Basically all I'm looking for is something for light work and making small furniture/craft pieces, I wont be needing it for sheet work. To be honest I've been using an ALDI table saw up to this point and its still doing the job grand, its only a small 8" one I believe but it has done the job, so I'd imagine that any of the saws listed above would have to be a step up and provide me with a little more power for chopping small pieces of hardwood etc.

Thanks in advance for any help or advice


EDIT:

How about this badboy??
http://cgi.ebay.ie/Ryobi-254mm-(10%22)-Folding-Table-Saw-***SAVE-%FF140***_W0QQitemZ360109758428QQcmdZViewItemQQimsxZ20081123?IMSfp=TL081123127001r186

gsxr1

I have a ryobi table saw. Not to impressed by it. It is very cheap and rough around the edges.
Overload start button has to be screwed in to keep it going after 4 months use. Noisy as hell and flimsy.

My friend has a Makita . cost 900. It is beter in every way. smooth and quiet . But cost twice as mine

Fingalian

I also have a Ryobi tablesaw
http://www.ryobi-direct.com/acatalog/254mm_Sliding_Table_Saw.html

like gsxr1 said it is a bit flimsy and noisy. I stiffened it up by running timber braces diagonally from one leg to another, and butt it up against a bench, and use the bench as an outfeed table. It will rip 2x4's no problem. I must make a cross cut sled for it.Still noisy though.

You were saying you are tight for space? well these yokes are the business.

http://www.rutlands.co.uk/cgi-bin/psProdSrch.cgi/@cMobile%20Bases@b::0::user::1,0,0,1::

SpitfireIV

Thanks for the replies guys! Appreciated. Fingalian, I had actually spotted that saw you have after I made my post here, and was quiet interested in it! Do you find the sliding carraige system on it any good? I was just looking at the setup of it, surely to have an effective sliding carraige your mitre fence would want to be nearer the blade, no?

bigstar

have that fold away ryobi one. its alright for small things but its a bit flimsy like the lads say. every time i unfold and set it up the angle has gone off 0 degrees, little things like that. build quality isnt great, id try something else for similar money if you can

SpitfireIV

Well I think ye have succeeded in putting me off the Ryobi saws anyway, well done! and in doing so have drove the amount I was willing to spend skyward :rolleyes:......:P

Anyway, had my eye on a couple of Makita saws now, they have to be a pretty good make, right? Was looking at this one, one thing that seems to be lacking on some of these saws (especially give the price!) is a decent rip fence:


Makita MLT100

Its around the £300 mark (minus the stand!), the cheapest supplier from the UK that I could find it on gave me an approximate quote of £200 for shipping!!!! :eek::eek: Bloody hell, I hope he added one 0 too many.

Well, the search goes on!

Fingalian

CroppyBoy,
You can move the mitre fence closer to the blade as there is another track it will slot into. The sliding mechanism is ok, not great though. 200 to ship from the UK is a lot though, like I bought a lathe off Axminister last year and it is heavier than that Makita and it was only about 40 sterling to ship it.

SpitfireIV

Fingalian wrote: »

CroppyBoy,
You can move the mitre fence closer to the blade as there is another track it will slot into. The sliding mechanism is ok, not great though. 200 to ship from the UK is a lot though, like I bought a lathe off Axminister last year and it is heavier than that Makita and it was only about 40 sterling to ship it.

Hi again Fingalian,

Yeah I was thinking £200 was just a tad on the steep side . Got a quote from another UK company for £45, thats 48 hour delivery, so it'd bring the total to €360 :cool:, just have to wait for another couple of shipping quotes and see who comes out best.

Now please, no one say anything bad about the Makita!!

bigstar

CroppyBoy1798 wrote: »

Now please, no one say anything bad about the Makita!!

well actually. no just joking i wouldnt mind a makita one myself

SpitfireIV

bigstar wrote: »

well actually. no just joking i wouldnt mind a makita one myself

Feck feck feck! Was just about to order the Makita, asked my mom could I use her credit card to get a new table saw, at which point her expression changed and I guessed at that point that she had got me one for Christmas! :rolleyes: Well, not so bad you might think, but........she says she got it in Woodies and it cost nearly €400! Thats all I got out of her, anyone know what type of table saws Woodies were selling(she doesnt know anything about it, just that its a 'table saw')? I hope she didnt get ripped off with one of those over priced generic brand saws, for her sake as well as mine.

gsxr1

CroppyBoy1798 wrote: »

Feck feck feck! Was just about to order the Makita, asked my mom could I use her credit card to get a new table saw, at which point her expression changed and I guessed at that point that she had got me one for Christmas! :rolleyes: Well, not so bad you might think, but........she says she got it in Woodies and it cost nearly €400! Thats all I got out of her, anyone know what type of table saws Woodies were selling(she doesnt know anything about it, just that its a 'table saw')? I hope she didnt get ripped off with one of those over priced generic brand saws, for her sake as well as mine.

wish my ma would buy me a new saw.

I will end up with socks... again.

for 400 euro she would have got somthing nice. If not. take it back and add money to it.

SpitfireIV

gsxr1 wrote: »

wish my ma would buy me a new saw.

I will end up with socks... again.

for 400 euro she would have got somthing nice. If not. take it back and add money to it.

She's bloody crazy! :rolleyes: As much as I appreciate it I hate when she forks out that much for a present, its too much. No doubth there's a hidden agenda, ie after Christmas there's something she'll want made and I wont be able to put her off, damn! :pac:

Cheers for the replies and help again guys, will report back in a few weeks!

ennisa

Hi Croppyboy,
I can't remember the ones that they sell in woodies, I should be in there again before xmas, if I see one I will let you know what it is.

I have the fox table saw that you have in your first post. I bought it from McQuillans in blanchardstown for 165 euro. It was the most I could afford, and they still have them there.
I have never used any other table saw and don't have much to compare it too, it was a bit mean of the shop to sit it beside the scepach saws but given that they started at about 1800 euro it would only have been a pipe dream. The saw itself is OK, just OK. It has a universal motor in it so it is noisy as hell. There are not many that size that would have an induction motor and the universals are smaller, lighter and cheaper. It has a max cut of about 2.5 inches at 0 degrees. I cut hardwood on it all the time. Mostly 1 inch thick white oak, red oak and walnut and it has not had many problems. 2 inch thick wood of the same types has caused it to stutter and chatter a bit but slowing the feed rate right down has sorted that out.
I have had a couple of problems though. The tilt on the saw will not go to 45 degrees, it goes to about 42-43 degrees. Which won't do the job when you are trying to cut long miters. It does go all the way past 0 degrees in the other direction so I think that the tilt mechanism is off by one of the teeth or is just misaligned. I keep meaning to open it up to have a look.
The miter fence has way too much slop in it and it is not a standard size slot. I have tried several ways to make the runner on the miter fence a little tighter in the slot but they don't work long term. (wrapping tape around the runner or using a centre punch to push out the edges ) I ended up making a crosscut sled. And to be honest because there are two mitre slots, one either side of the blade it is actually pretty accurate once you get everything square when you are making it.
You will really need to make a zero clearance insert for when you are not doing angled cuts. This one thing improved the accuracy of the saw ( and I presume any other table saw ) by at least a 1000% Before my cuts would always be a 1/16 or 1/32 of an inch off and i could never count on being more accurate than that. The insert means that I know exactly where the blade is going to cut.
The table of the saw is stamped aluminium and there are two extension wings and a rear extension. The mitre slots do not extend into the rear and it blocks anything travelling past the end of the table in the mitre slot. So I took that off and just made an outfeed table to go behind it using a workmate and two pieces of plywood in a T shape.
The distance between the front edge of the blade and the front of the table is quite short. This means that i don't have much room to make sure that something is flat before I start to move it into the blade, it also means there is not much room to add a feather board. I did manage to add one but it's a bit of a bodge job.
The blade guard attaches to the riving knife at the back of the blade and is very easy to add and remove. It can get hard to see through though and needs to be brushed out all the time. The problem with the riving knife is that it extends higher than the blade, this means that If I want to make a cut that does not go all the way through the workpiece you have to remove the riving knife. This is just an awkward pain as you have to undo 8 screws in the insert ( i have stopped using all 8 screws and only use 4 now ) then use and allen key to undo the bolts holding it in, take it out and then put the insert and all the screws back in again. Some days you never do this, other days I seem to be doing this all the time when I am using the blade to cut narrow slots for box bottoms etc...

The Fence is OK, There was a rubber piece under the fence clamp that came off after the first day but it does not seem to have affected how well the clamp works so I am not sure why it was there. There is a scale built into the table but it is useless. It is in metric only and as I am sure you can tell from this post i work in imperial, for woodwork anyway and does not seem to be registered in any way. I have not had any problems with the fence moving or flexing as I was cutting. I did replace the blade pretty soon after getting it. I got a freud combination blade for about 40 euro ( I think ) and that is much better that what is in there. Aldi currently have a set of their blades that they do in a 2 pack for 15 euro I think, and they should fit this too ( 250mm blade with 30mm arbour/bore)

There is a port at the back of the saw that fits a standard hoover hose and comes in handy for keeping the dust down.

Would I recommend this saw? If I had no more than 160 euro to spend then sure. The next one up that I saw was 300 euro and I could see hardly any difference when looking at them in the shop. But I have little to compare it too and I am afraid to use anybody's good table saw in case I begin to see what I am missing!

Pro's; price, 10" blade
Cons; Noisy, blade tilt problem, mitre slot slop.

I realise that you may have a saw already wrapped up under the xmas tree so a lot of this is irrelvant but i think that some of the things that bug me about this saw are worth looking at when somebody is buying a new one of any brand in this price range, although I do realise that a lot of these things are a result of it being in this price range, so hopefully somebody might benefit from the info.

Enjoy your new saw and have a good Christmas CroppyBoy.

---
Alan
Ireland/Dublin

SpitfireIV

Wow, thats quite a comprehensie review there Alan, many thanks for taking the time to do so!

I forgot to mention in the original post, partly because I forgot, and partly because I'm ashamed of owning it :P I have a 'Power Devil' 10" table saw, christ, what can I say, the thing is a piece of junk, complete and utter junk. Never worked right for me, rubbish mitre fence, a ripping fence that never gripped properly and would move while you were ripping!!:eek: and a throat plate that raised up a few mm above the surface of the saw table!! Enough said....:rolleyes:

I was looking at a table saw in the local '4Homes', it was a 'Kinzo' I believe, but almost identical to the saw you have! I was impressed with it (after having the disasterous Power Devil and the basic Aldi saw) the fence locked good and tight and was adjustable and the mitre fence also had the adjustable, sliding fence. Seemed a nice piece of kit alright.

I asked a similar question over on a UK woodworking forum, about the Fox saws (you'd think that there would be a fair few over there that'd have Fox, or similar saws) but didnt get a single reply, I think its because I'm Irish, or maybe the name 'CroppyBoy' didnt go down too well :P

ennisa

CroppyBoy,
No problem, I have been working in isolation for quite a while as there is not a lot of people that I know that enjoy or do or are really interested in woodwork, they always appreciate the end products ( when i do a half good job ) but they are not at all excited by the process and that is the part that I enjoy the most. I saw a quote ages ago, somewhere on Chris Schwarz's site but I can't remember who the quote was from, that said " the things I make are for other people but how I make them is for me" and that summed up a lot of what I enjoy about woodwork, so, it's nice to finally share.

I did do some searches for info on the fox saw when i bought it but could not find a single thing other than small uk shops like rutlands selling them and no reviews or info other than the sales blurb.
The mitre fence on this does slide over and back by the way there is a T track on the back of the miter fence and a couple of thumbscrews hold it on there so it can be slid all the way up to the blade ( and further as I discovered to my shame )for support. The rip fence can be slid back as well and can also be moved to either side of the blade

I think that fox is a divison of Delta as a lot of the fox tools that I have seen have the words 'made for delta, france' on the boxes.

I did have a power devil cordless drill/driver ages ago, I think that after a week or two it was mostly comprised of duct tape so I am aware of the build quality from them

Anyway I hope all this helps.

Take Care

--
Alan
Ireland/Dublin

SpitfireIV

ennisa wrote: »

CroppyBoy,
No problem, I have been working in isolation for quite a while as there is not a lot of people that I know that enjoy or do or are really interested in woodwork, they always appreciate the end products ( when i do a half good job ) but they are not at all excited by the process and that is the part that I enjoy the most. I saw a quote ages ago, somewhere on Chris Schwarz's site but I can't remember who the quote was from, that said " the things I make are for other people but how I make them is for me" and that summed up a lot of what I enjoy about woodwork, so, it's nice to finally share.

Its like everything else, the meat you buy in the shops or the sliced pan, the ordinary lay man doesnt really know the process behind it :pac: (maybe for the meat anyway that not a bad thing! :P). Unfortunately in recent years I think with the increase in wealth, furniture superstores, imports from the east and IKEA and such peoples expectations of furniture have dropped in some cases, they want it cheap, quick and stylish, MDF, chipboard, etc etc, I'm just wondering have people lost touch with what a true, well crafted piece of furniture is, that is made with love, care and attention. Its like the quote you gave, when I make something I almost form an attachment with it (as strange as that may seem :P) the money is great to get, but to see something go too that you've invested so much time and effort in is a killer too :rolleyes:.

I've just finished my honors degree in Industrial Design, where we were taught that mass production is good, design the next fad, quick and cheerful, but I'm afraid I'm turning my back on all that now and gonna give the furniture making/design a go. I've been messing about with wood in one form or another since I was in my early teens and am finally getting together a half decent workshop that I'm happy with, tis tight on space, but it has character :P (and a newly installed stove :pac:, so I'm happy and warm!). Unfortunately with the economy the way it is, and going to be its not a great time for one to be going out on there own in the furniture/crafts business :rolleyes:

Fingalian

CroppyBoy,
What sort of stove did you put into your workshop? Cheers,
F.

SpitfireIV

Fingalian wrote: »

CroppyBoy,
What sort of stove did you put into your workshop? Cheers,
F.

Its a domestic stove, its about 20 years old or so (looks older than it really is), set me back 200 yoyo's, but to be honest it was worth it, at least I can feel my fingers working up there these winter days , it stops me hording bits of offcuts and brings a bit of life to the shop. Its grand, pumps out a lot of heat with very little wood or coal! Mostly because of the large hood I'd imagine. All she needs now is a coat of stove paint and she'll be looking grand!

aerosol

Thats a fine stove you have there croppyboy:) I built my workshop from scratch and fitted an underfloor heating matt!! toasty warm,having a jacks in it is also a real bonus:cool:

Fingalian

Very nice CroppyBoy, looks toasty. Does that pipe / chimney run straight up through the roof or does it dogleg throught the wall?

SpitfireIV

aerosol wrote: »

Thats a fine stove you have there croppyboy:) I built my workshop from scratch and fitted an underfloor heating matt!! toasty warm,having a jacks in it is also a real bonus:cool:

Thanks aerosol , you did the right thing! As warm as the shop may get, the floor is still pretty cold. The shed is about 30+ years old, its been a garage, a pigeon loft, half pigeon loft half shed and now, a workshop :P. By right I'd want to tear the whole thing down and do a proper job of it, but we'll see how things are next summer .

fingalian, the pipe goes out through the wall, unfortunately the pipes outside are only single wall and I think this is causing problems with the draught, there doesnt seem to be a great draw on the smoke and it backs out when I open the door, not good! :rolleyes:

ennisa

Nice stove croppyboy, Wish I was allowed get one of those for the garage:(
The Chimney needs to stay warm for it to work properly, if it exits the workshop too quickly then it will cool down too quickly it might be that it needs to exit the workshop higher up the wall or through the roof for it to work properly, this is why chimneys in houses usually go up through the middle of the house, they need to stay warm. I think it is called stack effect, or something like that, or maybe it is that stack effect causes the updraft.

When we unbricked the fire place here when we moved in I did some investigation on line about checking to make sure that it was fit to be used and I came across some good info on the placement of chimneys. It was aimed towards the US market where people were adding furnaces to their basements and running the chimney up the outside of the house rather than through the house. This made it very difficult to start the fire and also caused it to smoke out into the room quite easily and this can be pretty dangerous if you end up getting a build up of carbon monoxide from something that you are burning.

I can't find the sites that I did before, should have bookmarked them!! I did find this though
http://www.woodheat.org/chimneys/chimneys.htm

actually I think this is the one I found originally.
http://www.woodheat.org/chimneys/trichim.htm

The thoughts of having a jacks in there would send my girlfriend around the bend, the only time she sees me during the day at the weekend is when I am passing on the way from the workshop to the jacks and back

--
Alan
Ireland/Dublin

SpitfireIV

Well I got a table saw after all, got it Christmas eve in fact, turns out the ma didnt in fact get me a table saw, but a sliding mitre saw (easy to get the two mixed up I guess when you dont know much about them :P)

I went for the Makita, cost me €381 total and thus far I'm pretty happy with it! Nice solid piece of kit, well made (as you'd expect from Makita I guess!). None of the product descriptions I read mentioned it having a sliding carriage, but to my surprise it has which was a nice bonus! Has a good table space and has an extendable right side table as well as an extendable run off table to the rear.

Tis some different compared to the Power Devil and Aldi saw I did have, I feel a hell of a lot more comfortable using a T/S now and its nice to have something with a bit of quality attached to it.

ennisa

From the pics of your workshop croppyboy that looks like a nice saw, no doubt a good bit better than the fox

--
Alan
Ireland/Dublin

pgf5312

Hi People,

What does anyone think of this saw?

Thanks.....:D

http://www.wolf.ie/product.asp?id=001767

aerosol

pgf5312 wrote: »

Hi People,

What does anyone think of this saw?

Thanks.....:D

http://www.wolf.ie/product.asp?id=001767

To be honest I'd say you'll probaly get €165's worth of saw.All depends on what you intend to use it for.......I've never come across the brand before so I'd only be commenting on what I see from the picture.

You can still get a good result from cheaper and poorer quality tools with a little messing,ie improving fence quality,putting a good blade on,always re-checking and adjusting squareness etc
I have several cheap brand tools which do the job I need them for ok but personally I think the table saw is one I'd always try to up my budget as much as poss:)

scooby the dog

i was looking to buy a table saw to make wardrobes for me house had a robyi almost bought then i noticed that when the fence guide was put in place and tighened it was impossible to get to run n line from one end to the other on the same line as the saw blade ,,,, meaning that there was a
2/3 mm difference in width from front / back on lenght of table in line with saw blade
might not seem a lot 2/3 mm but it will cause problems when been acembeled any one else notice this

SpitfireIV

I've heard of 'Wolf' alright before or maybe it was 'Wolf Craft', but I believe they were a German company whom made attachments and such for tools, like pillar drill mechanisms for handheld drills etc.

Looking at that site some of there stuff appears to be rebranded Aldi stuff, or maybe Aldi's stuff is rebranded Wolf gear? :P. Its dearer than the Aldi offer though.


(The guy using that saw is just asking for trouble if you ask me! :P)


I guess what you have to ask yourself is what do you want from the saw? Something that going to give you fine, accurate cuts for the likes of furniture making etc, in hard and soft wood or do you want something to rip timber rough for not so accurate work? If the latter then I'd imagine that saw would do the job alright. I just couldnt imagine it being overly accurate or that well finished, and, I'd bet in the long run you'd wished you'd have saved up a little more and went with a dearer, branded model.

Like aerosol said, if I did get this saw I'd ditch the blade right away, it'd be hopeless and by using it it'd sour your experience of the saw. Get yourself a good freud blade, or even Rutlands do a good Dakota range of blades for a decent enough price.

Looking at the picture of that wolf saw again I see the rail for the rip fence only covers the main table, not the extension?! So basically you have a very short rip width unless you make up a new table for it or buy a new fence system.

pgf5312

Thanks for all the replies..... I didn't want the saw for anything too sophisticated - just rough work really. Having said that, I might get more ambitious once I get started..... As noted, you get what you pay for, so I suppose I should pay more like €300 and get something decent. Any thoughts for this price range and what about availability? Thanks again...:)
PS - are blades interchangeable and pardon my ignorance, as this is all new to me, but what is the "rip fence rail"?

SpitfireIV

Once you get using a TS you'll wonder how you lived without it, and in order to have a good TS experience you'll need quality! In the bench top/small table saw range the Axminster TS200 is regarded as a fine bit of kit for the price, its 100 or so over your budget, but it'd be money well spent............once you can justify buying it of course

http://www.axminster.co.uk/product-Axminster-Axminster-TS-200-Saw-Bench-655467.htm

Take a look at the other TS's on Axminster:
http://www.axminster.co.uk/category-Saw-Benches-207929.htm

As a rule most TS's have a 30mm arbor and are usually 10" diameter (250mm), although that TS200 has an 8" blade so its depth of cut is restricted (its the only bad thing I've heard about this saw). After that then its all down to the amount of teeth, 48, 60, 90 etc, the higher the number the finer the cut.

If you read this thread from the start I was almost similar to yourself, I started out looking at basic saws and eventually kept going up and up in price until i found one I was happy with.

I got the Makita MLT100, with postage from the UK it cost me nearly €400, but it was a good buy and has served me well thus far, only last week I was using it to rip down 18mm chipboard for a shelving unit and it handled it no problem. It has a nice sliding carraige system too thats a treat to use!

ttm

I bought this one recently (Christmas 2008) and have been very happy with it. Not perfect but I paid the seller on eBay 220euro back before chirstmas now its nearly 300euro from the same guy. Would still buy it at the 320euro inc delivery but don't think its worth much more. Two problems with it so far, the guard is useless you can't see the blade if you are trying to cut sheet material along a line and the dust extaction is a bit narrow so that small slices of wood can get stuck in it. I don't have much space, so this one is handy as on a dry day I just take it out in the garden or on the drive to work.