Festool 30 day return

[peter gagliardi]

I unfortunately missed my return window. My brother said the strobe makes him feel like he is going to have an epileptic seizure. It doesn't quite affect me that way.
I do generally agree though that the machine is a bad piece of engineering!
Cuts ok, but you sure gotta work and think too hard for it!
Still needing a manual wrench to close the blade jaws down to the blade is just plain dumb.
Bosch has had spring loaded jaws for about 15-20 years now. Why festool can't get that figured out is beyond me.

[Marc Burt]

Didn't realize the carved needed a wrench for blade changes. That is crazy. My old trion has the (what I would've called) standard spring lever clamp mechanism. The strive light looks ridiculous to me. The problem with mine is the blade is too far back from the front of the saw so that the housing of the saw itself hides it from view. It's not bad on a straight cut because you can use the pointer on the foot...but who makes straight cuts with a jigsaw??

[Dave Zellers]

No- blade changes are very simple, no tools needed. The allen wrench is needed to adjust the guide bars to a thicker or thinner blade.

[Randy Heinemann]

When considering Festool tools, I learned that you need to determine if the tool is, in some way unique, compared to the rest of the market. For example, the Dominos are unique and, while expensive, they are, to me, worth every penny - accurate, easy to use, extremely flexible for joining, and essentially dust-free. Festool sanders are also great and unique in the sense of the superior dust collection. I love the CT vacs also because they have, as far as I'm concerned, the best suction on the market along with really helping to keep the air cleaner. Also, routers . . . What makes them unique is the superior dust collection and the fact that you can locate the center of the router bit via markings on the router base (and a couple of other unique features).

When you get into jigsaws and drills, I'm not sure that, for everyday use, their products are that much better and not necessarily unique.

So, if you are buying Festool (great power tools by the way), just pick the ones that have the unique features you need in your work. Just my opinion.

[Jim German]

The Carvexs (along with the Kapex) are generally considered to be one of the low points of the Festool line. They're good but not really worth the money. At the other end of the spectrum are the Dominos, the sanders, and the track saws. Those are really the best products from Festool.