Hmmm.. Just a Felstool thought / comment...

[Scott Parks]

Got a Festool catalog the other day, spent the last hour reading it front to back. I'm impressed! SOLD! (I think my next purchase will be a sander)

Over the last couple years I have brought home two compound miter saws. With less than impressive results, I ended up returning them both. I was dissatisfied with their accuracy due to motor flex, and blade wandering. This would leave me with slightly curved or angled cuts.

Anyway, enough rambling, my thought was... If you use the Festool plunge cut circular saw with their multifunction table (or homemade station), could you use it as a pricision crosscutting / miter saw to take the place of the CMS? Set it up at as a dedicated station.. Plus you'd have a panel saw and good dust collection to boot! I rarely cut anything more than 2" thick, so the lack of cut depth vs. CMS isn't a big deal for me. Yeah, or Nay??? I'd rather spend money on a good quality [multi-function] tool, than dissatisfied with another CMS.

[Jim Becker]

If you use the Festool plunge cut circular saw with their multifunction table (or homemade station), could you use it as a pricision crosscutting / miter saw to take the place of the CMS? Set it up at as a dedicated station.. Plus you'd have a panel saw and good dust collection to boot! I rarely cut anything more than 2" thick, so the lack of cut depth vs. CMS isn't a big deal for me. Yeah, or Nay??? I'd rather spend money on a good quality [multi-function] tool, than dissatisfied with another CMS.

I think that there are some things that are "more convenient" on the CMS, but will likely use my MFT for a lot of the things that I've been using the CMS for and some things that the CMS absolutely cannot do, like dados in panels. I'll always have my CMS, but at this point, there is no incentive to upgrade it as I was originally thinking about doing. The MFT, ATF55 and OF1010 are a dynamite combination, both for functionality and for dust collection support that the CMS could never compete with!

[Greg Mann]

I agree with Jim here as well, except I may be taking it a step further, in that I don't own a SCMS or even a CMS. Isn't it interesting; in another thread I mentioned that with an MFT and GCSS, I did not really feel the need to upgrade a somewhat limited tablesaw, and now Jim is saying the same thing about his CMS. When viewed this way, these tools don't look quite as expensive as first thought.

Over at the Yahoo User's Group there are several folks who are adamant about not needing a SCMS when one has the MFT and GCSS. So far, I have not been able to disprove that. Crown molding was mentioned as a potential problem. I will be dealing with that sometime this week. I'll let you know.

Greg

[Tim Sproul]

Either you got really crappy CMS's or you're trying to chop in less than a second.

Even the cheap Delta shopmaster CMS will work well if you use it with care.


And I'm assuming you don't install house trim. The Festool table, saw and guides are not exactly high throughput. The dust collection would be the pants off of any CMS, though. I don't knock Festool.....I just picked up a jigsaw, sander and dust extractor today.

[JayStPeter]

I've also considered my need for a CMS. I got a jointech SmartMiter and don't use my CMS as often as I used to. I really only use it for pieces over 4'.
I've been considering getting an MFT (hopefully in the next 6 months or so). At that point, I may rearrange my miter station to make the CMS a "portable" tool instead of a permanent one (or at least less prominent in the shop).
On other forums, I've read that crown molding is one place where a CMS comes in handy over a MFT. I also use mine to cut rough lumber to length before prep. It remains to be seen, but I imagine I will still do this as the setup time for the MFT will probably make it easier to do on a CMS.

Jay

[Paul B. Cresti]

A little background here. I own both Festool products and two Bosch SCMS (one was intended for shop use and the other for field use but the shop one was "retired" since my MM slider showed up). A part of my business is installing Architectural trim both custom and "standard" I would be lost without my Bosch for installing Crown and other trim for that matter. The combination of the Bosch SCMS and their digital angle calculator can not be beat for both SPEED and accuracy.