Festool's first U.S. production line
- Thread starter TylerC
- Start date
Serious question: in what way (or for what use) are the unholey ones better than the holey ones?antss said:
You're right, I for one have exactly one unholy rail - it came with the TS and it really annoyed me when I decided to get the LR-32 as I needed to get the holey version.
To add to the question above: where is the downside of it having the holes?
The ones without holes just dosn't make sense, at least to me, even the one on the MFT/3.
Dump the plain ones and have holes on all of them as a reminder to buy additional stuff.
Cheese
Member
This holey vs unholey thing is rather like framing squares with & without markings. You don't always use the markings on a framing square, but when you need them you got them...bonus round.
Regardless of whether all rails should holey or not. I am just curious about those using only holey rails ......... are you just using the two available lengths or have you machined/drilled other lengths?
Seth
Seth
HarveyWildes
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antss said:
If I remember correctly, there was a web site recently that advertised a 55' rail to go with a TS 55, and they allowed substituting a holey rail. Connect seven of those and you could lay out an American football field. I did not realize that soccer fields are only specified within a size range, but at any rate seven 16.8m rails would cover at least the smaller end of the range. So regardless of what football means to you, seven of these larger size rails would do the job.
Ok, done with the semi-random fun...
I haven't used my rails enough yet to know if I would want a different size for anything, but in theory one might order a 55" rail and a custom length 63" rail to make 118", which is around the length needed for cutting 4x8 sheets diagonally. Or maybe just two 59" rails.
leakyroof
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It makes it easier to hang that 5000mm Rail on my wall...... [wink] [poke] [poke] [poke]antss said:Bob D. said:Cheese said:
Ditto, it's been said before here. I guess it only makes sense from our side of the transaction. But also feel that it would be an incentive to some to invest further into the Festool system with the LR32 kit and that leads you to a Festool router. Once you're that far in you're gone, might as well go for broke.
Speak for yourselves guys, but not everyone. This customer likes both types of rails.
I'll also bet that ALL of you don't have holey rails exclusively.
And what are y'all going to use a 5000mm rail with holes for anyway ?
WarnerConstCo.
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I have no use for a rail with holes. I do not want to pay more for something I don't or won't need.
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WarnerConstCo. said:
I would think that the savings in reduced inventory and all that goes with it would offset having
only drilled rails and therefore let Festool hold the price to the same as it is now for non-drilled rails.
In short they shouldn't (to my way of thinking) increase the price if they only carried drilled rails in
the future.
rylim said:
I would seriously doubt that the price would go down.
Me too. I mean when has festool EVER lowered prices ?
The rails should be exempt from the ubiquitous 5% yearly increase though. But I'm guessing that won't happen either. :
Gregor - I never said "better" - that is too subjective. I said I "prefer" having rails with no holes in some instances, and that I have both kinds. I like the CHOICE. For jobsites where we cut cabinetry panels we have no use for a 32 mm drilling system, none. If the cabinet isn't drilled , we aren't modifying it or constructing them. The solid rails slip in and out of the carry cases easier than the holey ones. And they and the cases stay cleaner too.
This may not appeal to everyone, especially someone like Kreg who builds cabinets on site and uses the lr32 on every job. But he has the option of buying either rail and can even substitute a holey rail if he buys a TS "package" . Festool , or certainly the dealers I've dealt with since the single spine rails have been willing to swap solid for holey at no charge. So having "choice" costs very little or nothing to all customers.
But, drilling all rails will have significant and easily measurable costs to the bottom line. Where as economies of having two less sku's to is much harder to quantify and will most certainly not be as much in real dollars and euros as the extra time, electricity and tooling cost will be for drilling all rails.
I don't see Festool ever offering custom lengths. Their production line in Germany has this capability now. They simply don't have the will or the processes in place to offer such a service. They can't even offer the correct size deflector after a decade, which is only one size. What makes anyone think they can possibly deliver a random length rail 50+ times a week ? They just aren't that type of company. Frankly , I don't know any made to order custom hand tool companies [unsure]
What I'm interested in seeing is whether the new loooong rails are any straighter than their imported counterparts that many have been reporting lately as having a fair amount of warp in them.
The rails should be exempt from the ubiquitous 5% yearly increase though. But I'm guessing that won't happen either. :
Gregor - I never said "better" - that is too subjective. I said I "prefer" having rails with no holes in some instances, and that I have both kinds. I like the CHOICE. For jobsites where we cut cabinetry panels we have no use for a 32 mm drilling system, none. If the cabinet isn't drilled , we aren't modifying it or constructing them. The solid rails slip in and out of the carry cases easier than the holey ones. And they and the cases stay cleaner too.
This may not appeal to everyone, especially someone like Kreg who builds cabinets on site and uses the lr32 on every job. But he has the option of buying either rail and can even substitute a holey rail if he buys a TS "package" . Festool , or certainly the dealers I've dealt with since the single spine rails have been willing to swap solid for holey at no charge. So having "choice" costs very little or nothing to all customers.
But, drilling all rails will have significant and easily measurable costs to the bottom line. Where as economies of having two less sku's to is much harder to quantify and will most certainly not be as much in real dollars and euros as the extra time, electricity and tooling cost will be for drilling all rails.
I don't see Festool ever offering custom lengths. Their production line in Germany has this capability now. They simply don't have the will or the processes in place to offer such a service. They can't even offer the correct size deflector after a decade, which is only one size. What makes anyone think they can possibly deliver a random length rail 50+ times a week ? They just aren't that type of company. Frankly , I don't know any made to order custom hand tool companies [unsure]
What I'm interested in seeing is whether the new loooong rails are any straighter than their imported counterparts that many have been reporting lately as having a fair amount of warp in them.
antss said:
How would you add the railstop if they increase the width of the deflector?
[/quote]
Just like you did when the rails had a single spine instead of double. Like Gregor said: attach stop then attach deflector.
-or-
Slide it on from the opposite end. Easy peasy lemon squeezy. Unless you have two joined rails. Then you gotta do as Gregor says.
Are you making a lot of stopped cuts ? I've used my stop a grand total of one time in 20yrs +/-. But the deflector gets used on almost every cut.
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