Carvex 420 first impressions

[windmill man]

I take your point Ken, think Festool should get their finger out and facilitate some reviews.  [big grin] Both in Europe and the US [big grin]

The truth is you can make any tool look like manure in a review.  [big grin]

 

[Rembo72]

Wauw, this keeps people busy here...

@JMB: Dude, the second saturday the blades supplied by festool where used and these where supposed to be long enough to cut this thickness of wood

Dude for a jigsaw to work correctly it needs the correct blade for the jigsaw some jigsaws sit higher than others! Mafell sits very low so can have a shorter blade!

So using the same blade does not always make it a fair test a fair test would be that you use a blade that ALL JIGSAWS can use so the blade  should ALWAYS  come past the work piece  when fully retracted up.  

The carvex clearly didnt come past the work piece.   Saying that im not doubting the fact the jigsaws which might also needed a longer blade still performed with a short blade BUT I wanna see a test with proper use of a tool and having a blade to short for the work piece is NOT proper use of a tool.

@JimB1: Yes it's obvious that you don't do this regularly however, one of the test was to test the limits of the machine. This material is way within the specification of all 5 brands and machines tested. This was a remarkable finding and it was tested again after consulting Festool on whap happened. 2nd Saturday with longer blades and carefully adjusted guides you saw what happened in Rian's post. Im the guy you can hear being absolutely amazed on the bended blade as I was utterly stunned to see this happening.

Anyway I agree with the folks that said using a jigsaw on thick hardwood is something I don't think I've ever done. Usually 3/4" - 1/4" ply is all I use it for. Power to cut though 12/4 mahogany in a jig saw just isn't a concern to me. I have a bandsaw for that

I think I'd be more interested in smooth, tight cuts in ply with good visibility and dust control then power. Weight of the tool would be something that would also be of concern. I'm fairly happy with my Dewalt jigsaw but dust is an issue and I often think a light would be useful. Usually I try to position myself so that my shadow doesn't fall along my cutline but sometimes you can't help it, especially in circle cuts where you have to move around the piece a bit.

So I would suggest like I requested before that to make sure the blade is long enough that ALL jigsaws using the blade in question would be sticking past the material when full retracted.

@Shane Holland

Interesting since Remco posted this video showing no issues at all while at Festool Netherlands. Seemed to work just fine.

I indeed went over to Festool and tried to cut a 4x4" piece of wood and was successful. You saw my vid on that one. The test 2nd saturday was done with same blade as when I was with festool, blades where adjusted exactl the same and the same blade was used. You saw what happened in Rian's video. I was utterly amazed what i Saw happening with my own eyes especially when we used the 2nd (Brand new Carvex 420) and saw the blade break. Two tests happened within 10 minutes of each other and I was soooo amazed I couldn't believe what I saw. But all of it was true! Bear in mind that the piece sawed in festool was 95x95mm and this piece was aproximately 100x200mm Slightly thicker and twice as wide.

There's one important thing that should not be left unsaid: I couldn't believe it and I wanted to feel what happened myself and I did the same test, I was able to cut this piece of would with a Carvex 420 with the same blade without damage to the machine or to the blade, I did have sparks in the machine towards the end of the piece. Appearantly the other tester just pushed it slightly harder or did something else that make the blade bend and even break. As you can see in the movie it's by no means handled with brute force. He did not mis-use this machine as you probably can see for yourself in the video, this could have happened to any one. As it appears to be the machine is working at it's limit and temperatures end up in a region where they get so hot that it's getting a problem for the blades.

@Stone Message

They are using the wrong blade - it should be the 499478

I don't have one here with me but I believe that actually is the blade we used the 2nd saturday. These where supplied by Festool.

Guy's all in all, this post is not to tell everybody that because of this test the Carvex 420 is a bad machine. We tested 5 machines to find out what machine works best. 1 test of the tests that where done was the capacity test and we had a very remarkable outcome that was posted here. Most of the posts now tell that the test is done incorrectly and we are all biased and selling Mafell which is not true by any means. The 4 testers are enthusiastic people that are fully independent of any brand, or any person. We all have very well paid jobs in daily live and share our passion for high quality tools.  The test was facilitated by a dealer who'se main machine brand is Mafell, he obviously has high trust in the quality of the Mafell machine as he would probably not run this test if he would expect that the machine he sells would be the worst. I have never seen cheap / bad tool manufacturers run a test that includes high end machines, you can guess why. The tests are however set up by us and not by the facilitating dealer. He gave us complete freedom in what we wanted to test, all blades used or the same throughout the tests giving all brands equal oppurtunities.

Outcome of the test is actually that 2 Festool machines the PS 300 Trion and the Protool JSP 140 (Protool) are very good machines. The Carvex has very nice features and works fine in more regular material for jigsaws than 4x8" wood. It appears to have an issue with temperatures around the blade guides. Far more than the Festool Trion and the Protool JSP. Should we not mention that here? We have reached out to Festool with our results to ask for their opinions before we posted them. So far we have heard that our remarks where received and they are under investigation.

We all have a passion for high end best in class tools and in many many maybe most occasions those machines are branded Festool, in this case it's not, should we than say nothing or be honoust and share this with other tool passionates? Isn't that what this forum is about?

I would challenge anybody to take up the challenge and get your hands on a heat camera and some of these machines and see for yourself what happens. In any material you will cut the Carvex 420 will have a significantly higher temperature around the guide and blades than the other machines. We saw this on 2 Carvex 420 machines from 2 different suppliers, bough by regular Festool dealers in Europe so it would be too hard to believe that something is wrong with the machines.

Will the high temperatures make the 420 a bad machine? I'm not sure, but I do know for sure is that this is something that could be an issue for some of us and for those people it's interesting to know.

Last but not least a reaction to JMB

My test will always be fair like always! I say it how it is    CRAP OR GOOD lol

So have we!

 

[Administrator_JSVN]

Ken, I think I've been more than patient and generous, especially based on the information I made public today.

Forum members have always had the opportunity to speak their minds about our tools, good and bad, and I think there is evidence of that in the threads about the Carvex 400, the 420's predecessor, from our forum friends in Europe expressing their concerns with that model.

I've tried to look to our forum members and moderators in times like this for guidance and a consensus. To remove any perceived influence or bias on my part. Festool's goal is to have this forum's direction guided by its members. So, again, I look to the members to express their opinions here in the thread about what should be done. If it were up to me personally, I see a fair amount of unethical behavior on the part of the reviewers and Gereedschappro. Festool has never made it a practice to attack other brands, but to rely on the merits of our own tools and let the consumer decide. I see evidence of "posting on behalf of a banned member", in this case All About Tools (the owner of Gereedschappro), which is against our forum guidelines.

The issue isn't about the Carvex in this thread. It's about a concerted effort by employees and affiliates of Gereedschappro to manipulate the tests and results in favor of a particular tool. Starting with the non-disclosure in the original post and ending with the information about the owner of Gereedschappro and his very close relationship with Rian in particular. The suspicious activity of a banned account attempting to log on multiple times when this thread surfaced and since after over a year. And, I don't know any of us would devote multiple full days of our personal time to do tool tests for a retailer free of charge.

There are just to many things that scream foul to me personally. But, I am a Festool employee and as much as I try to separate my loyalty to Festool from my personal feelings, the forum members will always scrutinize my words and actions here, and rightly so.

 

[Scott B.]

I don't have a dog in this fight, I have an old pos Bosch jigsaw that I use for sink cutouts and siding notching mostly, although I did make my son some cool ninja stars last halloween with it, but this looks like a classic case of forum "drive by" posting, where you have a  member or two with 12 post histories and under, blowing through with polarizing footage and opinions.

Who really cares what some dudes in the netherlands did with some tools. I get a little bit more out of seeing what kreg or Dave R or Brice have to say about them, and Peter Parfitt (sp) as well. Even then, their info has to be measured against each of our own realities of typical tool use and project pipelines.

We all have free will, which no post, moderator, test or review can really alter very much, as is evidenced by the staunch stubbornness of opinions and beliefs even in ordinary every day posts about tools.

In all my travels professionally and personally, I don't believe I have ever been in the same room with a Mafell tool, or even been in a room with someone who was talking about them.  

 

[Rembo72]

And, I don't know any of us would devote multiple full days of our personal time to do tool tests for a retailer free of charge.

Shane is it you saying that as a Festool employee selling top quality tools to machine passionates? I guess there are numerous people that would be tool enthusiast enough to do so. Since these tests I know at least three more of them besides myself. I hope they did not get paid or compensated in any way because that would make me the fool out of us and normally I'm not that kind of person  [smile]

posting on behalf of a banned member

Shane , any proof of this? The original post was from JGVilla whom I meet at the test and who is a retired airline pilot. A woodworker ever since his retirement and a customer of the facilitator of the test like we all are. A Festool adept like all of us are. Would you think a retired airline pilot would post on behalf om somebody else, come on. How difficult would it be these days with IP scramblers or whatever high tech tools to post under a fake name..... He was just enthousiastic and posted this on the forum he was posting on for I believe a long time. My attention was drawn to this post by the comments He made me aware of and that's when I jumped in, nothing more nothing less.

What's all the hassle about? the fact that there's an issue with a Festool machine when tested in 1 specific test? Wait for the outcome of the whole test and you'l see there's nothing to feel bad about.

 

[Scott B.]

I guess one thing that makes me question the empirical nature of the testing is that in the Festool vs Piece of Pine video, I spotted this under the work surface, which struck me as a technological oddity amidst a team showing competence with infrared grade heat measuring technology...

I don't even plug office equipment into junk like that.

[attachimg=#]

 

[Rembo72]

I don't even plug office equipment into junk like that.

Hi Scott, one thing for sure you looked at the video carefully.... we indeed did not pay attention to that.

Sorry for mainly paying attention to things that would affect the test results and not at things that compromised working safely. Not shown in the video but there was a fire extuingisher ready on site for safety so if this would have gotten out of hand..... The fact that the infrared sensor kept focussing on the saw blades indicated that temperatures where way within acceptable reacht.

Nevertheless not the best practise to show, your right it's a bit odd being carefull in on area and not in the other  [smile]

 

[Scott B.]

I don't even plug office equipment into junk like that.

Hi Scott, one thing for sure you looked at the video carefully.... we indeed did not pay attention to that.

Sorry for mainly paying attention to things that would affect the test results and not at things that compromised working safely. Not shown in the video but there was a fire extuingisher ready on site for safety so if this would have gotten out of hand..... The fact that the infrared sensor kept focussing on the saw blades indicated that temperatures where way within acceptable reacht.

Nevertheless not the best practise to show, your right it's a bit odd being carefull in on area and not in the other  [smile]

Well, a couple of things on that. For a review video to so meticulously refer to the festool manual and using the "just like festool said" card, I just found it a little odd to see an piece of electrical equipment directly under the work surface that was so unqualified to be there in any shape or form. How do I know you didnt plug your tool and extractor combo into that junk, and if you did, could there be any correlation between poor current and heat at the tool? Perhaps.

Also, I am pretty sure that Festool didnt recommend that you run their tool on another brand extractor. Why on earth would your facilitating dealer not have provided you with a ct unit, given the systemic engineering of festool gear?

It appears that you used a different brand extractor on the tool. Is this the case? If so, why?

[attachimg=#]

 

[derrills]

You too can make sparks with any jig saw blade. Just run a screw directly through the path of your cut and then hide it from yourself by clamping the square, paying special attention to cover the screw so it won't be visible. Then push like you mean it when cutting. I was raised on a farm so I'm pretty sure I know bull crap when I see it.

 

[Scott B.]

The whole point of shop or lab based benchtop testing is that you CAN control all variables, for better or worse. While the heat cam imagery in the video lends the appearance of first glimpse credibility, on further analysis its specious. This is why I prefer to see testing that is done on real projects (and tasks that are generally considered typical for the tool) where performance consequences translate to time and money, and no shenanigans. Forget the torture testing, show competence with the tool in its intended skill set.

Difficult to splash into a pool of knowledge like the FOG without having all those essential bases covered. I didn't mention the cheap outlet strip because it is a safety issue. I mentioned it as potential skew in electrical current. I know I yell at my guys if they run tools on too long or wrong gauge extension cords. These things are engineered and built to work as a system, and the least a tester can do is test them in the manner that they were intended to be used, especially before making what is intended to be a scientific claim that has some obvious holes in it.

I am sure that as this tool gets around, more reliable footage will get shared, and hopefully by people who are plugging them in on jobs with real consequences and no nonsense.

 

[hockey_magnet]

And, I don't know any of us would devote multiple full days of our personal time to do tool tests for a retailer free of charge.

Shane is it you saying that as a Festool employee selling top quality tools to machine passionates? I guess there are numerous people that would be tool enthusiast enough to do so. Since these tests I know at least three more of them besides myself. I hope they did not get paid or compensated in any way because that would make me the fool out of us and normally I'm not that kind of person  [smile]

posting on behalf of a banned member

Shane , any proof of this? The original post was from JGVilla whom I meet at the test and who is a retired airline pilot. A woodworker ever since his retirement and a customer of the facilitator of the test like we all are. A Festool adept like all of us are. Would you think a retired airline pilot would post on behalf om somebody else, come on. How difficult would it be these days with IP scramblers or whatever high tech tools to post under a fake name..... He was just enthousiastic and posted this on the forum he was posting on for I believe a long time. My attention was drawn to this post by the comments He made me aware of and that's when I jumped in, nothing more nothing less.

What's all the hassle about? the fact that there's an issue with a Festool machine when tested in 1 specific test? Wait for the outcome of the whole test and you'l see there's nothing to feel bad about.

Actually I think the more time you spend - and you've already spent an inordinate amount of time testing a single tool IMHO.  - the more I'm inclined to side with Shane on this. Have you ever personally spent this kind of time testing any other tool? or been encouraged by this dealer to spend this kind of time testing other tools? Why not just test the Mafell and tell us how great it is instead of trying to make the Festool look bad and using such drama? (you'd think the Carvex blew up and killed a dozen people during the test). You can't possibly think you have a high level of credibility regardless of your protests otherwise. As a comparison, what would YOU think if, say, a BMW dealer conducted a test on a Mercedes with some customers and found problems with it? Would you accept the results as credible?   Of course not! I will rely on test sources that I am confident are unbiased and independent.   BTW, Why the obsessive interest in jigsaws? Instead of routers, TS, etc? Finally, Can you refute any of what Shane has said regarding this dealer and his previous activities on this forum? It's either true or it's not, it's not open to interpretation.

Chris

 

[le_yum]

it is obvious that the blade guides are too tight, why bend a dozen of blades and insist, just make 1/2 turn instead 1/3...

 

[derrills]

I wouldn't be afraid to buy any of Festool's  products. Their customer service is outstanding and with Festool's 30-Day Money Back Guarantee " Buy with confidence. If you are not completely satisfied, return your tool to the selling dealer within 30 days ......"

 

[PeterK]

Let this all just play out. My take on all this is that it will all get sorted out after the the final test video becomes available. If there are questions at that time on the results, I am sure we will see people who have the new Carvex replicating the usage and giving their experiences. No one here is going to base their future purchase decision on a video if it is obviously biased and flawed. I hope to see this comparison show some guys using the various saws in real world applications to show if there are any real differences. Actually, I don't expect to see any big differences between the tools.

I own 3 jigsaws, a Trion, a Bosch, a Makita battery powered. They all get used frequently for different tasks. The Bosch gets the really messy dirty jobs like cutting thick metal plate while using lubricant, the Trion sees all the shop wood cutting, the Makita gets used for all the really quick rough board shortening tasks as it is always ready to use anywhere I need it.

I look for features first in a saw- led lighting, dust collection, a good blower, clear view of the cut line, easy switch and trigger access. As I use Bosch blades most of the time, the final cut results are very similar for the 3 saws but the Trion really shines for true vertical cuts in thin and thick materials. Looking forward to the release of the Carvex as the optional bases will be very useful to me for some tasks.

 

[glass1]

This is my first post (moderator edit - first post in a long time). I usually post a the jlc forum. I am neither a festool lover or hater. I own several festools(1400 router, 55 track saw, trion jig, sanders, c12 drill, and 850 planer)all of which I find to be excellent tools. I bought and returned the kapex which I do not think is bad but was not worth the cost to me. Is it not possible the carvex is not as good as it should be. On another note in the finish carpentry forum at jlc I posted a few shots of a timber stair, for the record I rely on my "jig saw" to make some big cuts!

 

[derrills]

glass1

Online

Member Since: Aug 2008
Posts: 48

Posted on: Today at 09:20 PMPosted by: glass1 
Insert Quote
This is my first post. I usually post a the jlc forum. I am neither a festool lover or hater. I own several festools(1400 router, 55 track saw, trion jig, sanders, c12 drill, and 850 planer)all of which I find to be excellent tools. I bought and returned the kapex which I do not think is bad but was not worth.............. 

Welcome to the FOG [welcome] You must type really fast  [poke]

 

[peter halle]

I offer this as a member.  If I wanted exposure on the internet about something one strategy I would consider would be to go to a place that had great exposure and activity, post something controversial, interact to continue the conversation, add teaser comments and contents once the attention slipped, throw in multiple personalities to heat up and cool down the reactions and once there was not any more attention then my job would be done and I could go on to the next place.

Just some random thoughts.

Peter

 

[derrills]

Peter , thank you for your words of wisdom. Sheds a new light on the subject for me. Carvex light [thumbs up]

 

[Michael1960]

Shane - I would close this thread. The original video was claimed to be a 'teaser'.  The 'complete' review was conducted over a week ago and its release was promised 'soon'....  I've lost interest.
I'll look to other reviews on this forum for comprehensive test results on the Carvex 420

 

[glass1]

I was immediately emailed by Shane and reminded that I had posted in 2009 40 times. He went on to say that I must have just forgotten but just didn't want anybody to remember my past posts. thx Shane you are right I am the one with the agenda. After a long afternooof soccer games and a couple of beers I truly forgot that I used to post here.