CMU School of Drama


Wednesday, September 14, 2016

Skilsaw Dry Cut Metal Saw Review

Pro Tool Review: I’ve been using dry-cut metal circular saws similar to the new Skilsaw Dry Cut Metal Saw for a few years now, primarily for ten-gauge steel sheets as well as for a few custom jigs I use with steel tubing. I use my horizontal bandsaw for the bulk of my 90º cuts, but the bandsaw is a slow cutting tool and it takes some time to get different angles properly setup. So I break out my Ridgid abrasive metal chop saw when it comes to 45º angles or when I have a lot of cuts to make and I’m pressed for time.

3 comments:

Unknown said...

You would think over time that we’ve done just about everything you can do when working on making upgrades on tools and technology, and then something else shows up. Sometimes whena new tool comes out with features, they end up taking away things we enjoyed having and using. Not in this case, it looks like skilsaw does a bang up job of trying to get everything you need in a much more convenient and lightweight package while still keeping up on being the best of the best for cutting. You see all sorts of Skilsaw products around, and here is another to make the list of good worthwhile investments. Of course there is one thing to just make a few cuts and test it out a few times. It is another thing entirely to have it for a longer amount of time and compare any differences that may have occurred or slight misalignments that could have happened over time.

Chris Calder said...

Man oh man have I been waiting for a tool review to come up on the green page this year! I want to start off by saying that these types of saw astound me because it gives you the capability to cut metal and remain sharp for hundreds cuts. Here at Carnegie scenic we primarily rely on our cold saw for this application simply because of its precision and ease of cutting. I would be interested to see how this tool hold up again the pretty scary looking cold saw. After all metal is an incredibly useful material when on the job site but I doubt someone is going to have the capability to carry around a 500-pound machine with all the necessary attachments to make it run. So in conclusion the Skilsaw dry cut metal saw is probably the ideal tool for any person that uses metal and is constantly on site.

Drew H said...

I spent some quality time with a dewalt dry cutting chop saw this summer. When I first got there it was in terrible condition. I took most of it apart, cleaned the parts (except the motor) and put it back together. It smoother but the blade was still terrible and made sparks everywhere and made a fairly hot cut. We eventually got a new blade which made all the difference (except it was still excruciatingly loud). I wonder if this saw is really much better than any new saw. It doesn’t really sound like it has any unique advantages other than a smaller, cheaper blade size (which might not even be an advantage). It seems to be designed to be moved around since it is lighter than bigger chop saws. I wonder if there is a market for portable metal saws. I usually think of chop saws as saws that would stay in a metal shop and probably would not need to be transported around.