Recommendations for suitably powerful jigsaw ?

[Neil Ross]

Hi folks,

I'm going to be cutting quite a lot of heavy softwood (redwood) in curved shapes. The problem I anticipate is my 'budget' jigsaw will not be up to the task, so I'm looking for recommendations for a more suitable beastie.

The thickest I'll be cutting will be 2" (50mm) but in the past I've found that the budget range find this fairly difficult and tend to create a slope in the cross section of the cut (or is that just me and my questionable technique?) .

I'm hoping to find one that will eat up the 2" thickness *and* help me to keep things straight/curved (you know what I mean).

Any recommendations from personal experience?

Thanks Neil

[dom]

Yesterday I was cutting 100mm thick softwood with my Bosch GST135. Many people also recommend the Makita pro models.

[Andy Hall]

If you want to do this with a jig saw then the three manufacturers to look at are Festool, Bosch (blue GST series) and Makita.

If you are going to do this job regularly, then depening on dimensions, a bandsaw could be a better alternative, especially with thicker material.

[John Rumm]

Probably not your technique...

I have one similar to:

will cross cut an 8x2" in about 2 seconds with pendulum action on its middle setting! Cuts straight and smooth.

As Andy said though, if you are doing lots of it, a bandsaw may be more appropriate.

[Neil-R]

dom, Andy and John, Many thanks for the recommendations. Yes, I agree a band saw would be the best tool but some of this stuff is fairly hefty to wriggle through a band saw and also I would hope to be using it in future on site - I'm confident a good jigsaw will fit the bill and be more useful to me in future. It's high time I ditched the one I already have so no it's time to upgrade. Having read up as much as possible on the various models I'm leaning towards the Bosch GST135 BCE. It does seem to be a good tool and most likely to be the one for me.

Again many thanks for the advice, Neil

[Andy Hall]

OK. Well if it's site work, forget bandsaw, way too heavy.

If you currently have a "DIY grade" jigsaw (whatever that is) then you will be pleasantly surprised with what the GST and others can do in terms of controllability and accuracy.

Even so, any jigsaw does have its limits, so depending on the finish you are seeking, you may still need to cut on the waste side and do a final sanding. Choice for that obviously depends on scale and application.

[The Medway Handyman]

Makita 4350

My makita cuts 38mm worktop or a 6x2 like it isn't there, pretty much square cut.

[The Medway Handyman]

I've tried notching fence posts with my Makita & long blades. OK across the grain, wobbly along the grain. Which way were you cutting & what blade?

[Ed Sirett]

It's worth searching fr a supplier (even ebay shops) as I got mine for under £100 whereas most were offering for £120-£130