Hi,
I'm probably going to get in trouble for even thinking of buying one but here goes ;)
I can't afford a branded saw, so I was thinking of buying one from B&Q. Looking at some old posts some people love them, some people hate them.
From what I can remember someone said that some saws use blades with a non-standard bore, which makes replacement difficult or expensive. IIRC the Macallister red eye (from B&Q) was a standard bore, which was a plus point.
It also had two lasers one for 90 degree cuts and one for 45 degree cuts? I don't know what you did if you wanted to cut 60 degrees! but people seemed to think the laser alignment was not very accurate. Can it be adjusted?
I've been to B&Q and it looks though they are halfway through replacing these with a new "Macallister laser precision" range. I'm not sure if these are actually a step backwards. I think they only have one laser, not two, now but that may not be a big concern?
I can't find anything about these saws online. Why don't b&q put the specs on their web site or make a special Macallister web site? Looking at the boxes, I thought the bore size of the blade had changed. Why would they do this? Is it no longer a standard bore? (I can't remember what size it was/is, I'll have to read the box again, next time I go). If so, that's a big disadvantage.
The pricing is strange: some of the smaller saws cost more than the big ones. Why would that be? I did think a big saw would be more versatile but I think it weights 20kg and is very bulky to carry upstairs. I think one post suggested getting a smaller, lighter, one to carry about. Do you know the weights of any of the others? What is a good blade size for general purpose use?
I imagine I would mainly use it for skirting board and architrave to begin with.
Why is B&Q's other own brand performance power, even cheaper?
TIA