Review Detail

Where to start on how much this saw sucks. The big thing is right out of the box my angle read out is off. Works sometimes and others times not. I have to slide it around from one side to the other and back often many times for it to settle in to something that seems consistent with the manual indicators. I am told this can be fixed with calibration. The right fence does not slide. The lights are weak to the point I ask why bother. The cord is short. The clear plastic guard is extremely light bending in nature so that you can’t see through it to judge a pencil line, meaning you have to lift the blade guard because it doesn’t even have slots to see through. they decided to limit the travel of the sliders so that the saw does not take up as much room, which sounds great but it means if you have marked your stock at the back edge you HAVE to sight down the blade judge where it is in relation to the pencil mark because the power head does not slide past the point where fence meets table. This means the thicker the stock the further the blade is away from the back of the stock during the alignment with the pencil mark process. This affects accuracy be assured, as your judgement is now more heavily relied on, not to mention the extra hassle and time this takes. And time is a big thing to not waste if you ask me. The dust collection they say is the best and brag about this point, but if you are cutting thick stock ever, which means often if you do allot of custom stuff which I do (slabs and small beams) this goes for even stock on edge. Then the dust shroud hits the stock meaning you can’t even cut such stock without removing the shroud. Remove the shroud though and you have absolutely no dust protection as there is no vacuum adapter. How retarded. There is no hold down clamp. There are spots for one meaning you have to go buy one as an afterthought. More money. The lock for the slide assembly is so close to the mounting assembly that it makes you wonder if it was made for Smurfs as large hands are just simply in the way. The depth stop is sloppy as they rely on a rubber o ring underneath the stop. Rubber squishes guys, so if you plan on using this say for dadoes in anything make sure it you are careful not to cut too deeply by using too firm a pressure on the power head. I really do not know what people see in this when they give it good reviews. There is so much to learn from and update. The last thing I have to say is how lacking the customer service is. I have spent hours and weeks on the phone and awaiting replies to emails. Finally I talk to someone and they tell me I can send it in and they will recalibrate the angle read out. Yeah, a brand new saw that is so poorly designed that it shouldn’t even be sold to craftsmen let alone my blind dog, that I am expected to send it back and be without the saws I stupidly sold when I bought this one. That’s right; they don’t even have a loaner program, which means I will have to buy another saw to use while this one is fixed. I think not. I will just use the manual indicators like always have. Do not get this saw, you will regret it if you do anything other than framing. Oh, and another possible fear. The LCD is always on when the saw if plugged in. No off on switch with it, so my guess is you may want to unplug it every night to prevent early burn out.