Porter Cable Compound Miter Saw With Twin Laser 3802L Opinions?

Rick,

I bought one. Nicely made saw. The laser was nice, but the switch was enough of a pain that I took it back. It was a rocker switch, but it was real uncomfortable to push and hold. It has to be held to work.

Joe

snipped-for-privacy@texasnet.no.mail.here wrote:

You can get the Delta for around $255 right now from Amazon

So, how much was the PC??

John

Then you got one with a bad switch. It does NOT have to be held to work.

Charlie Self "Political language... is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind." George Orwell

Does that mean they are not identical then?

Other than the blade and a $40 higher price tag I could find no difference.

It's a poor saw and I have no idea why you dared trust your own judgement to buy it.

Smartass.:) Usually I do a bit of research before investing in a tool, but in this case I saw it, I bought it. It was an impulse purchase. That's the reason for asking here/now before I set it up. Accuracy is what I'm looking for, something seriously lacking in my 10" Craftsman.

I would be interested in the answer to the accuracy question. I had a Craftsman CMS which became a job site saw rather quickly. Noticed that when one moves the saw off 90deg, it is no longer perpendicular to the table. Same problem with a much later model Ridgid that had been brought to a job site. Amazed another couple of old farts that had never noticed that "feature".

mahalo, jo4hn

I have the Delta version, the PC model is identical. Either saw can be offered with a carbide blade as an upgrade from time to time. The list prices are the same but the discounts on the saws vary from time to time. All things being equal I would go for whichever is cheapest after whatever discounts apply to you and ditch the blade it came with regardless of whether it is carbide or whatever.

The saw usually comes with an extension fence & table to the left of the blade. The extra room is handy if you don't have a mitre saw table (which I don't yet) but otherwise its not much point.

Mine came with the carbide blade but the cuts it made never compared to the ones I got on my table saw until I replaced the Delta blade with a Freud Diablo. After that the cuts are almost as good as I get on my table saw with a Woodworker II.

The laser lines help speed up a lot of tasks, the first thing I used it on was building a set of handrails for some outside steps. Saved several hours in marking &ct. If I need to do something that is really accurate I do some test cuts to work out exactly where the blade is relative to the kerf but thats only necessary if you have to be accurate to better than 1/16 and the thickness of the laser kerf starts to matter.

If you have to hold the laser switch in to operate then the saw is broken. I leave mine on all the time so that it serves a double purpose telling me that the saw is powered.

Don't you need the extension to fasten the higher fence on the left side?

What is a good 12" blade worth $$? This is my first 12" saw.