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  • Sliding mitre saw – which one for home use?
  • burko73
    Full Member

    Hi

    I’m after a sliding mitre saw, double bevel thing. Need to make some new doors and I do a bit of work making log stores. I’m also soon going to build a treehouse thing for my daughter and have a project soon to build a new shed/ garden office which will be wood frame.

    Which one should I get? There’s so many in the market, some are plain nasty to use and some are too expensive for home use. I’d love a makita but the large size makita is a lot of cash. Has anyone experience of a decent, reasonably accurate nice to use middle of the road model?

    Thinking I need a 255 size blade as most of my stuff is rougher cut outside dimension (first fix) type timber,

    dovebiker
    Full Member

    Bear in mind the depth and width of the cut – I have a 200mm one and sometimes have the to 2 cuts which was a bit of a chore when building a set of trusses to re-roof my garage.

    nickjb
    Free Member

    If you don’t want to spend makita money then the evolution saws are pretty good. Not perfect out of the box but a bit tweaking gets it cutting square. Mines been pretty robust despite being abused a lot.

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    mikedabear
    Free Member

    A 225 blade wont give you much of a depth of cut. That would probably be okay for stud work, skirting and the like. Anything bigger and a 10″ or 12″ blade would be better. I prefer DeWalt mitre saws over other makes I have owned. As for cost my DeWalt 708 is still going strong after 20 years.

    nickjb
    Free Member

    On the size issue I find a smaller cut is fine most of the time. There are some rare occasions when a bigger cutting depth or length would’ve been useful but that is usually on a bigger bit of timber which can be a pain to get lined up on the chop saw. I find it easier to use a rail saw or normal circular saw and take the saw to the wood in this instance.

    deadlydarcy
    Free Member

    What’s your budget?

    squirrelking
    Free Member

    I got the green Bosch one with the table and it’s been great. Think I paid £270 all in second hand.

    burko73
    Full Member

    Budget – I dunno. Couple of hundred quid.

    burko73
    Full Member

    Already have makita battery circular saw and a cheap one circ saw. Also got chainsaw for big bits of wood.

    RustyNissanPrairie
    Full Member

    Look for an older Elu/ Dewalt radial arm saw on eBay. Cheaper than a double mitre saw but just as useful. Can also be used for ripping (with care).
    Solid well built things – the only downside is they aren’t very portable and take a bit of room up when not being used.
    I paid £150 for a decent one recently as I have a big project about to kick off.

    maccruiskeen
    Full Member

    What are you using the slide for? theres two things you can achieve with it- more capacity for wider cuts and trenching cuts- being able to cut grooves across the timber rather than cut straight through.

    If it’s only larger timbers then it’s better value to find a saw with a bigger blade rather than a slider. Even the priciest sliding saws can have flex and slop in the rails and runners that can effect accuracy.

    There’s plenty of good quality 250mm ish non-sliding saws on the market. With a bit of shopping around you’ll find Ines with 305mm blades. Nothing to really go wrong with them so worth considering second hand ones. My dewalt dw713 has been on the go for nearly 10 years and I hardly ever need anything bigger. I’ve also recently bought one of the all bells and whistles Kapex saws but still revert to the dewalt 99% of the time.

    If you are insistent on sliding then buy from somewhere you can actually get your hands on the machine. Price isn’t really a guide as to how stiff and accurate the mechanism is. Some cheap ones are actually pretty good, some expensive ones are pretty bad. Because the sliding mechanism can wear I’d be less keen to buy one second hand.

    In the showroom drop the blade down and slide the saw right out on its rails and give the handle a wiggle and see how much the blade moves side to side.

    maccruiskeen
    Full Member

    Already have makita battery circular saw

    If it’s one of the ones with the blade on the left of the machine, and you’re right handed, then most of what you can do with a mitre saw you can do with a cordless makita and a big yellow Stanley roofing square.

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