Re: Panel saw kit

[mac davis]

>Earlier, I was looking for a panel saw to cut acrylic sheet. I saw this kit.

>Looks like it would be a much lower cost solution. Anyone ever built one? Is >this company reliable? >Thanks >

I haven't built that one, but have made 2 panel saws in the past... they can be as simple as a sheet of plywood with a frame and a couple of pieces of pipe with a skill saw mounted on it.. and very accurate..

We used to build office "hot file" holders and could never get the lumber yard to cut the shelves square, so we took a day and built our own panel saw..

mac

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[BG250]

I was considering building the whole thing myself as well. The pipe is a good idea. I just have to figure a way to make a glide the saw can run on smoothly down the rail (pipe). The acrylic blade may be the most expensive part of the whole thing! bg

[makesawdust]

I've been toying with building one when I set up my shop in the ne house we are building. I looked closely at the one at my local hom depot, and it looks like you can use u-bolts with a bunch of washers o it - these would ride over the pipe. I was considering turning th washers on a pen madred from that high density slick plastic (can' remember the initials for it), then cutting them to thickness on bandsaw

-- makesawdust

[jeff]

Yep, I made it. Here is my reply to the original post on 1/7/05:

I made this one:

is a little cheaper and works well for me. The removable wings are handy, and it folds back against the wall and only sticks out about 6". I also have another friend who made the same one. Together, we problably made about every mistake possible, so if you decide to go with the same plans, I can probably tell you what not to do.

The main issue seems to be the track that the panel rests on and slides on while being cut. My friend told me that his was a little tough to push through, and even with the rabbets had a tendency to gather sawdust. So I had the bright idea to mount skateboard wheels instead of the wood strip his uses. I have yet to get them all perfectly aligned (for a number of reasons) and am thinking of redoing it and going with a wood strip with teflon on top. If you're interested, I'll look around and see if I can find the plans.....

Jeff

[bridger]

I used that method of building a cheap linear bearing for a project once. I used a heavy Ubolt and some kind of nylon spacers from the little bin drawers at ace hardware. it worked fine.

[mac davis]

it was a LONG time ago, but I seem to remember using muffler type U bolts with the nuts on the saw base side and slices of teflon tubing covering the U bolt (saddle bracket?) where it slid on the pipes..

I don't think that the track of the blade was adjustable... I think we had a fixed fence/slide on the bottom and sort of a miter fence to set the width...

mac

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