Choosing a Plunge Saw

1. What to Look for When Purchasing a Plunge Saw

2. Today we're going to have a little bit of a look at the Festool plunge saw system. What I want to do is just talk a bit about what types of things you should look for when you go to buy a plunge saw. We'll talk about that, the features of the machines, but also have a look at and talk about applications. Particularly in carpentry, shop fitting and joinery, there are various applications we need and a plunge saw can really be of benefit. The applications of material can differ from job to job. These could be cutting down doors, cutting down panels, looking at breaking down full sheets on site and internal and external cladding. All these applications really require a good quality cut. Typical materials that we would use could be MDF or could be particleboard. We could be cutting aluminum and also cement sheet. These are quite dusty materials and we need to be able to control the dust. We need to look for a saw system that can benefit that and capture the dust into a dust extractor.

3. There are traditional methods for cutting down sheets, doors or whatever it might be. Usually we've got to set up a straight edge. We've got to measure back from the blade to the cut line. Then we can make a cut. Particular issues with that are we do get a lot of chip out. That means, before we do the cut, we need to scribe it. We may even need to put down some masking tape to make sure that the cut quality is there. Sometimes, after that, we may even to need to plane it. Key considerations when you're looking for a plunge saw system is where you can get a really good quality of cut. Can I get a good quality cut on both sides of the blade? You really need to look at a system where you can fit splinter guards, not just on the rail. The benefit of that is when that goes on top of the rail, we know that the splinter guard on the side of this rail will give us a really good quality of cut. Then our splinter guard on the side we fit to the saw when we do cut, we get a really good quality of cut. This saves us from doing a cleanup cut afterwards.

4. You really need versatility with a plunge saw. On these particular machines, we've got variable speed. This is so you can match it to whatever material that you're cutting, so different blades are needed. You need different blades for each application. You need to really look for a system that can be versatile, to be able to cut all those particular things. Also precision is really important with a plunge saw. Ideally you need to look at if it's going to be precise and stay precise for a long period of time. The build quality of the machine is really important as well. To make your job faster and easier, we need to look at a system. Let’s consider clamps. Clamps are often used to hold the guard rail down. You can see, in this instance here, we've got what we call a fast fix clamp. We can work from one end, we can put it on the material, we can cut and then we can take it off. All these types of systems make it a lot quicker to work. There are accessories such as bevels. This adds

5. to the value in the versatility of the system. We can get the angle, we can transfer directly to the rail and that makes it quick when we're looking for angles and so on. As I mentioned before, to protect you when you're working with these things, make sure that you can get as much dust as you possibly can into the dust extractor. We have different types of cover plates that will benefit you in dust extraction and make it a lot easier. Festool offer a full system. Obviously we have blades for cutting the different materials, guard rails, protractors and so on. This makes the job a lot quicker and easier to work with. So there are a few things there that you need to consider when you are looking to purchase a saw system. Now we do these in both cordless and we do them in corded. If you want the flexibility on site, we can hook up a battery. We can hook a bag onto this or we can hook it up to a dust extractor. The powered model obviously has dust extraction as well, with the added benefit of being able to

6. add a bag to it if we're not using an extractor to still gather the dust. We also do a larger cut. These will give you on the guard rail, a 50ml depth of cut. We've also got a 75ml depth of cut in a powered model. These all fit various applications. If you want to find out more about the plunge saws, by all means you can give us a call and we can send someone out. You can also come in or you can have a demo on site. This will help you understand the benefits of a plunge saw system, and the key considerations to think about before you purchase one.

7. Festool National Product Trainer Bruce McKinley discusses a few considerations you need to make when buying a plunge saw system.

8. Do you need assistance choosing the right plunge saw? Festool has a range of high quality plunge saws suitable for different requirements. Visit our website today to view or shop our collection.