Conturo Discontinued? - Merged Thread

[afish]

Unique? There are other edge-banding tools out there or no?

I thought Rockler made one. No idea how it compares to the
Festool Conturo, no doubt not the same level of quality or features
like handling curved surfaces but it might fit someone's need.

Yes, Unique.  Show me one that doesnt have a glue pot and allows the user to easily switch colors of glue.  Pretty sure you wont find anything but Ill check back.

 

[Ebuwan]

Unique? There are other edge-banding tools out there or no?

I thought Rockler made one. No idea how it compares to the
Festool Conturo, no doubt not the same level of quality or features
like handling curved surfaces but it might fit someone's need.

Yes, Unique.  Show me one that doesnt have a glue pot and allows the user to easily switch colors of glue.  Pretty sure you wont find anything but Ill check back.

I haven't seen ANY other edge bander with different glue colors; Of course i googled it once for a couple minutes then stopped caring lol.

 

[Crazyraceguy]

The Co-matic edgebander can do the inside/outside radius part of this situation too. The downside to it is the glue. It is a pellet/pot type unit. So the quick-change puck model has the advantage there, but only if that is important to you. It also has a table mounting option, for smaller parts, like shelves.
It's not like this thing is way less costly either. Somewhere around $1800 for the unit only and probably close to 3K for the whole kit.

 

[peter halle]

It would be great if [member=101]Festool USA[/member] would confirm this.  Might actually help sell product.

Peter Halle

 

[afish]

The Co-matic edgebander can do the inside/outside radius part of this situation too. The downside to it is the glue. It is a pellet/pot type unit. So the quick-change puck model has the advantage there, but only if that is important to you. It also has a table mounting option, for smaller parts, like shelves.
It's not like this thing is way less costly either. Somewhere around $1800 for the unit only and probably close to 3K for the whole kit.

Its not only the quick color change but not having a glue pot to deal with was a big win for me too.  If it gets dirty or contaminated it can be a real PITA to clean

 

[xedos]

Unique? There are other edge-banding tools out there or no?

There are.

Virutex makes one.  They were the first alternative.
https://www.virutextools.com/hot-melt-portable-edgebander-peb250-pid291

Maksiwa makes one marketed by a few places like Wurth & Richelieu.  2nd one I saw to market.https://maksiwa.com/usa/product/portable-edge-bander-cbc-e/

And the Co-Matic.  - They are late to the party though, and I suspect are just another marketing avenue. 

Jowat makes adhesives for all of them , in colors if you’d like. 

 

[Chip S.]

As members have mentioned on other threads, we have recently received a shipment of Conturo Edge Banders and do still have some in stock. They are in the newest generation of systainers. We have received no indication from Festool of plans to discontinue the Conturo.

 

[peter halle]

PLEASE NOTE:

Two threads have now been merged.  There may be some resulting disjointed conversations within due to the merge.

Peter Halle - Moderator

 

[afish]

Unique? There are other edge-banding tools out there or no?

There are.

Virutex makes one.  They were the first alternative.
https://www.virutextools.com/hot-melt-portable-edgebander-peb250-pid291

Maksiwa makes one marketed by a few places like Wurth & Richelieu.  2nd one I saw to market.https://maksiwa.com/usa/product/portable-edge-bander-cbc-e/

And the Co-Matic.  - They are late to the party though, and I suspect are just another marketing avenue. 

Jowat makes adhesives for all of them , in colors if you’d like.

Yes the glue is available in different colors. however, all those machines you linked have a glue pot so once you have put one color in you are not going to be changing it easily, if at all.  I actually know someone who has the Maksiwa and gets one for each color. On a side note he really likes them. the only issue with them is there is a drive chain below the unit and glue will drip down and collect on the chain and mess things up so he has to build a deflector shield in each.  The nice thing about it is it applies the glue to the part not the banding so its easier to trim and less wasteful.  The conturo applies the glue to the banding which = more glue waste and harder/gummier to trim.  The Maksiwa is great for straight but wont do curves.  Also large panels are a bit of a PITA unless you have it build into a bench to help support and keep everything flat and square to the glue roller.  The conturo beats it for large panels.  The Maksiwa is faster for door and drawer fronts though. It is nice not pre cutting the edgebanding to length first. I will say its not a matter of if you will do any curve work but when.  At first I was ahhh Ill probably never need to do any curves I think my second or third project after getting the conturo had curves.  Could I have designed it without curves? yea, but it would have looked like crap.  The conturo is the only bander on the market that can do it all ( no glue pot, color changes, curved parts, small and large parts, and neatly/compactly stores away when not in use) Is it the fastest for all applications NO but if you just want one edgebander that will be able to accomplish anything (other than outdoor rated) the conturo is the only one on the market that can do it all. It is very well thought out with the exception of the MFT table top, It WILL sag and it will mess up the height after awhile.  Festool really needed to add some extra supports for the MFT top sure a person can do it themselves but once you add everything up its something they should have thought of for the cost. 

 

[Crazyraceguy]

Unique? There are other edge-banding tools out there or no?

There are.

Virutex makes one.  They were the first alternative.
https://www.virutextools.com/hot-melt-portable-edgebander-peb250-pid291

Maksiwa makes one marketed by a few places like Wurth & Richelieu.  2nd one I saw to market.https://maksiwa.com/usa/product/portable-edge-bander-cbc-e/

And the Co-Matic.  - They are late to the party though, and I suspect are just another marketing avenue. 

Jowat makes adhesives for all of them , in colors if you’d like.

Yes the glue is available in different colors. however, all those machines you linked have a glue pot so once you have put one color in you are not going to be changing it easily, if at all.  I actually know someone who has the Maksiwa and gets one for each color. On a side note he really likes them. the only issue with them is there is a drive chain below the unit and glue will drip down and collect on the chain and mess things up so he has to build a deflector shield in each.  The nice thing about it is it applies the glue to the part not the banding so its easier to trim and less wasteful.  The conturo applies the glue to the banding which = more glue waste and harder/gummier to trim.  The Maksiwa is great for straight but wont do curves.  Also large panels are a bit of a PITA unless you have it build into a bench to help support and keep everything flat and square to the glue roller.  The conturo beats it for large panels.  The Maksiwa is faster for door and drawer fronts though. It is nice not pre cutting the edgebanding to length first. I will say its not a matter of if you will do any curve work but when.  At first I was ahhh Ill probably never need to do any curves I think my second or third project after getting the conturo had curves.  Could I have designed it without curves? yea, but it would have looked like junk.  The conturo is the only bander on the market that can do it all ( no glue pot, color changes, curved parts, small and large parts, and neatly/compactly stores away when not in use) Is it the fastest for all applications NO but if you just want one edgebander that will be able to accomplish anything (other than outdoor rated) the conturo is the only one on the market that can do it all. It is very well thought out with the exception of the MFT table top, It WILL sag and it will mess up the height after awhile.  Festool really needed to add some extra supports for the MFT top sure a person can do it themselves but once you add everything up its something they should have thought of for the cost.

If the MFT sagging over time is an issue, then maybe being late to the party was good for Co-Matic. Their table mount is very nice. I also does not require pre-cutting the banding, there is a cutter on-board. It's not a perfect flush-cut, you still need to finish it by hand, but it removes the part from the roll.
That said, it's not ideal. Most of the guys in the shop won't use it. It has been months since I bothered with it myself. It is nice for curves, but I don't have to do that kind of thing very often.

 

[Distinctive Interiors]

I had a problem with my Conturo MFT top sagging and noticed it straight away as soon as I did my first trial edges through the setup.
I contacted Festool UK about it......They sent me a replacement top within 2 days and it was just as bad as the original one.

In the end, I just used an old alloy spirit level, cut it to length and fixed it underneath through the top of the table. It keeps the top nice and flat and prevents the sagging issue which used to lead to misalignment of the edgebanding.

A simple fix and you would have thought that Festool would have come up with their own solution by now as it must be a common problem.....

 

[Cheese]

A simple fix and you would have thought that Festool would have come up with their own solution by now as it must be a common problem.....

Well that's interesting, the Conturo was released in 2015 so this has probably been an issue for 7 years?

 

[Distinctive Interiors]

A simple fix and you would have thought that Festool would have come up with their own solution by now as it must be a common problem.....

Well that's interesting, the Conturo was released in 2015 so this has probably been an issue for 7 years?

The Conturo may well have been released in 2015, but was the Conturo MFT table top released at the same time...?? Genuine question!
I imagine a fair percentage of Conturo owners only bought the machine itself and have never needed or wanted the MFT table insert.

A mate of mine bought the MFT kit for his Conturo a couple of years back,.....His top was HDF or MDF but the newer tops are chipboard core with an MDF layer top & bottom.

 

[Cheese]

The Conturo may well have been released in 2015, but was the Conturo MFT table top released at the same time...?? Genuine question!

Yes, both were released in the US in 2015. It may have been released earlier in Euro?

 

[Distinctive Interiors]

The Conturo may well have been released in 2015, but was the Conturo MFT table top released at the same time...?? Genuine question!

Yes, both were released in the US in 2015. It may have been released earlier in Euro?

Well,  based on that, I would definitely have thought they should have come up with a working solution by now.

Perhaps an additional section of extrusion that attaches to the internal slot running around the inside of the MFT?......Easily removed when the Conturo top is removed and replaced with the standard MFT top...??

I'll post a couple of pictures tomorrow of my own DIY fix of the Conturo MFT.

 

[Distinctive Interiors]

This DIY fix solved my problem but it would be nice if Festool came up with a proper fix of their own.....

[attachimg=1]

[attachimg=3]

[attachimg=4]

 

[xedos]

Yes the glue is available in different colors. however, all those machines you linked have a glue pot so once you have put one color in you are not going to be changing it easily, if at all.  I actually know someone who has the Maksiwa and gets one for each color. On a side note he really likes them. the only issue with them is there is a drive chain below the unit and glue will drip down and collect on the chain and mess things up so he has to build a deflector shield in each.  The nice thing about it is it applies the glue to the part not the banding so its easier to trim and less wasteful.  The conturo applies the glue to the banding which = more glue waste and harder/gummier to trim.  The Maksiwa is great for straight but wont do curves.  Also large panels are a bit of a PITA unless you have it build into a bench to help support and keep everything flat and square to the glue roller.  The conturo beats it for large panels.  The Maksiwa is faster for door and drawer fronts though. It is nice not pre cutting the edgebanding to length first. I will say its not a matter of if you will do any curve work but when.  At first I was ahhh Ill probably never need to do any curves I think my second or third project after getting the conturo had curves.  Could I have designed it without curves? yea, but it would have looked like junk.  The conturo is the only bander on the market that can do it all ( no glue pot, color changes, curved parts, small and large parts, and neatly/compactly stores away when not in use) Is it the fastest for all applications NO but if you just want one edgebander that will be able to accomplish anything (other than outdoor rated) the conturo is the only one on the market that can do it all. It is very well thought out with the exception of the MFT table top, It WILL sag and it will mess up the height after awhile.  Festool really needed to add some extra supports for the MFT top sure a person can do it themselves but once you add everything up its something they should have thought of for the cost. 

Was only responding to Ebuwan not knowing colored glues were available for the alternative units.  Your observations may or may not be of interest to him.  If a Conturo is not available to him - it doesn't matter how good (or better ) it is.

 

[afish]

my post was only meant to clarify for anyone who may not understand the difference between glue pot and puck system the conturo uses.  The conturo isnt perfect but its unique and great tool for sure.