Just got a new compound mitre saw from Sears Hardware.
I had a 10" Hitachi, its old. Been banged around and dropped one too many times. For rough cuts, framing, etc its still plenty good enough, but its just not accurate enough anymore for finish carpentry work. The lovely Mrs_Bob is lining up some projects for me to tackle, several of which include some extensive trim work. So I figured that I'd start the search for a saw. Not a super fancy saw. Just a saw that is good enough for me, a mid-range saw for a weekend warrior who uses it on a couple nice projects a year.
So I looked at some Hitachi saws yesterday. Mine served me well. They seemed to be about the same as what I have, probably not as wobbly as my old one. Figured I'd try something different. Looked at some BOSCH saws, but nothing was under $429 and I had a mental target of $250/$300 in my mind. Looked at some junk stuff and didn't even consider it.
Today I looked at, and just bought, a Craftsman for $239 + tax. 12" Sliding/Compound. It was on sale, $90 off. So it was listed at $329.00. It has a nifty laser feature too. Should do what I need, and because it has the 'sliding' feature it will cut some bigger wood than my old one, which occasionally frustrated me with its lack of capacity.
Its still a fairly basic saw. Not much fancy. Direct instead of belt drive so its only able to tilt to one side. Not super heavy duty so I wouldn't want to throw it into a pickup bed and let it bounce around. But I'm thinking that unless I drop this thing a few times it will last me the rest of my life. Or it should!
I had a 10" Hitachi, its old. Been banged around and dropped one too many times. For rough cuts, framing, etc its still plenty good enough, but its just not accurate enough anymore for finish carpentry work. The lovely Mrs_Bob is lining up some projects for me to tackle, several of which include some extensive trim work. So I figured that I'd start the search for a saw. Not a super fancy saw. Just a saw that is good enough for me, a mid-range saw for a weekend warrior who uses it on a couple nice projects a year.
So I looked at some Hitachi saws yesterday. Mine served me well. They seemed to be about the same as what I have, probably not as wobbly as my old one. Figured I'd try something different. Looked at some BOSCH saws, but nothing was under $429 and I had a mental target of $250/$300 in my mind. Looked at some junk stuff and didn't even consider it.
Today I looked at, and just bought, a Craftsman for $239 + tax. 12" Sliding/Compound. It was on sale, $90 off. So it was listed at $329.00. It has a nifty laser feature too. Should do what I need, and because it has the 'sliding' feature it will cut some bigger wood than my old one, which occasionally frustrated me with its lack of capacity.
Its still a fairly basic saw. Not much fancy. Direct instead of belt drive so its only able to tilt to one side. Not super heavy duty so I wouldn't want to throw it into a pickup bed and let it bounce around. But I'm thinking that unless I drop this thing a few times it will last me the rest of my life. Or it should!