If you have a room full of skirtings, then it's time to shell out and buy a Multimaster.
If it's just door frames (maybe you can lift the skirtings) then you can do this quickly enough by hand. A Japanese-style pull saw is easiest to use in this position, but they _really_ don't like to encounter nails (one nail is quite possibly a dead saw). You could do it easily enough with no more than a Happy Shopper tenon saw though.
I wouldn't use any powered saw other than a Multimaster or a dedicated floor-fitting circular saw. Reciprocating saws don't go anything like low enough and biscuit jointers are too high for most floorings. I'm also not a fan of using biscuiters for other than plunge cuts. They're not designed for it and you're left trying to mis-use a saw by sliding it sideways while the spring is fighting against you. This is getting unsafe.
1.15mm plus 3mm is 18mm thats high enough cut for a BJ
2.You dont drag the BJ along you do two plunges on the architrave and chisle of the bottom piece after you have cut through the wood as you would do with a FM.
Estimated time with a BJ with minimium effort on one piece of architrave...
The multimaster is slower (although in practical terms for this job not that slow) cutting than a BJ, but it is certainly not cumbersome.
You would guide the blade against a bit of upturned flooring. Typically I would use a general purpose narrow ish blade and make two or three plunge cuts to pcomplete the job for each jamb. You can also cut square edges right up to adjacent skirting etc.
Perhaps there should be a caveate there. The lack of precision and accuracy is a result of there (usually) being no mechanism to guide the blade. In this case however, you would be using a bit of flooring to set the exact cut position. As I said in my original post, it would not be usually be my tool of choice, however it does have the advantage of being it only meathod I can think of that would cope well with a jamb that is nailed to the floor.
You will note it also says (under example uses):
"Freeing a door frame upright from the floor that it was skew-nailed to, when the nails were fully home and the frame was held firm above. Using the flexibility of a 9" blade to enable a cut to be made flush with the floor, under the jamb." - this was not a line I invented, but an anecdote from someone who had done this.
The tool itself is anything but flimsy - the thing that strikes you the moment you pick it up is just how solid it feels. The blades however vary in robustness and really need to be treated separately:
Take sanding for example, since sanding pads seem to last rather better here than when used on an ordinary detail sander. Things like the carbide rasp are also very long lasting.
Of all the accessories, the ordinary cutting blades are perhaps the most vulnerable. They are fairly fine toothed and hence you need to be careful not pushing them too hard since they need time to clear swarf. You will also need to watch for nails, or going right through the frame and hitting masonry since this could take the edge off a blade. In the case of a segment blade, all is not lost however since you can just use another part of the blade. The danger (to the blade) comes when making more substantial cuts where there is a temptation to try to cut faster. For example it is a very good tool for lifting T&G floorboards with minimal damage - you can cut through the tounges, and make very fine cuts across the top of a joist, but you need to take it easy (I did manage to shatter a lump off a HSS segment blade doing this once - fortunately there was enough blade left to finish the job)
The carbide or diamond edged blades seem to last well and are much more forgiving.
It is a very versatile tool for getting you out of situations that would be very hard by other means. Recent examples include chopping of a section of 40mm solvent weld waste pipe where the cabinet and other pipes resulted in only one side of the pipe being visible, and there being no easy way to get any other type of saw in there. A quick plunge cut with a general purpose blade[1] solved that. Another similar cut was used to trim of the bottom of some metal conduit buried in a wall - just exposed enough of the conduit at the cut location and plunged a hacksaw blade into it.
[1] This was a blunt blade with a good many of its teeth missing - the result of an accidental plunge too far through a wood frame into a lump of concrete that ought not have been there. However even knacked blades will continue to cut, although they get a bit hotter in wood.
Thanks to all. I have now ordered a Fein Multimaster with a segmented depressed blade. I decided that this would be the most versatile tool, given that I will certainly use it for many other projects in addition to the immediate one of cutting the door frames. This has been most useful. Thanks again.
You won't regret buying it. Brilliant tool, use mine all the time. In addition to "normal" jobs you can use a knackered blade to neatly cut box cut-outs in lathe & plaster without disturbing the surrounding lathe/plaster.
15mm+ is reasonable for hardwood flooring, but most of us encountering this problem are doing it for laminates that are thinner than that, too thin for a biscuit jointer.
If you're just doing the architrave, then maybe. I certainly wouldn't like to do a whole skirting by repeated plunges (or by dragging).
I'm so sorry for you. Maybe more effort and it'll last longer?
I bought my fein supercut on a whim after reading here that they were good. I didn't use it for several months, first job was my neighbour's new kitchen, he had a piece of cornice to shorten in situ, right at the ceiling, I was a bit cautious as I had not tried the supercut before, but in moments I had made a cut so neat and precise it was amazing. since then I have only used it to cut floorboards above joists and it makes an almost invisible cut! very impressive tool of which so far I have only scratched the surface of its abilities.
Damned expensive for a whim though! The Multimaster is pricey enough, but I couldn't afford a Supercut.
Has anyone used both? Is there really that much difference?
That's the trouble with them, they're always best at this sort of odd job that nothing else can touch, and it's nearly always other people's problems they get used for. I've never really _liked_ my Multimaster. It's great for fixing boring, annoying things, but I never get to make anything _creative_ or particularly satisfying with it. Handy thing, but it's too much like work.
I got my supercut off ebay, brand new, unused for less than a multimaster would normally be. I must admit that I love tools though, and can put it down as a business expense. The more I use it the more I like it.
It does, I used to use a circular saw, set to a suitable depth, but in comparison that is like using a hammer and chisel, compared to the job that the Fein Supercut does.
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