Woodworking Reviews at LumberJocks.com

Jawhorse (Sawhorse) from Rockwell, the Handy Helper

EricWrights — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 15:31:53 GMT

I do 99% of my projects alone. Believe me this one is a Lifesaver! I’m always a bit skeptical of infomercials and typically believe gimmicky tools are much more trouble than they are worth. But, thinking about all the times I’ve risked cutting boards that were unstable and chasing odd shaped items across my bench with my surface grinder, I kept thinking this thing might just be worth a try so I finally decided to order one.

In the closed position the unit stores easily and takes up little floor space. Its clever folding design sets up and breaks down in a matter of seconds. Its first job was disassembly of a small electric motor to change bearings. The jaws worked great to snugly hold the stator of the motor while I removed the through bolts and end bells. It then firmly but gently held the armature in the vertical position while I pulled the bearings. It is amazing how much control you have over the amount of pressure you apply. I also used it to hold a circular saw I was repairing(talk about an odd shape) and then to hold some boards I was drilling pocket holes in. In all instances it worked flawlessly and much easier, quicker and safer than the way I would normally do those jobs.

Bottom line is I can see I will be using this tool for pretty much every project I have going. A little expensive but it will quickly pay for itself in time saved and improved safety. If you do a lot of work alone like I do, you will find the Jawhorse is an incredible helper.

Here are some pictures I have found on the internet when I was doing some research about it.

Book: Shop Class as Soulcraft: An Inquiry Into the Value of Work

Jim — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 23:42:29 GMT

Well, I’m not as good a writer as Publisher’s Weekly so I’m going to defer to them for this description of this book. Also there’s a review of it in the June 22, 2009 issue of the New Yorker magazine.

“Philosopher and motorcycle repair-shop owner Crawford extols the value of making and fixing things in this masterful paean to what he calls “manual competence,” the ability to work with one’s hands. According to the author, our alienation from how our possessions are made and how they work takes many forms: the decline of shop class, the design of goods whose workings cannot be accessed by users (such as recent Mercedes models built without oil dipsticks) and the general disdain with which we regard the trades in our emerging “information economy.” Unlike today’s “knowledge worker,” whose work is often so abstract that standards of excellence cannot exist in many fields (consider corporate executives awarded bonuses as their companies sink into bankruptcy), the person who works with his or her hands submits to standards inherent in the work itself: the lights either turn on or they don’t, the toilet flushes or it doesn’t, the motorcycle roars or sputters. With wit and humor, the author deftly mixes the details of his own experience as a tradesman and then proprietor of a motorcycle repair shop with more philosophical considerations.”
— Publishers Weekly, Starred review

As woodworkers I think most of us know the joy of creating something with our hands. It’s nice to read such an intelligent description of where that joys comes from, and the ultimate importance of our ‘work’.

G0513X2 17" Bandsaw

Don — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 03:04:28 GMT

This will be kind of a “Duel” review….One over the G0513X2 17” Bandsaw, and one over Grizzly’s customer service.

I received the Bandsaw several weeks ago, but because I had been so busy….I did not have time to even un-crate it. It stood in the corner of my shop for about a week and a half before I could even open it up and start to put it together.

I opened up the saw, looked it all over….no scratches,dents,blems etc..so we’re off to a good start. As I looked through the directions to make sure I had everything….I noticed I could not find a bag of hardware. Now there is VERY little assembly to do on this saw…basicly four bolts for the bed…four bolts for the fence….and one knob/crank handle that needed to be added…(This knob raises the blade guide)....the bolts I could have lived with out…but I needed the knob/crank handle.

Now I have never really had to deal with Grizzly about a problem like this…and was afraid that since the saw sat in my shop for almost two weeks before I noticed the missing parts…they would give me some trouble.

No such thing…I called Grizzly’s customer service, told them what happened and why it took me so long to call them, all they said was..”We are very sorry for the inconvenience, what parts are you missing ?” After I told them what was missing they said “It will be shipped out tomorrow !” ...two days later the missing parts were sitting on my front porch. Not bad imo !!!!

Now on to the saw…. As I stated earlier…about eight bolts and one crank handle is all I had to put on. As far as adjusting all the settings….again, VERY easy…..very easy to follow and precise directions. I really did not know what to expect when it came to adjusting this saw….I have a great old Rockwell bandsaw that runs like a dream….but it is a cranky old thing…some days it is a breeze to adjust a new blade…and other days it takes forever and just will not hold a adjustment.

This G0513X2 17” Bandsaw took me about 30 minutes to adjust everything…and that was only because I was not used to this saw. Now that I know where all the different adjustments are and how to use them…it only takes about five to ten minutes to change out blades and to reset all the rollers to fit the new size blade….I was ALL smiles !!!

Accessory’s and options ?? IMO this is a very well thought out saw, it has two different see through windows…one to see what your blade tension is at (Has a nice very easy to read scale for this) and another to watch the top of the top wheel to see how your blade is tracking. It has a large easy to use lever to release blade tension…and all of the adjusting wheels to set the tracking, raise or lower the blade support etc are large and easy to use.

The cast iron table is large and very easy to adjust and true up to the blade. It has cast iron wheels instead of aluminum and once I had the blade set proper ran smooth as silk and with no vibration. It also comes with a over sized re-saw fence that attachés to the existing fence in about five seconds.

Power ??? The largest lumber I have resawn so far is 12” wide mahogany…...Once I got used to the saw and how to set up the fence….I made several dozen 1/16” thick slabs, all came out smooth as glass and it never bogged down a bit.

When I had done these same cuts on my old rockwell….lets just say I would still be out in the shop pushing the wood through.

It also has a very neat “Rack and pinion” for the cast iron bed that works very well.

This is a GREAT bandsaw…plenty of power, plenty of nice options, good dust control…that I would highly recommend to ANYONE…it also has free shipping.

The ONLY negative thing I found was “One” adjustment for one of the bottom blade rollers…all of the rollers are locked with allen head bolts/screws…all work very well and all the allen wrench’s are included. But one allen head under the bed toward the back….could not be adjusted with a allen wrench, when you but in the short end of the allen wrench you do not have room to turn it up and down with out the long end hitting the bed or the saw body….and you can not put in the long end because it is to long and hits the saw body and goes in at a angle…this is a easy fix by just swapping out the allen head for hex head bolt.

I have seen several reviews about members not even using the blade that comes with it…and I agree…when I ordered the new saw I ordered a full set of Timber wolf blades to go with it. I am sure the factory blade would do fine for some light sawing….but there is no way it would stand up to any serious hard wood…so I didn’t even try it…but put on a new timber wolf during the adjustment and set up stage.

Here is a close up picture of it

And in this one you can see (Kind of lol) how big the re-saw fence is.

Move over Big Foot...The Rockler All-Terrain Mobile Base Rules the Shop!

allenworb — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 02:02:37 GMT

I recently broke down and dropped some cash ($180) for this new product from Rockler. My shop space is limited and I have little space to move around my table saw.
The parts are gigantic, and almost over the top, but in a good way. The wheels, thickness of steel and bolts are all over-sized. Assebly was so easy, there were no instructions…
It can accommodate for just about any standard sized piece of small shop equipment, but it offers some extension sets (longer metal bars) to allow for larger pieces.
The hardest part of the whole process is coming up with a strategy to assemble it under your machinery and avoid as little lifting as possible. I used some 2×4’s to acheive the lift needed to get my SawStop table saw (contractors grade) up onto the supports.
It boasts a maximum capacity of 800 pounds. After that, you probably shouldn’t be moving a piece of equipment that big.

It’s performance is amazing across concrete, in fact, my 4 year old son can move it as easy as his own bike.
The locks are rock steady, and it feels like there has been some reduced vibration in the saw’s performance as a result of the heavy duty 5” urethane casters.

I highly recommend this for anyone that needs to regularly move a table saw, or other large tool around to make your shop space bigger.

Rikon Belt/Disc Sander

Wayne Precht — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 20:26:08 GMT

I came into a little money horse trading some rough oak, so I decided to spend it picking up a couple of much needed tools. The first one is a Rikon 6”x48” Belt / 10” Disc sander. It was on sale at Woodcraft, $50 off. Even though Springfield is a bit of a hike, this weighs a ton, so shipping would have been eye-wateringly expensive. This tool filled a gap in my lineup. Previously I had a little Delta 1”x42” Belt / 6” Disc sander that was just this side of useless for furniture making. About the most important thing it did in the last couple years was clean up some pegs for the Glastonbury project. I really needed a large disc sander to clean up end grain especially and some minor shaping. The large belt has turned out to be even more useful than I thought.

I won’t go into the features; you can look it up for that. This was a bit of a flyer since I have not heard anyone talk about this brand. I have seen it at Woodcraft for years and figured they wouldn’t still be carrying it if it’s junk. Plus the Belt/Disc sander on my “wish list” costs more than double and would involve the aforementioned shipping, or a trip to PA to pick it up, about the same considering gas.

Step one, getting it into the shop and out of the box. I believe I that mentioned it’s heavy and it is; it’s 110 lbs in the box. So humping it down the stairs was a chore. In retrospect, I should have taken it out of the box on the tail gate. The sander has a little flip up handle on the left side (just visible in the photo) and a padded hand hold on the other end. It would still have been heavy, but more manageable than a large box with no hand holds. Anyway, once it was down and I got it out of the box (also a chore), it was time to look at the setup project.

Fortunately, it comes almost fully assembled. All I had to do was install the PVA Disc and then the table for the Disc. The manual was of the usual unremarkable type from these Far East firms. Bad B/W pictures and text you need to read a few times to get the jist of it. The table was a bit to get started as the table is heavy and the sander is hard to flip up on its side, but that’s where you want it to screw together the table supports. I also had to assemble the miter gauge that I will probably never use. Its “ok”, nothing amazing, if I really need one, I will take the Incra off the table saw.

The code is a little short for my tastes, but typical of machines these days. I moved a heavy duty extension code into range and all was good. Note that this draws around 10 amps though, so don’t use a busy circuit.

Running this is smooth. Those 110 lbs of cast iron comes in handy. There is a dust collection port for a 2.5” Shop-Vac type thing. I am not a fanatic about dust collection, but this is the fine dust you really don’t want to breathe so I highly recommend hooking it up. And the collection actually works very well. Even my poor, abused Rigid 12 Gallon vacuum was more than sufficient to handle the job.

My only complaint is that the belt tracking is a bit more finicky than I expected. It took some noodling to dial it in and it’s easy to get running off a bit. I really consider the belt a secondary item though and it’s not bad, just not up to par with the rest of the excellently put together machine.

Rockwell Sonicrafter Does a Great Job

EricWrights — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 20:15:27 GMT

I had looked at the Fein Multimaster, but couldn’t justify the price.

I bought the Sonicrafter specifically to sand between the rails of a baby crib I built for my daughter.

This tool will see as much use as my random orbital sander! It’s very well made, and does a superb job.

A couple of experiential comments:

1. The tool is a fast worker, let IT do the work for you.

2. The dust collection attachment gets in the way, and is useless.

3. I haven’t found a source for sanding pads that fit, except Rockwell, and they’re relatively expensive.

Overall in terms of price and quality, buying Rockwell Sonicrafter is a win-win decision.

Very little vibration on this little guy

sIKE — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 16:14:57 GMT

As I blogged yesterday my old PC 333 ROS went to the great tool yard in the sky in the middle of my project. I needed something quick so I could finish the project. After looking through the reviews here at LJ’s this was the one my mind was set on. It was $70 at Lowe’s but I got them to honor a coupon from the BORG and got $5 off.

PRO’s

- Very little vibration, unlike the old PC
- Dust Collection was very effective as previously noted
- Nice long power cord – seems to be a Bosch trait as it’s the same for my Jig Saw
- Nice cushiony grip – see Cons though
- The body is narrower than the pad so you can eaisly get up in the edges of your project
- Variabale speed is very nice

CON’s
- The grip is a bit wide for my hand
- The black rubber handle will cause a streak if you are sanding shelves and you raise the sander up and hit the side of the case. Not a big deal as you just sand it out.
- It is a bit heaiver than my old PC

I have to highly recommend this Sander. Gave it four stars as the handle is a tad bit big for an average sized hand. Now I just need to finish using up my boxes of 5 hole disks as this guy uses 8 holes :(

Just another offshore replica?

charlton — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 09:39:23 GMT

Disclaimer
I’ll preface my review with a warning to prospective readers that I can be obsessive about details and my day job entails finding design flaws. This review will be long. If you’re interested in purchasing this saw, you may find value in pouring over the details. Otherwise, you’ll likely be bored out of your mind.

In the beginning it was the 50100…
The bandsaw buying process was a very long and arduous one for me. I’ve always felt that the newer European-style saws to be superior yet the choice of saws with both big resaw capacity (>10”) and a small footprint are pretty dismal. The Rikon 10-325, Grizzly 0457, and Laguna LT14 series are probably the best candidates except none of them are available in Canada! Actually, the Laguna is now available but the pricing, coupled with the lack of standards approval make it less appealing.

I initially set my sights on the SteelCity 16” Industrial Bandsaw but it turns out that saw was relegated to the history books along with the Dodo and finding a store that carried one within a 100km radius proved pointless.

Resigned to the fact that I’d have to settle for one of the conventional cast iron saws with a riser, I chose the SteelCity 50100 14” bandsaw and bought the corresponding riser kit with it. Assembling the saw was fairly straightforward though one of the tapped holes used to secure the saw to the base was poorly executed resulting in a stripped bolt. I installed the riser kit from the get go and put on a Viking 3/8” 3tpi blade. The anticipation mounted as I fired up the saw and to my dismay, there was an unbelievable amount of vibration. I noticed that the included Poly-V belt had a fairly substantial twist to it that I suspected might be causing the vibration. I decided to call SteelCity to see if they would be willing to send a replacement belt and was told that it’s normal and that the twist will resolve itself in time. So I lived with the vibration…hoping with each use that the miraculous day would arrive when the saw would purr silently. After a few weeks, there was no improvement in site and I read in other forums of other people having vibration issues with the saw (also with the riser). I contacted SteelCity again and they graciously agreed to replace the saw with the forthcoming 50130! “Wow,” I thought to myself, “that’s some serious customer service!”

The 50130 arrives…
Turning the clocks ahead 3 months, the replacement 50130 saw arrived from the factory. I was told to keep the base/motor assembly and to package up the actual saw. True to their word, SteelCity came by one day, and delivered the 50130 and took away the 50100 with no questions asked. I had a nice conversation with Terry (the regional sales manager who dropped the saw off himself) and shortly after he departed, it was off to the races once again.

I’ll introduce the 50130 by reviewing what this saw has:

“Native” 12in resaw capacity (no riser kit needed)
Granite table
Granite lower wheel/cast iron upper wheel
Included fence
Worklight
Mobile base
1.5HP motor
Roller bearing guides

It’s a pretty impressive saw on paper and if SteelCity’s reputation is any indication, this saw should be an absolute winner. Let’s see if this is the case.

The Good
The saw’s fit and finish, for the most part, is excellent. The components are all nicely packaged, screws sorted, and the paint job is well done.

The granite components really are quite nice. There is little concern for the table warping or rusting which is good. The bottom of the table is also flat which means clamping things is very convenient. There is absolutely no doubt that the granite wheel yields greater angular momentum because it takes much longer for the saw to stop. If cast iron helps the saw resaw better, then certainly the granite will be better.

The included mobile base saves you from having to purchase an external one which is good. It is, however, a two-fixed, one swivel system so maneuvering requires you to understand how to parallel park a car.

The fixed work light included with this saw is vastly superior to the magnetic base one that came with the 50100. The magnetic version didn’t have enough holding power to keep the light in position most of the time and it had such a large footprint, there wasn’t a whole lot of choice on where to actually mount it.

The saw has a cast 4-in dust collect port which is better than the 2.5-in ports on some of the other cast iron offerings.

The saw is capable of operating at two speeds, 1500sfpm and 3000sfpm. This is accomplished by moving the belt on a pair of stepped pulleys much like on a drill press.

The trunnion on this saw is nice and beefy. One many other 14-in offerings, the table supports are very soft and even applying a moderate amount of pressure causes movement of the table. This is not the case with this saw.

The saw has a quick-release lever for de-tensioning the blade. On the 50100, releasing the tension would allow the blade to be changed whereas on the 50130, even de-tensioned, there is still enough tension on the blade to prevent you from being able to change blades. You must, as a result, crank the tensioner down until the blade is relaxed enough to change.

The Bad
Unfortunately, with all that the saw has to offer, there are some warts as well. In fact, there are many warts. As this saw is based on the venerable design of the old Delta 14in bandsaw, it invariably suffers from some of the same shortcomings. You would think that after 40 or 50 years of continuous “refinement” they’d be able to improve upon the design enough to make the saw feel a little more contemporary rather than like the Ford Model T. Many of the comments that I make henceforth are likely applicable to many Delta copies. Nevertheless, since SteelCity seems like a company that’s willing to try new things and to improve upon existing designs, I’d expect them to pick up some of the low hanging fruit as they pass Go.

The first problem with this saw is that it suffers from usability/ergonomic issues.

Let’s start with the blade guard. The design of this blade guard is such that it mounts to the guide assembly and folds around the front of the guide assembly shielding the user from the blade. Almost all 14in bandsaws have guards this way except for some reason, SteelCity elected to use a guard that blocks all the way to the bottom of the guide bearings. The average human is about 6’ and the usual recommendation is to have the guides set about 1/4” above your workpiece. It doesn’t take long before you realize that you can’t see enough of the blade to guide the workpiece in making accurate cuts (unless you stoop down even lower). With the 50100 riser kit guard, it was “tough luck.” With the 50130 SteelCity “improved” the guard by putting in two small plastic windows to help the user see. I’ve worn glasses the vast majority of my life but these plastic windows make me feel like I need to have corrective eye surgery even with my glasses on. Surely they didn’t think that looking through Coke bottles was going to help the problem any great amount? Not to mention that as you cut, sawdust tends to stick to the plastic and you soon end up with a graffiti canvas…the kind where people write “wash me”.

Fortunately, the little plastic windows are removable though their absence only improves visibility by a fraction. Imagine cutting with tunnel vision.

Next up, the blade guard…again! My PC chassis have been tooless for quite some time. The good news is that the SteelCity is tooless as well, but only for the bearing adjustments. Removal of the blade guard requires the help of your friend Phillip.

A couple of knurled screws (positioned slightly differently, of course) would have made it fully tooless. Of course, no one would ever want to take the blade guard off unless one wanted to change the blade. It turns out that removing the blade with the guard on especially with wide blades (i.e. 5/8”, 3/4”) is extremely difficult. In fact, darn near impossible.

As if changing blades wasn’t hard enough with the nuisance of the blade guard, next up we have the fence and lower door. Observe exhibit A:

The nice fence rail is so long that even with the door wide open (yes, 90 degrees is as wide as it goes), there’s hardly a gap for you to pass the blade through. In fact, for wide blades, it simply can’t be done. Instead, you have to tilt the table (unless you prefer removing the fence rail).

Next up is the lower bearing guides. Everyone knows that setting these bad boys is a test of patience. In the case of the 50130, they’ve decided to push the human frontiers of patience. Observe exhibit B:

This is a photo of the bevel gauge but what you don’t see but really want to see, is the guide assembly that’s craftily hidden behind the knob. That’s right folks, the vantage point from which you are best able to set the bearings is not available. Of course, one could remove the knob (there’s another one at the back anyway) except:

that lower blade guard will pretty much hide whatever the knob doesn’t. Of course, you can peer down the hole in the table but, trust me, it’s dark down there.

A more minor quibble has to do with the work lamp and the quick release lever. SteelCity chose to use a quick release mechanism that rotates almost 180 degrees. That’s fine. However, the lamp is mounted along the trajectory of the quick release lever. The following photo doesn’t have the lamp mounted but the two screw holes are where the lamp would mount.

At least the lever doesn’t hit the mounting bracket of the lamp but you typically have to move the lamp out of the way to engage and disengage the quick release mechanism. Also, the lamp requires its own plug. It would be very nice if it could just tap its power off of the same line feeding the saw.

As I mentioned earlier, the saw has a nice 4” dust port to suck up all those sawdust baddies. Here’s what it looks like on the inside:

That little red bracket is supposed to help direct dust into the dust port. Frankly, I find the dust collection on this saw to be pretty bad. I think the dust port is too low and should be positioned closer to the lower guide assembly. Positioned where it is, dust is inevitably going to get trapped between the blade and the tire before it makes it to the dust port. Oddly, dust seems to always find a way into the holes in the lower granite wheel:

Going back to the guides, I fail to see why the guide bearings have to be adjusted fully independently. The eccentricity I can understand but the amount of thrust should somehow be locked together. Now I’m not claiming that the Ridgid BS1400 is a better saw but even it has a micro-adjusting screw that moves both left and right guide blocks in tandem. This is especially true of the lower guide assembly where it’s hard to see how far out the left bearing is relative to the blade. I won’t even complain about the fact that the thrust bearings do not have micro-adjusting screws (that are present on even the lowly BS1400).

As with most 14in bandsaws of the cast iron variety, the 50130’s guide post is not perfectly parallel and in lateral plane with the blade. This means that every time you move the guide up or down, you can expect to have to readjust the bearings. It’s annoying but it’s not a show stopper and I’ve stopped worrying about this in light of the “Ugly” issues below (which are of far greater concern).

The Ugly
It’s time now to embark upon the truly nasty aspects of the saw. The following section will be long and detailed and if your stomach has already turned, then I suggest you close your browser down now. Otherwise, proceed at your own risk.

Perhaps the biggest failing of this saw (at least this particular instance of the saw) is that the tolerances throughout are all over the place. We’ll start with the most minor issue. The blade guard that houses the blade on the left side of the saw is made of plastic and is kept in place using two bolts. It’s simple enough except the piece of plastic clearly isn’t straight. A blade under tension, though, is close to being straight so naturally a straight line drawn through a curved channel is bound to result in some tangential intersection (if you’re unlucky). Looking closely at this picture:

you’ll notice that the blade within the guard is awfully close to the side of the guard around the power switch area. Stick a straight edge against the guard:

and it’s clear that the guard is bowing to the left (which is why the blade is riding so close to the right wall). I’ve tried loosening the bolts, pushing the guard straight while tightening down the bolts again in hopes that it would retain its shape but to no avail. Now I’ve stuck a couple of shims between the power switch and the guard to make it straight.

To the more serious issues now….

As I stated above, the upper guide assembly has zero ability to compensate for front/back or lateral shift. If the whole upper guide assembly could shift left or right having to readjust the guides when raising or lowering the guide post would be of minimal consequence. However, this saw suffers from a major problem. With the guide assembly placed on the guide post as shipped from the factory, the right bearing has used up all of its eccentricity threshold and is still touching the blade when the guide post is down:

The blade is actually touching the right bearing which has been turned to be as far right as possible already. But you need not look any further than the thrust bearing to know that something is wrong. The blade is riding ridiculously close to the inner raceway of the thrust bearing. In fact, the snap ring that holds the bearing in place looks like it’s prone to hitting the blade. Now there are a couple of ways to possibly deal with this:

Shim the entire upper assembly of the saw
File and shim the upper wheel axle so that the blade shifts over to the left

I haven’t sat down to bust out my trigonometry yet but I suspect the amount of shimming required is substantial. What I’ve done in the meantime is to loosen the set screw that holds the guide assembly to the guide post, shift the assembly down a little bit so that the set screw doesn’t engage in the V-groove of the guide post. That way, I can rotate the guide assembly a little bit to give the right bearing a little bit of clearance. Obviously, though, this presents other problems:

When you rotate the assembly to the right, the bearing edges are no longer parallel to the blade. You can see that for the right bearing, the back touches the blade but there is a gap at the front. Conversely, the left bearing touches the blade at the front while there is a gap at the back.

Another upper guide assembly problem is the fact that the guide bearings can’t project out far enough to properly support even a 5/8” blade:

The bearing edges are quite far from the gullet of the blade even though the shaft that holds them has been fully extended.

The final issue, and the one that I’ve spent the most time (and money) addressing has been saw vibration. I don’t expect a saw of this value to be perfect but the saw vibrated so badly that I was afraid to use it. Unfortunately, as great as SteelCity’s support was in replacing the first saw, they’ve become quite silent for everything else. When I asked again for a replacement Poly-V belt, I was told that they didn’t have stock and that I could get one from Motion Industries. For all that they did for me, I was happy to fork out the tiny cost of getting a new belt. While that helped a little bit, there was still a ridiculous amount of vibration. Trying to minimize the drive train vibration, I bought new V-belt pulleys and a link belt. What’s interesting is that the shafts are all metric. The motor shaft is 16mm with a 5mm keyway while the lower wheel shaft is 18mm also with a 5mm keyway. My understanding is that 18mm shafts are supposed to have a 6mm keyway and this meant that I had to have a custom step key machined just to use a standard 18mm bushing. The new pulleys haven’t eliminated all the vibration from the drive train but I’m content with its performance at this point. This allowed me to turn my attention to the other moving parts of the saw. Surprisingly, the lower granite wheel appears to be remarkably well balanced. Unfortunately, the same is not true for the upper wheel. The upper wheel is so out of balance that it will seesaw back and forth to nearly the same rotational poise every single time. When I took the wheel off to look at the back of the heavy spot, I found this:

There were a hole slew of balancing divots drilled where the heavy spot was but clearly more material needed to be removed (but there wasn’t much more to remove). What’s more, two divots had whitish substance in them. When I picked at one of divots, the debris actually fell through and a hole appeared. I believe the divot was drilled a bit too deeply and there was a paper thin layer of metal left that succumbed when I imparted a tiny bit of force. Here’s the divot with the hole:

I’m uneasy about drilling into the cast iron wheel so I’ve since elected to attach wire to the wheel in hopes of balancing it out (though it’s made minimal improvement only). I’ve told SteelCity about the bad wheel and though initial correspondences indicated they would replace it, they’ve dodged the issue in subsequent correspondences.

In addition to the vibration, I noticed that the blade was oscillating quite violently. This led me first to measure the “out of roundness” of all wheels and tires. What I discovered was that the granite wheel had all sorts of lumps in the crown. It’s difficult to see but it’s either some sort of epoxy or glue.

The lump here becomes obvious when I started to sand it down:

There were also entire areas like this:

The dark areas are all covered with some sort of glue and are raised. All of these contributed to wheel/tire runout. Removing the tires was a mixed ordeal. The top wheel’s tire came off easily with just minor finger strength. The granite wheel tire was extremely difficult to get off (I suspect it’s a bit bigger in diameter than the cast iron counterpart). I had to use a screwdriver to dig out the tire and, in the process, chipped the granite. It was a bit disheartening at first but a little Gorilla Glue and it was good again. Here I am gluing the chip back into place:

What’s ironic is that when I was taking a photo of the wheel brush, I noticed that there was a factory chip repair as well:

This is obviously a chip but the repair job is obviously much better than mine (here for reference):

When trying to determine the root cause of blade vibration, I noticed that there were actually sparks arcing between the blade the roller bearings. At first I thought that my bearings must have been set too close and that the bearings were contacting the blade but I set them further still to the point where I was certain that contact wasn’t the cause of the sparks. I looked around and saw this:

These photos show the tire actually lifting away from the wheel. I remembered how easy it was to take off the tire and suspect that maybe the tires were slipping, building up charge, and then discharging through the blade. I drew a hash line across the tire and onto the rim and then ran the saw. Sure enough, after power-down the hash line on the tire was no longer registered to the hash line on the rim. As such, I ordered a new set of neoprene tires from R&D Bandsaw and there is no longer any slipping (and no sparking).

So how does it perform?
Ironically, I haven’t done much real cutting with the saw because I’ve spent all my time trying to fix the saw. The guide assembly issue still irks me but I’m no longer content throwing my own money at the problem. I believe I’ve repaid SteelCity’s graciousness with my own time and money. As ill set up as the machine is, it at least cuts without any drifting (at least using a 5/8” blade). I haven’t had a chance to do any serious resawing but will hopefully follow-up with a post when I get around to doing that.

It should come as little surprise that I give the saw such a mediocre rating. I don’t believe anyone should have to waste such copious amounts of time and money on a new saw. I’m ambivalent about SteelCity’s customer service (they’ve been exemplary on one hand and rather abysmal on the other). I think the granite components have merit but execution on the other parts of the saw is weak. I’m disappointed that SteelCity didn’t capitalize on the inception of its new saw by addressing all the shortcomings I’ve stated in my review. Save for the granite, I have to say that the 50130 is just another run of the mill 14” cast iron band saw. Perhaps SteelCity is content playing the status quo card but I suspect that if that’s the case, they’ll always be playing second fiddle to the field if they’re playing at all.

What a Great Tool

EdC — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 06:41:48 GMT

The 22-44 Oscillating Sander was a Luxury on my wish list. But I have no regrets at all. It does everything it claims it will do and then some.
It comes in three boxes, the base, sander head, feed table. Make sure you have some muscle on hand to assemble this monster. To save on a hernia repair it wouldn’t hurt to have a chain fall, come along to lift the sander head. Besides being very heavy due to the solid cast iron construction, it is a off balanced lift. 90% of the weight is at on end of the machine, the motor end.
The directions are well written so assembly went well. I was really impressed with how well everything is built. The base is very solid and stout, there is no question in my mind that this base will have no problem supporting the load. The base comes in five pcs, that fit together really well.
The sander head attaches with for bolts from below, lots of room to work inside the cabinet. My son broke off some off the styrofoam for a pillow and just laid on his back, with no problem.
The only thing I would warn you about is that the sander head slides really easy sitting ontop of the base, it would be very easy to slide it right off the base if you are not carefull. You would not want it falling on you as your trying to get the bolts in.
The feed table takes two minutes to attach with four allen screws. The instructions warn you that the belt is over tensioned for transport, so remember to adjust it before running it.
Total assembly time about 30 minutes.

I couldn’t wait to see it work, hooked up the dust collector, and we are up and running. The closest wood I could grab was a piece of Hard Maple with a live edge.12/4×20x48 really deep saw marks from being cut on a old rotary mill. The blade dia. at the will is about 60” you get the picture. The 22-44 did a great job, it didn’t care what it was being fed, man does that monster make sawdust. I ran the wood thru with out the Oscillating on first. The feed rate will run faster this way. the next pass with the oscillation on. I’m running 80 grit as factory loaded, it does a fantastic job.
I didn’t get the infeed & outfeed tables yet, should have them in two days, but they are a must have item. They are at extra cost of around $100.00

Would I recommend thiks tool- you bet I would.
Well worth the money

What Delta says they are trying to improve, and will get it right.

EdC — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 05:55:25 GMT

From what Dennis at Woodcraft said I’m the first one to get the new Unisaw in this area. I just hope they have all the bugs worked out of it. He gave me a DVD on how to put it together. It all looks pretty straight forward. I’ll just need a extra body to help with the cast iron wing though. That looks like it takes three people to do, two holding it in position and one body below bolting it together.

The new Delta Unisaw is packed into 5 boxes. The saw body, fence, drawer, side table and fence rails. And a huge pile of other heavy boxes for everything else.
BUT one of the items I need the most isn’t here yet!!!!!!!!!!!

My mobile base for the Unisaw…......

I really don’t want to move the saw from it’s skid till I have some wheels to put under it. If what I think has happened a ton of s* will be hitting the fan in the morning. I’m trying to keep my cool till tomorrow morning when I no for sure what is happening. And if they can’t have my wheels here by close of business Weds. I be screaming so loud they’ll hear me all of the way back in Seattle.

I have pics of all the toys all boxed up. I just have to figure out how to get them off my sons memory card. The stupid thing will fit in my HP 8500 Office Jet PRO printer, but not my HP Laptop? Go figure? You can email directly from the printer, so I was thinking about emailing the pics to myself. Then save them as pictures? Does anyone know how to do this our if it will work? Then I think I can figure out how to post them from there?

My thing is woodworking not IT, I know how to do most of the basic things I need to do with a computer, past and we are entering the Twilight Zone! I have tried to get my son to figure it out for me but he’s mad at me at the moment. He figures we should have had every thing assembled by now. I had my shop rewired, and they just finished that today. I wouldn’t let him in the shop where we would be getting in the way of the electricians. Once they finished he wanted to get at it hard and heavy, but it was just to darn hot in there for me. So I have a window A/C unit installed now working to cool it down. So I’ll head out there in a little bit and see if it bearable in there tonight and work the nightshift.

As for my mobile base Delta really screwed up on that one, big time. They started selling the saws before having the bases made. You would think that they would be able to have figured out how to have both products ready at the same time. Like the guy at Delta said the Engineer who figured this one out is a IDIOT!!!! And it’s not just me who is unhappy, it sounds like everyone buying one of the new saws.

Bottom line if your looking at buying one of the new Unisaws with a set of wheels under it, forget it for about 2 months. Or you put it together with out then figure out how to get the base under it later? I hope the same Engineer wasn’t involved with any other part of the saw.

We have the saw off it’s skid and sitting on concrete now, so I guess the next step is to start cleaning all the shipping gunk off the cast iron. At least its not on there as heavy as some of the equipment that comes out of China.

Well we went to put the new saw together tonight, BUT Delta screwed up again and sent me TWO Left Wings. Instead of one Right and one Left.It’s one thing that I have to wait two months to get a mobile base, but this is just too much.

In the DVD you get with the saw is a well put together video on how to put everything together. They are very clear about how to determine which is the Left wing. They state “the Left wing will have two countersunk holes”, this is where the on/off switch mounts. The wings come come in one box with both wings inside. I pulled out the first wing, it had the two holes at the front. Front is determined by the chamfered edge. We mounted as per the instruction sheet from the box, which is more detailed than the book or DVD. They supply four small set screws to help level the wing. So you have three large holes on the side of the wing where it attaches to the table. And you also have four small holes, you are to use holes closest to the front and rear for the set screws. Every thing went well attaching the left wing. We followed all the directions and got every thing leveled and secured one the same plane as the main table. We put the Right wing in place with three large bolts only “finger tight” then tried to put the set screws in and no holes. After looking closer we found it was also a left wing.

At that point every thing came to a halt. So it looks like it’s off to Woodcraft in the morning, a 100 mile round trip. Hopefully they can find the right part in one of the other saws they have. Or they can take the one off the saw they have on display, I don’t really care at this point where it comes from.

My faith in Delta is quickly going down the tubes!!!!!!!

Now for the rest of the Story

The following four video’s will help support why I feel ripped off, and that a bait and switch is going on here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6PREA5XDDOA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5Nrx_1Rsbg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jUiz8oKQjDM

After taking the extra Left Wing back and trading for a Right Wing as should have been shipped with saw in the First place. The Right Wing attached to the saw and leveled out well.

Just a note about the finish of the cast iron.

Delta really builds up the quality of the cast iron top for this Flagship saw. It is claimed to be built in America by one of the “Industries Leading” Manufactures. A machinist is able to work metal too much closer tolerances than can be seen with the normal eye. One thing that is immediately noticeable on my table is that the bevel on the two cast iron wings are different from that on the saw bodies table. I find it something that keeps bothering me is the lack of attention to detail. If one of us had a piece we were making for a customer, just for spec or a commission. The piece would not leave the shop till the bevel was uniform the entire length. The second factor about the non-uniform bevel is that at the point where the wings bevel meets with the bevel on the table you have two very sharp points. When installing the front rail this sharp point has already drawn blood from the piece of skin removed when my knucle made contact it.

Bottom line is that it makes the saw look cheap, and is a safety hazard, that has to be filed down.

At this time, I have only checked the flatness on the cast iron with a 18” straight edge. It appears my 36” is MIA at this time.

Time to put the table together.

When you watch the preview DVD’s for this saw, or the DVD that comes with you saw. The presenter has a saw set up with both a table to the right of the saw as well as a outfeed table. He starts off by saying I want to introduce you to the New Delta Unisaw. With no mention at any point in the presentation, that some of what you are been show is optional or you just wont get. Go Figure? SO Don’t get your hopes up because you are not about to recieve any where near what you think you are going to get, in more ways than one.

The table and legs are in one box. And the drawer, comes in a box of its own. As you sit down to inventory the parts you will be scratch scratching your head. If you have watched the DVD that promoted this saw, or the DVD that came with the saw. Like I said what you are shown and what you get will not be one in the same. There will only be ONE table top. At no point in the build up is there any mention of the outfeed table being an option for an extra $499.00. (That is also not available currently.) During the video about the table the presenter keeps referring the table being built like a Aircraft Carrier. When he gets to the table legs, he explains how Delta paid attention to what the “Woodworker Wants”. He says that Delta has received a ton of complaints about the legs of the table on the previous Unisaw models. For this table they have “beefed up the legs. One way they did this was be increasing the size of the legs. They done this, and I must say, a nice set of legs. The second item they changed was that they have added a stretcher between the legs. At this point he states how this definetly brings this saw up to “Aircraft carrier specs” Again it will not be there????? Sorry, NO Stretcher? It appears that it should be there, as it looks like you have the hardware to attach it. But you will not find any holes drilled in the legs to recieve it. At this point my blood pressure is rising, and my faith in Delta is plummeting.

The box that holds the drawer will, also hold the contents of what goes in the drawer the guard, kickback pawl, one non rubberized wrench(again Sorry no rubber anywhere, the videos very strongly promote the Rubberized handle) the arbor nut is already on the saw as is one of the riving knives. If you watched the FWW video with Mike Bois, Deltas Managing Engineer of this New Unisaw. He explains how you will not have to keep spending money on this and that. He explains how the saw comes with a Medium Riving Knife mounted on the saw plus two other riving knives one for thick blades and one for the thin kerf blades. When I showed this to Dennis from Woodcraft, he stated “you can read too much into the video”. That is not how I feel. When you show me an item in a video and do not tell what exactly is optional equipment I expect for it to be there. These aren’t 30 second sound bite commercials we are talking about, we are watching Mike Bois (and others hired to give Delta’s scripted words) Delta’s head Engineer for the New Unisaw on a carefully produced video, as well as the interview he gave FWW at the IWF in Vegas. FWW never tried to trick him into saying something he did not want to say. He very clearly states “three” riving knives. Not we will give you one with the saw, and sell you the others at $50.00 a piece. When he is talking about the drawer he does state that it will accommodate five saw blades and they are very clear about the fact that you only get one blade, and not all the ones shown in the drawer. According to the second youtube video at the top of this post you are supposed to get more than just one insert. Instead now I am being told that the Dado & Zero Clearence inserts are available at around $60.00 each. Ouch!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=H51HM-k0MSc FWW’s interview with Mike Bois at FWH in Las Vegas.

We continued to get the table finished and mounted to the saw. Do not crank everything tight yet, the hardware attaching the table to the cast iron still needs to be adjusted. You till have to get all the cast iron and table on the same plane.

At the rear of the table the corner closest to the saw the laminate on the edge was left proud for about a inch or so from the corner. At this point I have not checked to see why. Also there is something on the surface of the laminate (looks like a sloppy job of cleaning up squeezed out adhesive) I left it alone till I can photograph it. There could be something behind the laminate that kept it from sitting properly. If it is not fixed I know I or someone else will catch a shirt or something on it, and break it off. The table was easy to put together and attach to the iron. You do not forget to put the nut on the leveling legs so you can lock them in place when everything is leveled.

Attaching the fence rails.

Make sure before you even start setting up the saw that you have enough room at the right side of the saw to slide the fence over top of the nut heads on the rail. So you need about 80” of free are to the side of the saw. You can take the end cap off to slide the fence on from the opposite of what the directions say.

Update
So far Delta has had two weks in which to return my calls. The guy a Delta keeps telling me that he has gotten on the Engineer and he is supposed to call?????

It is really sad that Delta has spent untold amounts of money to bring this saw to market, and now they are dropping the ball with lousey customer service.

————————————————————————————————————————

Update

Delta finally made contact with me!!!!!!!
I was suprised when I answered the phone and the caller said he was from Delta, seen as it was in the evening outside of normal business hours. He agreed that they have been having some problems, but they are trying to get everything ironed out.
He agreed that evrything shoild have been there as one shipment. I didn’t mean for it to sound like I figured the mobile base is part of the saw package. It was added as a option, my point is nothing was said about the base being about two months away from delivery to the dealers. It is still in the production stage.
He stated a package will be leaving Delta today, and that I should recieve it in a couple of days.

I have gone throught all the adjustments on the saw and all are where they should be, with the exception of the riving knife. The riving knife needed to be brought to 90 deg’s to the table. This is a minor adjustment, that is made at the holder for the riving knife.

After setting everything up to specs, we had to fire up the saw.
With 10/4 Hard Maple the sound of the hardly changed. The only change of sound was a soft hum coming from the blade. The saw has more than enough power to do anything you may ever need to do. I ran the stock through at a 90 crosscut, rip and then repeated the cuts at 45. I have to admit for a blade that came with the saw I am superised it cuts so well. It left a very clean,, smooth edge.

I will let you know when I recieve my care package from Delta