I am looking for a compact portable table saw for some around the house type jobs. I am currently split on these 2 models.
Craftsman Professional 10-Inch Portable Table Saw 21829
Bosch 4100-09 10-Inch Worksite Table Saw with Gravity-Rise Stand
The Bosch reviews say it is built better The Craftsman has a built in router mount. Which I have a router that I don't use cause I don't have a good table.
I am leaning towards the Bosch, but then I need a router table I will need to buy and store. The Bosch route will cost more. Are there any large negatives for either of these saws??
Negatives? Noisy, perhaps too small on both counts. I would go with the Bosch over the Craftsman. The Craftsman may have the router feature but I have never been a fan of sharing my cabinet saw with a router table.
Why is that, Leon? I have built a few saws for myself and others. Starting off with a decent cabinet saw, add a Biesemeier T-square fence and take out one of the extension tables and make it into a router platform. The Bies services both the saw and the router on both sides of the blade/bit. Compact and useful.
Why is that, Leon? I have built a few saws for myself and others. Starting off with a decent cabinet saw, add a Biesemeier T-square fence and take out one of the extension tables and make it into a router platform. The Bies services both the saw and the router on both sides of the blade/bit. Compact and useful.
Becauseeeee, I like to leave my router set up and it can get in the way if I want to have the fence over the router bit. I have a dedicated router table. Additionally my saw is on a mobile base and it moves easily from the extension end and that end would not stay still. The router also takes up storage space under the saw which I use for all the stuff. ;~) Personal preference.
snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com wrote in news:206a6e5d-9877-4ef0-ba7b-7a97cc955605 @8g2000hse.googlegroups.com:
I have the Bosch, and for me it was the best way to go, I don't have a whole lot of space, and with the gravity rise stand, you can fold it up and move it up next to a wall...
The factory settings were really close, and any adjustments are made from -outside- the saw....and it has a riving knife...
The factory blade made for a rough cut, but I had a nice Freud from my old saw ( Craftsman Contractors saw that was just too big ) and once replaced the saw cuts wonderfully...just a pass or two with a smoother and the saw marks are gone....
Bosch parts take FOREVER to arrive and are unorderable after a few years. I would go with the Craftsman, or look at a Delta or Rockwell. You can get parts for any of them pretty easily.
I'm prejudiced because of bad experiences with Bosch portable tools. The tools were fine when they worked, but when they broke, I was without them for weeks while parts were shipped from God knows where. My Rockwell saw is
25 years old and still works as well as the day I bought it.
Sears is a good source for parts.
Regarding the router table feature... My experience is that if I buy a tool with 2 functions, neither function works well. Buy yourself the best saw you can, then build a router table. It's a simple project and a good thing to build for practicing new techniques. Heck, you don't really care too much about how good or bad it looks, so you can use scraps and try dovetails for the drawers, etc. if you want to. If you don't want to practice, just cut it out of plywood and nail it together. Throw some casters on it and away you go. (Use 2 pieces of 3/4" melamine for the top and you're set.
Norm Abram had a nice plan and show on building a router table on the New Yankee Workshop a while back.
Sharing a tablesaw extension table is not a real problem for most of us, and if he's using a portable saw, it probably means space is valuable. Still, I liked the Bosch and its stand, though the Craftsman I tried some years ago was better than decent. Currently, I'm using the Ridgid with its stand, and, IMO, it and the Bosch are about tied for first place.
Yeah, the motors are noisier than those in larger saws, but you go up in motor type, and you go up in weight and size. These are job site or portable saws, and are about 500% more accurate, durable and useful than the old lightweights. For the small shop, they are close to unbeatable.
I know its not one of your choices, but I just orderd the rigid
2400ls. It was 400 bucks delivered. 3 year warranty and the lifetime service agreement. It has the foldup stand, and it seems to be a really solid saw from what I saw at HD...
I just looked at the Ridgid saw this morning and that would be my choice also. As for Sears having parts, they're twice the price of others and they become "obsolete" or "no longer available" quite soon. (try to find a "driver", part number N60057, for a Stanley Bostitch N60FN)
I'm not a big fan of Sears but a Stanley Bostitch N60FN is not a Sears branded product. Bostitch doesn't even list a part N60057 for a Bostitch N60FN. Why would you expect Sears to have it?
At Christmas time, I went to Sears to get a replacement knob for my mother's Kenmore dryer. It is about 45 years old (and still running). I expected to get laughed out of the store. However they were able to order a replacement part. Of course they did charge over $30 (including a $5 order handling fee) for a plastic knob.
And when you paid that much, did they laugh then? :~) Some things are worth the price. I just paid $97.00 when having a tire, with 5600 miles on it, repaired on my 07 Tundra. I saw a bolt sticking out of the tread and Discount Tire offered a road hazard warranty for all 4 tires that came on the truck. A new tire for that truck is about $250. That hole could have easily been over 2" and I would have been buying a new tire.
I bought the nailer at Sears. It was on sale. They did have the part at one time. I paid $40 plus for one. That's why I expected Sears to have it. I learned later that I could get it from Stanley Bostitch for less than $30. I expected Sears to have parts for a Craftsman band saw I once had but it was "obsolete". Sears had an enviable parts system at one time. It's no longer true. (The N60057 has been replaced by part #N60059) I have one on back order. I've been told that the part number changed because of problems with the original part. Not durable enough.
Sears is better about having parts than anyone I know of. My table saw is a couple of months older than me (40 years) and I can order any part that I need for it. Even when an original part is no longer manufactured, Sears will find an alternate and sell that. For example, I can't buy the original handles for blade adjustments but I can buy a new hand wheel that's better than the original part. I've also bought parts for a clothes dryer I had that was 57 years old. On top of that, Sears has detailed drawings and manuals.
As for price, try buying parts for an old car, washing machine, stove or any other durable good. Replacement parts have always been expensive compared to what the manufacturer paid for them. The reason is supply / demand, materials and additional cost of handling small quantities. It's much cheaper to supply 5000 hand wheels to Emerson Electric than it is to supply 1 to me or you.
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