the new unplunged TS-75 from Festool

never occurred to me to unplunge my TS-75,

then when talking to Dino he mentioned its very
EZ to unplunge a plunge saw, and here it is,

few inches of cotton rope and a bowline knot
is all it takes to unplunge festool TS-75

/branko

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Spock, from the old TV series, "Star Trek" would say, "Crude, but effective". In other words, she ain't pretty but it looks like it will get the job done just fine. However, be extra careful because you now have a permanently exposed saw blade. Don't lift it up off of the rail until it stops. You aren't supposed to lift up any saw until it stops but with this saw it's critical. You probably already are well aware of this but I thought it warranted pointing out.

Bruce

Is there anything about this saw that makes it any different from a regular (non-plunge) saw now?

Peter,

to be honest, if I would purchase a new saw today I'll probably go for
a Makita 10" for some $350. Equiped with Dino's dust collecting and
rail system it feels like a much better choice

/Branko

Really Branko? You don't think the size would be a detriment? I am thinking about getting the 8 1/4" Makita but have often thought maybe I should just spring for the larger one.

Peter,

You bring up an interesting topic with the 8 1/4" and 10 1/4" Saws. I have both. As long as they are on a PBB with a height of 3" or better you will notice very little difference. In either case, you just push and pull the saw. When you start handling the saw, then you notice the difference. The 8 1/4" is literally lighter than many of the 7 1/4" saws on the market. The 10 1/4" saw is about 7 or 8 pounds heavier - close to twice the weight.

Cutting with the big makita is a thrill. The big saw is relatively quiet and super smooth as it moves thru the wood. Just yesterday a customer wanted to joint a piece of 3" cypress. I sold the jointer years ago but I sure had a ball cutting that with the big makita.

Unless you're cutting a lot of heavy timber, the 8 1/4" should be more than adequate. But if you want to stroke your male ego, go for it!!! Another idea is to keep the 7 1/4" that you have and add the 10 1/4".

Burt

in my case, most of the time I'll have it on the B-300 bridge
so I don't think it should be any problem lifting the whole
bridge with the saw on it

/branko

I will definitely be keeping my 7 1/4" saw. Honestly, I almost never take it off the rail. Whenever I make this purchase, I will also be upgrading to the B-300.

One of the things driving this is I'm starting to play with some 8/4 hardwood, and I am stuck with using my bandsaw for the cuts unless I switch. I could see myself wanting to cut something thicker, although it would be rare.

One downside is the cost of the blades. I asume they will be thicker also. Is using the large Makita similar to using my 7 1/4" in that the cut is nearly perfect even with the cheaper blades, or am I going to have to buy the top end stuff?

I'm still leaning towards just going to the 8 1/4" honestly, but usually bigger is better in the world of tools...

Branko,

I have to really say thank you to you guys because your 'problems' are mine too. Since your first post about unplunging the saw,
I have been looking at my saw and the rails and working on figuring out how to understand the real cause and find a solution
that makes sense. Believe me, that has been going on for a while but knowing that someone else was experiencing the same thing
along with the arrival of my PBB seems to have made a difference.

I noticed that your friend Nils did not make any new friends over in the FOG and did not get any answers to his questions either.

I do not have the solution to the 2" rip on 5m boards that are less than the width of the rails
but I am going to figure that one out.

Anyway, here are some things that I learned and have done which you might find interesting.

1. another reason for the not perpendicular edges on rips.

Aside from the Fest rails being generally weak, the surface is also not completely flat. The green plastic strip that is supposed to help the saw slide, also creates a
pivot point around which the saw can rotate along the length axis of the rail. So, if you do not apply constant and consistent pressure to the left, the saw can tip to
the right. Here are a couple of pictures to demonstrate what that means.



first picture is the saw sitting untouched on the rail.

then with some slight pressure to the right



So, there was one nice guy in the FOG who suggested to Nils that technique might be a solution and he was correct. Just as it takes very little downward force to
plunge the saw, it takes very little sideways pressure to tilt it.

2. another way to avoid that.

Aside from practicing your technique, now that you have (or soon will have a PBB), you can actually eliminate the possibility of this happening without having
to sell your existing rails.

Effectively, I turned the Fest rail into a giant sub base for the TS75 and the whole thing slides on the EZ rails like silk. And cuts like magic.

First to get an idea of how this works, here is my PBB this is not set up for ripping. i do not have the EZ rails long enough for that so it is set up as a cross
cut/cut off tool.



Someone asked the other day about cutting the SME top kit when cutting a piece of wood. I do not want to do that so I cut on the end of the bench.

I also took the rip fence apart and turned it into a giant clamp. It clamps down to the bench and there are smart clamp/jorgensen hand screw type
threaded rods which allow for variable amounts of pressure to keep the work piece from moving or allow it to move in a narrow corridor. (this
whole set up is also a router table).

Now I can use the Fest anti kick back plunge stop to actually lock the saw down to the fest rail since that rail is now just a sub base.



So, this set up takes up about 10 more cm of cutting depth than the EZ sub base. Which is ok for me. (the wood is 5/8 and I am sure you could do this with 1/2")

Watch the whole thing in a short video on You Tube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wUhcolHMDM4

Thanks for the idea of closing up that big hole in the side of the saw for better DC too!. You see that red piece screwed to the side of my 'sub base'?

this thing



That thing is my anti chip protection. UHMW screwed on to that piece of wood that supports the rail with nylon screws. It fits right into the edge groove
of the EZ rails (and there is actually another piece on the other side which was left from my first attempt at this) so the whole sub base is really captive
to the EZ rail it will not come off vertically or tilt to the left or right. (also works great for lining up a line to the inside or outside of the blade)

I also noticed in your picture of the tied up saw that you have a WoodRat. One of the other things that I have been trying to figure out how to deal with is cutting out
the ends of boards for tenons. Here is an idea for making that fence system a little more useful.

1. Use your smart clamp system as brackets to hand the thing on the end of your PBB



2. hang the WR on the PBB



3. build your own short guide rail out of wood (this is maple and it looks like a piece of furniture). and a support system to extend it laterally



4. extended mode...that's about an eight inch wide piece of cherry clamped to the WR that i can now clip the corner out of without turning the
whole piece into a pile of dust with a router bit.



ok, enough for one day.

here is one final picture of the PBB as a router table with stops that I find useful. just for reference, those hand screws
(aka stops) are clamped to the same EZ rail that is used for the cross cutting. the maple short guide rail on the WoodRat
is there in the foreground and the EZ rail at the top of the picture (back of the router is supported by the Brooklyn bridge).



last one....the Brooklyn bridge



as you can see, some parts were borrowed from another system that does not work as well.

Matthew,

Good work on the tipping saw problem, and excellent explanation. Are you going to post that on FOG?

A lot of good ideas in your setup description. I'm going to have to ponder all that for a while...

Dik

[quote="Dik Harrison"]Matthew,

Good work on the tipping saw problem, and excellent explanation. Are you going to post that on FOG?


take a look if you like

http://festoolownersgroup.com/index.php?topic=4926.0

hi Matthew,

Thanks for this great post, really interesting approach!

It seems like your mind is working just as mine but faster,
took me quite some time to realize I need Dinos powerbenches.

Btw, see you modified and applied the old rat to your powerbench, have one of those myself and have been thinking to adapt it to one of the benches, but again you was faster.

Also, thank you for supporting Nils at the FOG, have pretty much the same problems as he does, talked with him earlier today and he is really pissed of, apparently he was asked by the FOG members to post pictures to prove that less than perpendicular construction of Festool MFT table and when he tried to upload his photos he realized his account at FOG has been restricted by admin.

How about that?

/branko

Branko wrote:

Also, thank you for supporting Nils at the FOG, have pretty much the same problems as he does, talked with him earlier today and he is really pissed of, apparently he was asked by the FOG members to post pictures to prove that less than perpendicular construction of Festool MFT table and when he tried to upload his photos he realized his account at FOG has been restricted by admin.

How about that?

/branko

not sure that they did something to prevent him from uploading pictures, i could not figure out how to get them into the post itself either. but
uploading them to the FOG gallery was simple. i sent Nils a pm on the FOG system explaining how to post the pictures to the gallery and
then copy the link for the photo to the post.

having said that, it seems to me like nils is wasting his time over there. from what i have seen over time, something like 10 percent of the people who post there are
interested in being helpful when they can, the other 90 including the moderator are bigoted wind bags who use the thing to bait people and then abuse them for their
own personal amusement. if you do not come in on your hands and knees bowing to the knowledgeable and asking for their blessing in the most humble way, they
start to salivate. i posted a very simple video of the saw tipping over with the slightest pressure and one of the chief clowns says that it does not happen. so when
you have that sort of situation, the shortness of a lifetime should suddenly loom large and this long list of other things that your time could better be spent on should
pop right up there for immediate attention.

if you want any more pictures of the stuff that i put together, just let me know. i did some tenon roughing with the saw on the woodrat and then cleaned up the
lines with the router and it was a real pleasure relative to hacking off these huge chunks of wood with a router bit. also zero tipping of the saw on the home made
maple guide rail. you would like that.

right on Matthew,

life is to short to waste in Fog, we need sunshine, open minds and new ideas that brings us forward in our lives

your giant subbase idea with the Fesstool rail on top is great, will try it when my EZ-stuff arrives

please give us more info of all the other stuff and ideas you have, it works like steroids to my mind, especially when we both are using same TS75 saw

glad I found Dino and this forum where you can relax in the sun, avoiding nasty disbandment of minds in the Fog

thanks for sharing
/branko

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