I'm what I'd call a "prosumer" hobbiest. I self-perform a lot of very involved home projects and I can foresee myself stepping up my game and getting into light cabinet making. These projects are bordering on something a contractor would take on, but I'm only a homeowner. As an example of a project that I going, I attached a picture of our cabin that I'm building.
I currently have a Bosch 10" portable table saw. It's a good saw for what it is, but I've been exceeding it's capacity and would like to upgrade to a cabinet saw. I'm looking for a saw that will complement the Bosch and I'd like for it to have more capacity, a larger table, a better, longer fence and a really good square. I like old industrial machines because they meet all of these criteria, are affordable and will outlast me. Without question, I want it to be able to rip a rough sawn 4" timber. I'm assuming the saw would be 3 phase, but I don't have 3ph so I'd run it on a VFD. 5hp VFD's are getting expensive so I'd rather have a 3hp saw. 7.5hp and over is off the table - unless it was single phase.
I'm thinking I'd like a saw in the 12-14" range, but I've noticed that many of these saws are arbor saws and their cut capacity is quite poor. Especially when compared to the price, weight and difficult in moving the unit. For example, my Bosch has a max 45 depth of 2.5" and a max 90 depth of 3.125". A Northfield #4 with a 16" blade will cut 3" at a 45 and 4" at a 90. That's a huge blade for only 7/8" increase in depth. This is exceptionally disappointing because the big cabinet saw will have a large arbor and expensive blades. Plus the saw will be hard to move and will need other upgrades such as guards. I've checked other brands (Greenlee and Delta) and they're all arbors with a comparable depth of cut. At this point I get frustrated and give up. Are there any options for a quality, 40+ year old industrial belt driven cabinet saw?
Do I even need something this good or is a 10" unisaw good enough? There's a 12" uni close to me for $850 and it'll do everything that I need for a good price. It's just not what I want...