Saw Stop Contractor's Saw

[Hank Knight]

I just got a good look at the Saw Stop contractor's saw. The local dealer has one on the floor. Man, that's a nice saw. Saw Stop applied the same approach to the contractor's saw they applied to the cabinet saw: heavy and very well built. It has cast tables - not pressed steel, and a heavy extension wing. The base is heavy and solid. The fence is very nice and works smoothly - like on the big Saw Stop. All in all, a very nice saw. It should be, it retails for $2,100. I've been trying to make up my mind to trade my Unisaw in for 3 hp cabinet Saw Stop. I really like my fingers and I figure a Saw Stop is probabaly the best insurance I can get for them, but it's a lot of money, even with selling my Uni.

Hank

[jason lambert]

I saw one as well looks nice but the one I saw had the stamped steel wings. Not so nice, Get the cast iron wings unless you are moving it alot. the roller base was also nice much larger wheels than the normal base which is a improvnment. The internals, quick changed riving knife, break, adjustnments looked similarto the cabnet saw. Looked pretty nice still not sure how I feel about the motor hangin off the back though.

[Peter Quinn]

Looks like a nice "contractor's" saw. I particularly like the optional job site cart for mobility. But seriously, $2100 for a contractor's saw with a 15A motor? That must be for really expensive high end contractors. That would look great next to a new KAPEX!

I guess I'm asking does a $2100 contractor's saw have much place in the market? Will or can many actual working contractors justify that expense given the alternatives? Would insurance companies be willing to reduce WC insurance premiums for guys providing these for their crews?

I only paid a few bucks more for my PM66, and believe me its a good bit more saw than that one (though not very portable). Some of the saws I've seen guys use in the field these days are some real frightening pieces of work though. Be interesting to see how this one does.

[Geoff Barry]

I think the market will be a bit bigger than contractor-types. I'm a hobbyist, and I'd love a Sawstop. But anyway you slice it, $3500-4000 is just too much for me to spend on a saw, especially when I can get a perfectly good grizzly or steel city cabinet saw for $1100-1200, and a used saw for even less. It's not that the Sawstop isn't a nicer saw, it's that occasional hobby use can't support the price for me. I once saw an article that claimed the Sawstop mechanism should add a couple of hundered dollars to the price of a cabinet saw, and I'd be willing to pay that much more for such a saw. However, Sawstop apparently has been selling its cabinet saw as fast as they can make them, so the price is unlikely to come down anytime soon.

From their perspective, though, that leaves an untapped market of folks who want a Sawstop, but for whom $3-4k simply is too much. So the contractor saw is a good move for them. I can envision paying $2k for a saw (though I won't be anytime soon ), so now such a saw would be in the running if I ever step up from my current saw, even if it only is a fancier contractor saw. So I think this is aimed as much at the hobbyist types who want the Sawstop technology, but who can't afford the price of their cabinet saw, as it is at actual contractors. I do wish it were a hybrid, though. A choice between the aforementioned cabinet saw, and a hybrid with the Sawstop technology, even with an $800 price delta, would (for me) tilt fairly easily toward the hybrid. An $800 price delta between a cabinet saw and a contractor saw is probably goes the other way, even though I'd really like to have the Sawstop tech. But I'd still have to think about.

[jason lambert]

Geoff the one thing you are over looking is this saw stop is $$$ for a contractor saw but it also has the nicest features, probably better features than most cabnet saws. Nice table cast iron wings, quick change riving knife and guard, etc. Plus it is really stable before you look even look at the saw stop feature. I did not get a chance to see it run, so I don't know power and how smooth it is. I think this will really appeal to the tool guroo/hobbiest. But I do aggree the premium is high for just the saw stop technology.

[Dave Bureau]

I may not lower your comp rate but it might keep it from going higher. I had a guy fall 3 rungs high from a ladder and broke his arm. My rates went up $10,000 a year for three years. if the saw has 1 save, it will pay for itself 10 x over.
Dave

[Ben Rafael]

$2100 for a contractor saw seems insane. My big complaint with my contractors saw is the useless dust collection. Unless they found a way to make the DC as good as that on a cabinet saw then the price is way too high.
I'd rather save some money up and get the sawstop cab saw, even if I have to save money for a few years.

[peter de tappan]

The grizzly GO661 has riving knife, inboard motor, and under table blade shroud with dust collection hookup and costs $821 delivered to your door.
Seems to me the target audience for the Sawstop is high school shop classes for which the attendant liability exposure would justify an $1300 safety device on an $800 saw.

[Hank Knight]

Seems to me the target audience for the Sawstop is high school shop classes for which the attendant liability exposure would justify an $1300 safety device on an $800 saw.

Peter,

My dealer here told me that his biggest customer for Saw Stops is the public school system. I, personally, think that's great.

Hank

[Shawn Honeychurch]

Just saw the new Sawstop contractors saw retailing for $1450 up here on Vancouver Island in BC CANADA.

[Peter Quinn]

Just saw the new Sawstop contractors saw retailing for $1450 up here on Vancouver Island in BC CANADA.

Really? At that price point it starts to make sense.

[Steveo O'Banion]

The grizzly GO661 has riving knife, inboard motor, and under table blade shroud with dust collection hookup and costs $821 delivered to your door.
Seems to me the target audience for the Sawstop is high school shop classes for which the attendant liability exposure would justify an $1300 safety device on an $800 saw.

Yup, much cheaper than a lawyer!

Steve

[Greg Pavlov]

So I think this is aimed as much at the hobbyist types who want the Sawstop technology, but who can't afford the price of their cabinet saw, as it is at actual contractors. I do wish it were a hybrid, though. A choice between the aforementioned cabinet saw, and a hybrid with the Sawstop technology, even with an $800 price delta, would (for me) tilt fairly easily toward the hybrid. An $800 price delta between a cabinet saw and a contractor saw is probably goes the other way, even though I'd really like to have the Sawstop tech. But I'd still have to think about.

I may be wrong, but I think that what we are seeing is a very clever marketing strategy.

I believe that Mr. Gass knew that if he came out with a saw, schools and various businesses would pretty much *have* to buy it: imagine a kid losing 2 or three fingers on one hand using a Brand X saw, and a court case where it comes out that the school could have purchased a less-dangerous (SS isn't "safe," it's simply less dangerous than other TSs) saw?

At the same time, Mr. Gass, I am sure, knew that he would start out with relatively low sale volumes. SO he developed/had developed a saw that was somewhat more expensive than the run-of-the-mill products in the marketplace, but a very decently-built one to at least somewhat justify the premium price. With such a product he gained some volume while at the same time assured a reasonably decent per-unit sale and, ultimately, profit.

It's a very well-thought out strategy, but it really doesn't do much for most hobbyists, since it's too expensive for most. So out comes a "contractor saw," something that schools and non-construction businesses are not likely to buy, thus preserving the market for the upper end offering, but priced at or even above the hybrid saw level, but not *too* high to drive away many hobbyists.

My suspicion - tho again, I could be wrong - is that we won't see a SS hybrid for at least another year or so, because such a saw probably will appeal to many schools as a cheaper but viable alternative to the $4K big brother, thus knocking down its sales. Eventually there should be a hybrid SawStop, once the development work has been paid for, the brand's well-entrenched, etc. .... about two years from now (delivery, not announcement date)?

[Steven DeMars]

I may be wrong, but I think that what we are seeing is a very clever marketing strategy.

I believe that Mr. Gass knew that if he came out with a saw, schools and various businesses would pretty much *have* to buy it: imagine a kid losing 2 or three fingers on one hand using a Brand X saw, and a court case where it comes out that the school could have purchased a less-dangerous (SS isn't "safe," it's simply less dangerous than other TSs) saw?

At the same time, Mr. Gass, I am sure, knew that he would start out with relatively low sale volumes. SO he developed/had developed a saw that was somewhat more expensive than the run-of-the-mill products in the marketplace, but a very decently-built one to at least somewhat justify the premium price. With such a product he gained some volume while at the same time assured a reasonably decent per-unit sale and, ultimately, profit.

It's a very well-thought out strategy, but it really doesn't do much for most hobbyists, since it's too expensive for most. So out comes a "contractor saw," something that schools and non-construction businesses are not likely to buy, thus preserving the market for the upper end offering, but priced at or even above the hybrid saw level, but not *too* high to drive away many hobbyists.

My suspicion - tho again, I could be wrong - is that we won't see a SS hybrid for at least another year or so, because such a saw probably will appeal to many schools as a cheaper but viable alternative to the $4K big brother, thus knocking down its sales. Eventually there should be a hybrid SawStop, once the development work has been paid for, the brand's well-entrenched, etc. .... about two years from now (delivery, not announcement date)?

Can you say "Custom PM 2000" . . . .

[Cary Swoveland]

I may be wrong, but I think that what we are seeing is a very clever marketing strategy...

I'm not so sure, Greg. I think Steve Gass is truly on a mission. If he were just a financial sharpie, I think you'd see evidence of corners having been cut in the design of the Sawstop. I find none. I think he's actually from the "let's do it right" old-school. I'll bet adherence to that creed has bumped up costs and lengthened time-to-market. Yes, they've been quite successful so far, in part due to sales to schools, but perhaps it's due less to a clever marketing strategy than to an ingenious, well-designed and well-built product, which, safety-wise, has no competition.

Cary