Kapex and planer

[L2theP]

Just picked up the Kapex on wednesday along with some crown stops, the 80 tooth blade, the smaller 65 planer and the head/15-3 light.  so far i am extatic with my purchase, the lasers were dead on out of the box on the kapex, the cuts were amazingly smooth, one thing i did notice is the stock 60tooth blade didn't do too well with cutting down a 4x4 island leg made out of cherry as there was quite a bit of tearout on the edge pressed against the fence, but you cant expect much out of a 60 tooth blade.
The planer is probably the smoothest i have ever used, just amazing in how smoothly it takes off material without jolting side pulling while working on a wide plank.

my only dissapointment is that festool did not include a finish quality blade in a saw for 1300$, the crown stops and the blade brought the total cost of the saw to 1600$ plus tax out the door which is a ton of money, and there is no way i will ever be able to justify spending an additional 1000$+ for the kapex stand with extensions. 

Festool should come out with a portable stand, light weight, foldable legs with extending arms,  something like the bosch stand, and please keep the price under 500$!!! hehe, i can always jump out of pocket for a highly engineered piece of equipment with high quality parts, but i will not pay 700$ for a few pieces of aluminum.

once again festool did not dissapoint. 

 

[chrisrosenb]

my only dissapointment is that festool did not include a finish quality blade in a saw for 1300$,

Not sure what blade came in your saw, but my saw came with a finish blade. 

Chris

 

[festoller]

Usually the Kapex (KS120 & KS88) comes with the HW universal saw blade W60 #494604.

HW universal saw blade W60 #494604:

    * For working with every type of wood and wood composite as well as building panels, gypsum fibre boards and soft plastic
    * Because of the alternating teeth and the medium rake angle, this saw blade is suitable for both rip cuts as well as cross cuts

Fine tooth saw blade W80 #494605:

    * For clean and splinter-free cross cuts in solid wood as well as for coated or veneered panels

It would be great to hear more about your experience with the W80 and the EHL65. I was thinking about buying the 65 instead of a thicknesser or to cover some of the hand planing work.

 

[Brice Burrell]

L2, there is very little difference in cut quality between the 60 and 80 tooth Festool blades. In fact a fair number of guys prefer the 60T blade. You do have other choices, Forrest and Tenryu have blades for the Kapex. Good luck.

 

[WarnerConstCo.]

To me, 80 teeth is too many teeth for a 10" blade.

It can't clear the cuts fast enough and will start to burn sooner.

Against better judgments, I should have one of my 60t matsush!ta blades back from the re-boring guy this week.

 

[L2theP]

i mainly work with maple, qs oak, walnut and mohagany, i build and install kitchens, lately i have been doing more installations rather then whole builds and for the most part my saw is used for small trim along with solid wood crown and my blades of choice are the tenryu silencers which came in 100t for my 12" dewalt and 60t for my 8 1/2" dewalt and i loved how smooth and flawless these blades have been.  And while i do appreciate the speed a 60t blade provides, the smoothness of 80t+ blade does it for me much better, i often use the cmt blade cleaner on my blades which prevents the burn-in buildup around the edges of the teeth and from experiance it does prolong the period of use in between sharpenings.
Although my outlook on blades might be affected by the accuracy and lack of wobble that the kapex offers vs my dewalts which have served me well up to date.  So i will check back in after a few months of use, as of right now i'm going to let the w80 hang out on the sidelines and will use the w60 for a while.
Do appreciate all your toughts

 

[twistsol]

I've had the same issue with tearout on the back of cuts, slowing the speed at which I pull the blade down through the work seems to have helped a bit, but still not perfect.

As far as a stand, My Kapex is on a $99 Ryobi stand which is foldable and very easy to put in and out of the truck. It's sort of like putting a Ming vase on a cinder block pedestal but it works quite well. The stops are far too sloppy on it to use for anything other than framing though.

 

[erikfsn]

I used my 80 tooth blade for the first time yesterday and thought it gave a very nice cut in cherry. Noticeably less tear-out than with the 60 tooth blade my Kapex came with.

 

[danrush]

I prefer the 80t for the pre-finished trims and crowns that I install.  Yes, it gums up a bit sooner than a 60t, but the tearout is significantly less.  ( most of my mouldings are finished with conversion-varnish, tough on blades, requiring lots of cleaning)

Dan

 

[Warrior]

A high quality blade will have zero tearout when sharp. Both festool's 60t and 80t blades have significant tearout on the back of the cut. I had both a forrest and frued ultimate cutoff blade rebored for the Kapex the the cut quality from both far surpasses the festool blades.

IMO the festool blades for the Kapex are total duds and should have never passed muster. HUGE!

Me thinks the carbide in the kapex blades are low quality as well. I had the 80t sharpenned and did a wainscot job and after about 500 cuts in small pine mouldings was totally dull!  [eek]

 

[rnt80]

A high quality blade will have zero tearout when sharp. Both festool's 60t and 80t blades have significant tearout on the back of the cut. I had both a forrest and frued ultimate cutoff blade rebored for the Kapex the the cut quality from both far surpasses the festool blades.

IMO the festool blades for the Kapex are total duds and should have never passed muster. HUGE!

Me thinks the carbide in the kapex blades are low quality as well. I had the 80t sharpenned and did a wainscot job and after about 500 cuts in small pine mouldings was totally dull!  [eek]

I've got to agree with Eiji on the Kapex blades.  I bought the finish blade a couple of months ago and I've come to regret that purchase.  I didn't see any noticeable difference when I first started using it and it certainly hasn't got any better.  Anyone have any experience with the Tenryu blades for the Kapex?

 

[WarnerConstCo.]

Several years ago I used the Leitz blades and was happy with them.  I switched to Tenryu for a couple years and then found matsushita.

I will agree the Festool blade (Lietz) is not as good as they used to be.  I had a Matsushita re-bored and am looking forward to putting it to work soon.

I will save my factory kapex blade for the muck work.

I guess none of the blades that come with miter saws these days are all that great.

The factory 60t Kapex blade cut great but, not for very long.  It is kind of surprising as the TS saws are the same brand.

 

[JohnDistai]

Could someone please tell me more about "reboring"?  I assume it is making he arbor hole smaller or larger.  I assume that I couldn't just take a drill bit and make the hole larger.  Where would one take a blade to be "rebored"?  What does something like that usually cost?

Thanks!

 

[ForumMFG]

I would assume you could take it to any local machine shop to have it taken care of.  Or even the place you have your blades sharpened.

I don't know if you can make a hole smaller by re-boring it =). 

 

[WarnerConstCo.]

Could someone please tell me more about "reboring"?  I assume it is making he arbor hole smaller or larger.  I assume that I couldn't just take a drill bit and make the hole larger.  Where would one take a blade to be "rebored"?  What does something like that usually cost?

Thanks!

Re-boring does not seem like a real safe DIY type project.

There is a lot of spinning force and could be very dangerous if not done properly.

 

[L2theP]

i just ordered two tenryu blades, a 80 tooth which was 128$ and a 72tooth silencer for a little over 90$, will see which one is better, after a little bit of testing i will shout back with results.

 

[JohnDistai]

What does it typically cost to rebore a blade?  Do you take it to a machine shop?

In regards to making the hole smaller, a skilled machinist or welder could fill the hole in and then bore it to the correct arbor size and balance it.  That's why I'm asking.

 

[WarnerConstCo.]

Between 10 and 20 bucks to re-bore.

A machine shop might, a good saw sharpener should be able to re-bore as well.

 

[Brice Burrell]

What does it typically cost to rebore a blade?  Do you take it to a machine shop?

In regards to making the hole smaller, a skilled machinist or welder could fill the hole in and then bore it to the correct arbor size and balance it.  That's why I'm asking.

Forrest charges $11 USD. I believe a bushing can sometimes be used (for standard sizes) to fit smaller arbors. I think Forrest may make custom bushings but I'm not sure.

 

[JohnDistai]

What does it typically cost to resharpen a blade?  I've considered throwing out some old Freud blades and buying new ones for my other saws, but maybe that wouldn't be so wise...