Harvey Ambassador vs Alpha Bandsaws

[Greg Berlin]

I’ve been looking at both the Harvey Ambassador vs the Alpha and for the life of me, I can’t figure what makes the Alpha worth $1000 more than the Ambassador. Does anyone have experiences either? I want to upgrade my bandsaw and I’m highly considering one of these.

[Dave Mills]

I have the Alpha, and like it. I have not used the Ambassador to compare, though. The differences seem to be that the Alpha has: 15"wheels instead of 14", 4" deeper table, nicer fence & rail system, polished chrome knobs.

Depending on sales, I suspect you can get the price difference lower than $1000, but I haven't looked at their pricing in a while. I think they now offer the Alpha without the Titanium top, for example.

[Greg Berlin]

Did you use the stock blade that came with it or did you upgrade and which blade did you end up going with?

[Dave Mills]

The stock blade worked fine until I started resawing some oak logs. At that point it started not cutting straight anymore. I replaced it with a Lennox Trimaster 1/2" 3 tpi blade which has been working well. I also have a Lennox 1/4" 6 tpi blade, but don't used it as much as the 1/2".

[Joe Jensen]

I do not know either machine. But price difference could also be due to rigidity of the frame and therefore the ability to tension a blade properly. The bigger one is nearly 100 lbs more. I had a Laguna LT16HD which was manufactured by ACM, an highly respected Italian maker. It struggled to tension a 3/4" blade. Both these saws looks a light like the lighter version of the ACM. I'd ask around on the forums about how wide a blade they can tension. I now have a Felder FB540 which is a 21" version of the heavier ACM saw made by ACM. It can tension a 3/4" resaw blade correctly but not a 1" wide blade. When makers show the blade width specs they are showing you how wide the blade guide can handle but not what it will tension.

The Harvey 14" Looks like their version of the Laguna SUV14. Those have been around for years. Maybe search the forums for users experience with tensioning blades on the Laguna?