Table Saw recommendations

[Charles Wiggins]

There's a good outfeed table in an issue of family handyman that I want to make but it requires 4 sheets of oak plywood which'll cost me about 200 bucks and so she's fighting me.

For most shop furniture, any flat plywood of consistent thickness will suffice. Hardwood ply is better. That said, such a critter can be hard to locate in the wild. Usually, you have to go to a hardwood dealer. Most of the stuff in the BORGs, even the hardwood ply is crap, but if you're near a Home Depot check to see if they have PureBond plywood from Columbia Forest Products. It's better quality than the other stuff they carry and usually cheaper than the good HW ply at the lumber yards. If home Depot does not have it the Columbia website has a Where to Buy locator.

[Kent A Bathurst]

[/B][/URL]

Unfortunately Amazon is asking almost $1900 for the G1023RL and $1800 for the G0690, really stretching my budget..........I especially don't want to have to buy another table saw in a few years

Cry once.

Used is a good choice, if you are willing to undertake any issues that may pop up. the new one comes with a 1-yr warranty, and Grizz' rep for standing behind their products is, overall, pretty solid - though you can find a few people that disagree.

Where in the Atlanta area are you located?

[Jim German]

Have you actually looked into selling the gift cards? They sell on ebay for very close to their face value, you could try selling them on CL to avoid the Ebay fees. I'd offer that guy $900 in gift cards for that Delta.

[Benjamin Brown]

Cry once.

Used is a good choice, if you are willing to undertake any issues that may pop up. the new one comes with a 1-yr warranty, and Grizz' rep for standing behind their products is, overall, pretty solid - though you can find a few people that disagree.

Where in the Atlanta area are you located?

I'm in North Atlanta near Mall of GA. Fortunately I drive an F250 so at least I don't have to make weird arrangements to get it to my house.. Although my tiny wife won't be useful getting it from the truck to the basement =D Hah guess I'm gonna be knocking on a neighbors door if I go this route

[Benjamin Brown]

Have you actually looked into selling the gift cards? They sell on ebay for very close to their face value, you could try selling them on CL to avoid the Ebay fees. I'd offer that guy $900 in gift cards for that Delta.

Yeah eBay fees are rough. If I sold a $500 gift card for $490 (which is very possible for some reason), I would net $441 after eBay fees and $427 after Paypal fees. Ouch. That's losing about 15%.

Now if I could do $500 for $475 on CL that could be really good for me, and I am kind of leaning that way now. But I imagine that there won't be a lot of people buying $500 worth of GC's in one go, I'll probably have to meet a bunch of $100 and $200 people... why can't anything be easy =D

[Cary Falk]

Here is a solution <$1500. I would buy it in a heartbeat over a hybrid. There are mixed opinions on the granite top but it wouldn't bother me. I have the Grizzly G1023RL and love it. I have several Steel City tools and never had an issue.
http://www.amazon.com/Steel-City-Too...saw+steel+city

[Benjamin Brown]

Here is a solution <$1500. I would buy it in a heartbeat over a hybrid. There are mixed opinions on the granite top but it wouldn't bother me. I have the Grizzly G1023RL and love it. I have several Steel City tools and never had an issue.
http://www.amazon.com/Steel-City-Too...saw+steel+city

The lone review is a little scary - anyone else have any feedback on this saw?

[Cary Falk]

I had to laugh at the review. A retired engineer that can't assembly a tablesaw without instructions. Really? I check alignment out of the box because I don't expect anything to be to my standards. News flash, All extension tables are made from wood.

[Mike Cozad]

Well I have its hybrid brother, the Ridgid 4511, and have been happy with it. I like that I don't fight rust issues. It stays aligned and is solid. The only complaint I had was with the stock fence on mine. It had a 2 piece rail that would flex when clamping the fence down. I replaced it with a shop fox fence. Its been a very good saw. Mine has less power than the one on amazon, but I would pull the trigger on it if I were in your horrible position of having $1700 in amazon gift cards....

I have been seriously considering their granite jointer because I don't have to worry about rust....

[Kent A Bathurst]

I'm in North Atlanta near Mall of GA. Fortunately I drive an F250 so at least I don't have to make weird arrangements to get it to my house.. Although my tiny wife won't be useful getting it from the truck to the basement =D Hah guess I'm gonna be knocking on a neighbors door if I go this route

Mall of GA is "North Atlanta" ??? It could equally be called "West Athens" or "South Gainesville"

Me - I is just off Peachtree, near the intersection with Lindbergh.

What we would call "Atlanta-Atlanta"

Mebbe connect sometime...........

[rudy de haas]

hi:

I just bought the Canadian version of the G0690 saw after looking long and hard at alternatives including the G0715. The saw is great - rock solid, quiet, nearly vibration free. The only problems I have had with it are: first that the Cdn manuals are terrible (but downloading the Grizzly ones fixed that) and second that the riving knife doesn't quite work with a freud thin kerf blade. On that basis I'd recommend looking at the 690 - it's $1,735 including delivery to your shop floor on Amazon and you can get the other stuff (upgraded fence, longer rails, better blade) as you need them.

I won't use mine to cut sheets, but it's easy to make an extension cabinet to let you do this - and even better to get a track saw for rough
cuts in plywood.

I looked carefully at sawstop. It's nice technology on a reasonable saw, but its great value comes from reducing insurance and related costs for people giving shop classes. You're not their market: sawstop's appeal is to people paying to protect themselves from the idiocies of others, not to people paying to protect their own body parts from their own idiocy. No shop tool is safe - but if you think you're a thousand dollars worth of likely to hurt yourself using a G0690, I'd suggest getting a small hand saw instead.

[Barry Linkiewich]

I'd grab that Unisaw for $800. Certainly better than a Chiwanese knock off.

This is the way I'd go, find a nice clean unisaw locally and either sell some gift cards or buy it with gift cards if the seller is willing.

Benefits are more saw for less money, not paying to ship it and you get to test the saw!!
New saws should not have problems but sometimes they do and who wants to carry a cabinet saw up and down the basement stairs more than once?

And just think, a unisaw for ~$900 leaves lots of money for upgrades, lumber and blades.

[Mike Holbrook]

I have cut lots of sheet goods. I have had two different table saws in the last thirty years and hated cutting sheet goods on them. I had the Inca woodworkers saw many years ago but had trouble getting blades dado sets etc. Then I bought a General Contractors Saw adding a Bessie type fence and extra long arms. I thought it would be easier to cut large pieces with the extension arms. Now I am trying to get rid of the General saw too. The table saw takes up way too much shop space for the amount I use it. I use older hand miter boxes and saws for small pieces. An electric chop saw for cutting up large amounts of lumber and a track saw for the big pieces.

I love the Festool saw, table and guides. I find the Festool tools more versatile to use than a table saw and much better for a solo woodworker trying to cut large pieces. One person trying to guide a sheet of plywood through a table saw comes close to being a futile act in my experience. It is much easier and more accurate to take a small saw and guide to the large board/sheet. If you spend double the budget on table saw extensions, work supports....for my money you still end up with a slower, less accurate way to cut sheet goods. The Festool table allows you to do most of what you can do on a table saw with a Festool saw. A few jobs may be a little slower on the Festool table but in my world more are faster with the Festool saw. I work in two different locations (home & home business) and it is easy to fold the table up, put the Festool saw in it's box and move them to where I am working. There is even a Festool hand truck for moving them up & down steps, in & out of trucks...I am much more comfortable with the Festool saw in terms of safety too.

My shop now takes up three rooms in the basement I am finishing. Even with all the room I have, my table saw takes up too much space. It winds up being more of a work station for me than a saw and the Festool MFT is a much more functional work surface.

[Jim Andrew]

You won't go wrong with the Grizzly 1023, it is built in Taiwan, which is where the other premium machines are built. Have heard of no issues with that model. You would probably be fine with the used Unisaw as well, I bought a new one in 05, have had no issues with it. Would think that Amazon gift cards would be almost the same as cash, if buying used.

[Viking Mountain Tool Works]

I sell on Amazon. Amazon takes an average of 22% off of the top on everything I sell (which includes delivery). That would be $378 on an $1,889, so I can see why Grizzly would need to charge more. Amazon sells more then the next 10 E-retailers combined so a lot more E-sellers are using them as an additional sales channel.
Scott