I have long been an advocate of Forrest blades, recommending them to all of my woodworker friends who had not yet discovered them. I actually own 10 of them which is a fair amount for a non-professional.
Now it seems that every time I send one or two of them to Forrest for resharpening I get really terrible service. First off, they get $20.00 bucks for sharpening a 10" blade. Then they almost always find something wrong with the blade (chipped tooth that I did notice when it sent it to them or a blade they claim is not running true) and they charge additionally for that. Moreover, one usually spends $20.00 on shipping charges for each sharpening. When you are through you usually end up spending more than $30.00 per blade. That's pretty stiff but if their service was prompt I could probably live with it. This time I sent them my blades three weeks ago and am still waiting for them to arrive even though they told them they would be shipped 10 days ago.
I'm really about to reach the point where I start looking for a substitute. Which brings me to the real reason for this post. Are there any woodworkers out there who are former users of Forrest blades? If so, what did you switch to? Are there any other blades which are close to Forrest and what do they go for?
JOe