Along those very lines I bought one of these earlier:
I'll have to say it actually feels pretty solid / substantial. What it's like to use I'll let you know soon. ;-)
I think it's quite special and therefore quite expensive (compared with alternatives etc).
The ones you see in steel stockist's run quite slowly and I have seen used with soluble oil (when it was cutting something substantial).
T i m
I can't resist :-)
Why would I buy anything from a water closet? :-)
Dave
Didn't spot a depth stop on that Lidl one - where is it?
Might be tempted if it has one, for the uses you mention.
My mistake (or my bad if I were cool). AFAICS its a SMS.
Because its at a rock 'bottom' price?
RAOTFL
Good one Dave.
Dave
Most do seem to have a 210mm blade.
What about this one at Argos, it seems to offer a much longer width of cut?
Aha, that's probably most of the reason - my cheapy one's a 10" blade which is what, 254mm. It'll handle a 4" (102mm) cut though, just - so there's only about 54mm of dead space where the spindle is, rather than the whopping 80mm that this saw seems to have...
cheers
Jules
Looks like a better spec too, in that it's *definitely* a compound mitre and not just a mitre. OK, it's 1500 watts instead of 1700 - but that should be adequate.
If you want one for the weekend, use the on-line stock checker, and reserve one if it's in stock. Only one Argos branch anywhere near me has any stock - and they've only got one. I've reserved it, but I'm a bit worried that it'll be one which all the world and his dog have previously bought, and returned.
width != depth
That Argos one still only has a maximum 65mm depth of cut. It does have a marginally longer slide (width of cut) though 310 v 205mm.
Looking at the two pictures the Lidl jobbie has a boss that is where one would expect the 2nd axis of rotation to be for a CMS, so maybe it is SCMS?
I think it's this one:
It happens that Roger Mills formulated :
It doesn't actually say compound mitre, are you sure?
They do have one described as a compound mitre at £39.99, but its length of cut is only 120mm. The job I have in mind for it needs the full 300mm.
The link didn't work, but it seems to be a Sliding Mitre Saw BT-SM 2050
The product manuals are at -
Well, if my understanding of "compound" in this context is correct, yes.
You can cut compound bevels - which are at an angle to the axes of the wood in two different planes. Firstly, you can rotate the cutting assembly through +/- 45 degrees in plan view - which *all* mitre saws can do. *Then* you can tilt the blade about a horizontal axis. [The text calls one of these "miter" (sic) and the other "bevel" - and defines the max cutting capacity for various combinations of these].
That's one downside with mine - I can only tilt the blade between 0 and +45 degrees, not -45 to +45 degrees (it'll still do +/-45 in 'plan' view, of course). Every once in a while it's a bit of a minor inconvenience (I've got enough bench to handle about 8' either side of the saw, but of course it doesn't mean it's not bench that's often cluttered with crap on one side :-)
Maybe they're always like that though - but if not it's a little niggle I'd try to avoid next time I go to purchase one.
cheers
Jules
Dunno - haven't studied them in great detail. Presumably the blade tilts in a way which raises the motor? The thought occurred to me that if the motor tilted downwards, it might foul on the workpiece.
As you say, you can achieve the desired effect by turning the workpiece round, but that might not always be convenient. Anyone know whether there are any saws out there which *do* tilt both ways?
Having said all that, I can't think of too many occasions when I'd want both tilt and turn at the same time. Nevertheless, the tilt function on its own would be needed for cutting mitres on skirting board etc. - and it would be useful if the saw could be tilted both ways.
Don't you just turn the board over?
Could do - but you then have to measure where the mitre needs to come to on the opposite face of the material. Slightly inconvenient, but do-able.
I usually use a stop at the other end, then you can cut either side and end up correct.
Yes, it would for longer pieces - I usually find I'm doing angled cuts right at the end of a piece, though (hence wasting as little material as possible), so I'm not sure that the motor would foul there (I'll have to take a look later - maybe there still wouldn't be much scope for tilt without fouling the saw bed)
No, I haven't found many, and of course for tilts in a single direction it's much more convenient to just pivot the saw around the vertical axis.
Even something restricted in one direction, like -30 .. +45 or whatnot, would be more useful than 0 .. +45.
Some of the more expensive ones might do that, actually, because ISTR there are ones around where the motor isn't on the saw arm, and presumably there's a belt or shaft drive up to the blade.
cheers
Jules
A cautionary tale:
Last year I bought one of the rather embarrassingly-named "B Square" motorcycle helmets from Lidl, for 49 quid; the full-face type with a hinge that allows the whole of the front face and visor to be raised. It seemed like a bargain and was very comfortable to wear. Two days ago however I heard a 'snap' as I put the helmet on and discovered that one side of the hinged front face was loose. After a careful ride home, I checked it again and found that the steel(?) screws/bolt holding one side of the visor hinge to the main helmet body had sheared, leaving the bolt stub inside the body and rendering the helmet pretty much fit only for the bin.
Normally I'm pretty impressed with the quality of Lidl stuff but this had me thinking what good the helmet might have been if I'd had a spill.
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