If I'm not mistaken, the kerf of the US-blades varies. In Europe, all TS-55 blades at least, have a kerf of 2.2mm.

Jusi,

All six of the cabinet makers working for me currently owned Festools before we met. I have only purchased one TS75 but I own 7 TS55. I also own a whole lot of rails, some drilled LR32 and most non-drilled. The fellows working with me also own TS55, TS75 and rails.

As they were hired, we have set the toe-in and fit to splinter guard such that the total of 13 TS55 and 7 TS75 all fit each rail the same.

In the USA and Canada all current Festool TS55 blades have 2.2mm kerfs, despite the many typos on page 62 of the 2011 catalog.

My experience is that there is more than enough adjustment available with TS75 and TS55 so they can be set to fit the same rails.

so this is possible by running the same kerf blade on all saws or at least the same kerf on all ts55's and same on all ts75's?

2.2mm = 0.088 in  but what on earth is that in fractions I don't know - looking at this conversion table it looks like it's between 3/32 and 5/64's. These inch fractions baffle me every time regardless that I'm an engineer by schooling 

2.816/32 or 11.264/128 to be precise 

Ah, so that's why my imperial to metric conversions always suck since we were thought in school that an inch = 25mm or 2.5cm which I guess is more of a rule of thumb since apparently (according to wikipedia) it is actually 25.4mm (which I guess must be somehow logical to the imperial world  )...

I wonder if a foot = 300mm or is there another catch there... Apparently yes... 304.8mm  

And lo and behold - even the yard is actually almost 90mm shorter than Finnish golfers usually use i.e. 1m = 1 yard not the official 0.914m... So my drives actually don't suck as much as before since I'm getting a free yard to every 11 meters

But that still doesn't make it any more even with 3/32 (at least in windows calc keeps telling me it's 2.77165/32) - it's more like 11/128 (11.0866/128'2).

I guess I need to get to bed since it is almost 2 a.m. here. G'nite!

Even back in the days when not all TS55 blades had 2.2mm kerfs, there was enough adjustment the saw could be set to the splinter guard. Of course with only one TS55 that was hardly practical. That was my original reason for buying a second TS55, so I could leave a Panther rip blade on it and still have that set so it did not nick my splinter guards. The current Panther blade is a 2.2mm kerf.

My fellows happen to mainly use TS75 blades with 2.4mm kerf. So once set they can have those blades interchanged as needed. I have several older TS75 Panther rip blades with 2.6mm kerf. My own TS75 is clearly marked for Panther only and is set such that on it the Panther blade fits our standard rails the same as all the other saws.

The fact is in my shop we hardly ever use a plunge saw to work anything but sheet material. When we need to make a long rip to produce a straight edge on a piece of rough lumber, we clamp it to the slide of my Felder sliding table saw. With all that power and its 550mm blade, the resulting clean-up rip needs very little help later from the jointer.

However, when the TS75 first came to North America, I did not have a shop with a slider saw or jointer. To make those clean-up rips I used rails as long as 3000mm and my TS75 with a Panther blade. By then I had gained experience setting my Festool saws for ideal toe-in and also consistent relationship to the rail splinter guards.

Who can say what package of that blade you found.

In the Festool USA 2009 catalog the Panther blade for TS55 was cat 495 372 with a 2.5mm kerf

In that same 2009 catalog the Panther blade for the TS75 was cat 495 378 with a 2.6mm kerf

Exactly where did you get that 2.0mm kerf and it was for which saw?

The current TS55 Panther blade cat is 496 305 which has a 2.2mm kerf.

In fact the only current TS55 2.2mm kerf blades which do not have a cat 496 xxx is the fine tooth which has not changed in years. It always had a 2.2mm kerf so remains cat 495 377

Does it really make a difference?    

I mean we're talking about a difference of .3mm/2= .15 mm or .0059". Does that little an offset of the splinter guard really increase tearout noticeably on crossgrain cuts?

Just asking.... 

Bill

Yes, I think there is still some old stock out there, just like some classic systaqiners. But if you stick with part numbers beginning with 496 for the TS 55 you will get 2.2 kerf blades.