This week I drove to the Felder office in Delaware to pick up a new band saw I ordered. I wanted to both transport my new saw and take advantage of the opportunity to meet the folks at Felder. Because it was such a hectic round trip from Virginia to Delaware in a day I didn't get to spend any time with the Felder Staff but I hope to remedy that in the coming weeks.
The idea of a shop without a table saw has been discussed here many times and I have decided to give it a try. In order for me to give up my table saw I would have to have a pretty serious band saw that I felt could handle every aspect of the work I do in my shop. Like so many of you I have owned several band saws over the years starting with a small three wheel table top Craftsman to the 18" Jet band saw I have been using for several years now. Although I have been very happy with the Jet saw it doesn't have enough throat capacity to take the place of my table saw so I decided to upgrade.....hopefully for the last time. I should also mention that I have a panel saw that I use to break down sheet material, these days mostly long sheets of Corian.
My research here at The Creek led me to Felder based on the number of positive comments here. My second reason for selecting Felder is that they are a sponsor here and I believe that supporting our sponsors is in our best interests. After a long conversation with Rich Williams I decided on the FB 610 model, it is the largest saw in their product line that is 220 volt single phase and will fit in my garage door. The 610 has a five HP motor and a 22" by 30" table. The saw weighs in at about 800 pounds.
I picked the new band saw up on Wednesday and unloaded it by myself on Thursday. Friday I completed making all the adjustments and installed a plug on the cord. It was late when I started the saw for the first time, Jackie and I had scheduled to have dinner with Jim Becker and his family at 7pm so I only had a few minutes to run some test cuts. The first was a piece of scrap plywood and the second a piece of 1/2" Corian. Even with the stock OEM one inch blade the cuts were effortless and smoother that I ever expected. I hope to be able to give the new band saw a serious workout this weekend and provide more information about its performance, for now there isn't much more I can say except that my initial reaction to the new saw is WOW.