Is that table worth it?

KennyR

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Joined
Nov 21, 2007
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15
I have looked at the mft at my local wood craft store and the ohter dealer near by but they cant demo that table worth a hoot.

So is that table worth the cost?  I only build small projects like toys and work tables.

I built my daughter a a small almost table top bookshelf to use in her room and it is a quarter inch oout of square.  What causes that?  What fixes that?

Is it something that will get easier with time? 

Thanks for the help. 
 
Yes.

Causes would be out of square cuts, not enough time setting up clamping, to name two. Time, care, and precise measuring tools are the fix.

Yes.
 
for me the mft is worth every single penny it goes out on site and gets used in the workshop

eli's covered out of square

so just a suggestion, a pair of stair buttons for your framing square helps setting out on sheet materials
 
when I first saw the table and at a 500 buck price I though oh well a slab of plywood on top of saw horse will do fine.  I watced a video from gary katz on building wainscot and he uses the table in their to ways I never really thought of. 

So 2 weeks ago I bought one and also added the extension wing and clamps.l  I am a professional carpenter and build custom bookcases, window seats etc.  I used the table all last week and now I wonder how I was able to do stuff before.

1. cross cutting sheet good:  after I rip to size I then need to cut length.  most some are 11 1/4 wide which would be no problem for my scms (sliding compond miter saw) but lots are 16-24 inches wide. which  I used to flip to cut.  now I set it on the table and its done.

repeat cuts:  the little stop block attachment (comes with it) also has save me lots of time for repeat cuts.  Yesterday I used it to even cut 1x material

2:  using the domino it acts as a stop edge to hold the material.

3: clamping for sanding of the cabinet doors.  holds material great sand and done.

4: did fluting last week.  I screwed my piece 1x3 x66" long,  now clamps would not work due to the edge guide would hit it.  solution: I screwed the piece from underneath to the table.  I just put 2 screws through the mdf top and into the back of my peice and it held it perfectly.

before I had to keep the piece long and clamp to my old plywood piece.  the above was must faster.

one note on using the edge guide you have to have it run off the edge of the table due to the height of the edge guile is about 1" and the piece is 3/4 so by using my method it worked fantastic.

for you making small pieces this table would be perfect.  if you can afford it go and buy it, get the mft 1080. 

 
I am no expert.  i am not a professional WW'er.  i do mostly small projects.  I have found so many uses for the MFT that had not been demo'd to me before purchase that i have niether time nor space to relate.  (that might be a slight exageration, but it hits the point)  You will find, with experience that the limitations for use of the MFT will be limited only by your own deficiencies of immagination.  When you reach the limitations in that area, come back to the FOG and you will find new ways to stretch those limitations even further.  You might just blow your mind from trying to retain so much information. :-\ :P ::) :o ;D ;D ;D.

All kidding aside, you would not regret purchase.  the problem now is the discontinuation of the models we all have worked with up until now.  We are all (most of us/or maybe only some of us) hoping the new replacement model will be an improvement (in my own case, i don't see it as possible, but I'm looking forward to a surprise) over the old. 

Welcome to the SS (Slippery Slope)

Tinker
 
I started with one MFT1080.  I now have two of them connected together, and they are the center of my home, semi-pro shop.  Scroll down to the link at this Festool-USA page entitled, "Getting the most from the MFT multifunction table by Jerry Work":
http://www.festoolusa.com/woodworking.aspx

I used to struggle with clamping.  The MFT is a great clamping solution.  Crosscuts are a breeze on panels using the MFT.  Follow Jerry's advice on squaring cabinetry, and your out-of-square cabinets will disappear - assuming you cut all the pieces the same length on your MFT first.  Good luck.
 
Can't tell from your post if you 1) are looking at one wondering if you should buy it or 2) bought one and are disappointed with the results of using it on a project.

Either way, I would guess that most people who come across it blind echo the comments of honeydokreg--I know I thought it of an overpriced piece of MDF when I first saw it. I am purely an amateur trying to learn to build cabinets and furniture.

I don't have a traditional WW bench.

The MFT gets more use than any other Festool in my shop. Clamping is my #1 use--perhaps if I had a traditional bench I would use it instead, but maybe not.

Yesterday I need to cut a half-circle out, decided to use a router with a trammel base (std accessory with the 2 1/2HP Triton router). HAd never cut a circle with a router before, was a bit puzzled how to not cut through the workpiece into whatever it was sitting on. Long story short: wound up clamping the workpiece and a piece of sacrificial particle board sandwiched on top of the MFT. The ability to clamp THROUGH the table instead of just outside it is powerful, since you can position pieces in all sorts of weird ways. the combination of the clamping elements to hold things laterally and the "normal" clamps (I like the fast ones) to hold things down gives me a lot of flexibility in clamping: panel glueups, jig holddowns, alignment setups, etc.

Without a normal WW bench I find hand planing on the MFT troublesome. I could fix that by attaching the table to a studier base; perhaps I will. Plus the ability to clamp on the side of the table to hold something like in a traditional face vise isn't nearly as powerful as a WW bench.

I can't imagine using the Domino without the table--I did a (for me) tricky Domino joint yesterday and the results were perfect--required the clamping flexibility of the MFT.

I do all my sanding there. I have a little $20 stool from Ikea with a back, I hook up my Festool sander and vac, clamp my piece, turn on the radio, and go to town. Takes ALL the pain out of what used to be a nasty noisy job.

And the MFT + TS-55 is a hard combo to beat. I don't use that saw as much as others do on my MFT--it's primarily a sheet goods saw for me (cut downs on the floor on some pink foam). The table saw and SCMS do the bulk of ripping and cross-cutting. However, when I need to trim an edge off a panel or piece of plywood--especially when it's slightly angled to match another piece or to bring something square, I can't think of a better tool. Or, say you've got a bunch of little pieces that you want to the same exact length. You could set up a stop block and cut them repetitively on the TS or SCMS, but you can also lay them all down on the MFT side by side and make one cut. The guide rail provides enough pressure that nothing will move and the cut will be perfect.
 
  First things first.  If your book case is not square, plumb,or level, as mentioned previously, this is due to materials not being cut at 90 degree angles before assembly.  Probably the most important piece to make sure is square is the back panel.  This is the component that keeps the sides, top, and bottom perpendicular.
    As to the MFT, making square cuts is one of the many tasks this system is great at.  I am a carpenter by trade and like many of my fellow woodworkers I was taught to use a set of tools and skills.  The Festool systems were at first foreign to me and I might have said once or twice " thats stupid, who needs plunge saw.", or " I'll never remove my table saw from the center of my shop. ".  I ate my words.  I still use my table saw some processing and some moulding but now most cross cutting and cross dadoing are done on the MFT.  I won't leave home without it. 
 
Daviddubya said:
I started with one MFT1080.  I now have two of them connected together, and they are the center of my home, semi-pro shop.  Scroll down to the link at this Festool-USA page entitled, "Getting the most from the MFT multifunction table by Jerry Work":
http://www.festoolusa.com/woodworking.aspx

I used to struggle with clamping.  The MFT is a great clamping solution.  Crosscuts are a breeze on panels using the MFT.  Follow Jerry's advice on squaring cabinetry, and your out-of-square cabinets will disappear - assuming you cut all the pieces the same length on your MFT first.  Good luck.

Are the tables connected together or just standing side by side?
 
  Markus, he already answered the question, see the bold text in the quote. I find reading goes much smoother when you read all of the words.  ;D

Daviddubya said:
.....I started with one MFT1080.  I now have two of them connected together, and they are the center of my home, semi-pro shop......
 
KennyR said:
Is it something that will get easier with time?

Well, it will get better over time for sure.  But not easier:  as you get better, you'll drive yourself to higher levels of performance.  Sorry, but if you're motivated to do this kind of stuff, that's the kind of person you are  :)

But yes, if you start looking for where you went wrong on each project, then the next one will be even better.  On thing that has helped me a lot is making "trial versions" of projects.  It can double or triple the amount of time it takes to finish the final version, but you learn a lot if you try to find ways to improve your construction methods so you save steps or achieve more accuracy or both.

All the other advice on this thread is good, but I hope you'll find this a little encouraging and useful, too.

Regards,

John
 
  Don't sweat it John.  My motto is "practice, practice, practice".  I prototype everything and every process.  I had a job specific to tasks I thought I would do with a MFT so I bought it a month before I needed it on site.  I set it up, looked for flaws in the system, broke it down, expanded it, practiced with it, broke it,and fixed it.  Now I set the table on every site I'm on and I'm still looking new uses.
 
I have one large and two small mft's. With the ratcheting clamps you - like me could not work without them
 
I'll pile on...while I don't actually use my MFT a lot since I have a Euro slider in my shop, I do use it when it's the right tool. Since getting the slider, I've been moving away from using the TS for things like dados/grooves/rabbits and going to the router...the OF1400 in this case using both the MFT and the stand-alone rails. You cannot beat the MFT for crosscutting these kind of things. And given it's portable, it means so many home improvement projects can be kicked up a notch in quality relative to on-site fabrication.
 
WOW, Thanks for all the advice and encouragement.  I guess I might have done a search for the mft but it was a secondary question to why my stuff is always out of square. 

I thought I was being careful to cut square this time.  I will have to kick it up one more notch.  I am going to take another look at the mft when the new one comes out.

Thanks again.
 
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