Saw for chipboard floors etc.?

Machine Mart also has real shops in many towns. Yes, Screwfix has a few trade counters but they are very thin on the ground by comparision. Can you handle the goods at a screwfix trade counter like you can in Machine Mart or a shed?

That doesn't work in practice, at least not on my jigsaw. Something to do with the length of stroke vs the length of the blade. The OP doesn't say whether he's laying new flooring or cutting into existing. In the former case any old £30 circ saw will do. It's one of those tools where cheap is ok, unlike jigsaws.

I think you'll find that there are now *more* Screwfix trade counters than there are Machine Mart shops, Screwfix have expanded their trade counters very rapidly over the past couple of years.

OK... maybe I should have added the rider "thin on the ground round here" B-) The SF counter distribution must be very uneven.

The nearest SF is Gateshead, MM have a branch in Carlisle. Why have SF branches in Gateshead and North Shields and Sunderland (all within 15 miles of each other) when to the north up to Edinburgh and the entire other side of the country from Glasgow down to Lancaster (160 miles) has none?

Ive still got and sometimes still use mine

Ah! the crimean surgeons leg remover saw

While I accept that this may well be a well engineered piece of kit, entirely suited to the things it is designed for, I do like the web- site hype: "No job is too big" ... apart from those that need more than 12mm depth of cut!

Thanks all! Well I've used the drill+tilted jigsaw trick and I have a corded circular saw but I ended up with a few bent/broken jigsaw blades, a cut phone cable and far too much sawdust for anyone to be happy, particularly when it comes to lacking x-ray vision, lottery luck and all that...

Never heard of the Fein before but I looked it up on the web and lo and behold, once the wife saw a youtube clip of a US woman try (and fail) to cut her own hands ("as seen on TV!") she said "even I could use that!" So I took that as authorization to order the "Fein Multimaster TOP" :-) . Not received it yet though, and wife doesn't know yet...!

So looks like the circular for the long floor cuts, and the Fein for the short runs. Stay tuned...