Las Vegas FOG Tool Training!

[joraft]

It was a complete surprise to receive the invitation, both that Festool was doing the event and that I was invited.  Matthew, of course, should have been at the top of the invitation list without question.  I knew the other attendees from FOG, and they seemed good choices as well...

Ned

Ned, as much as I would have loved to attend an event like this, I have to agree that the choices made good sense.

I think anyone who reads this forum on a regular basis knows that it's you guys that are most certain to put any information you received to good use for the benefit of everyone here.

John

 

[Dave Ronyak]

No Dan, this is the pic of Dave trying to walk out the door with the Kapex, I'm glad security didn't ruff him up too bad.  

PeterK, details are coming.

Brice is correct.  If you guys hadn't been blocking my pathway, I'd have been headed for Ned's truck!!  Kapex is easily carried by a 155 lb man.

As for my closed eyes, I was trying to save my sight so I could make my escape.  (Smiles!)

Dave R.

 

[Per Swenson]

First off sometimes I go with the attitude that I pretty much know all about the tools I own.

The reality is, that just wasn't the case. These tools are just so much more.

For instance, lets step back for a second to the ct 22 and the blower part described above.

Yes you can stick another hose to the blower to vent fumes outside.....BUT!

And I never use exclamation points, I am allowed only a half dozen every year.

You can hook 2 (I have two) ct's together for super suction. Suck on that a moment.

Now a few things about that Kapex above.

I was going to buy one, eventually, when I can afford one. (Business not so hot this season),

But in the same respect I don't see how I can not to afford to invest in it.

The advantages really do not become glaringly apparent until you have it in your hot little hands.

Struggle with your old saw a 1/2 degree out of detent? Constantly. (The competition all slips).

Put the saw where you want it stays. Like a rock.

Now I don't cut crown flat and on the bevel. Why? To much thinking. Becomes to much time.

When you hear or read , cuts crown in the nested position to 6 5/8 doesn't,

put it in to perspective until you see the picture. So rather then go into exhaustive detail,

just take a lookee here.

Per
[attachimg=#]

 

[Brice Burrell]

..............The advantages really do not become glaringly apparent until you have it in your hot little hands.

Struggle with your old saw a 1/2 degree out of detent? Constantly. (The competition all slips).

Put the saw where you want it stays. Like a rock................

My standard is 1/4 degree, if a saw can't be adjusted to a 1/4 degree I can't make money with it. The Kapex had no problems locking a 1/4 degree even at the detents. As the guys on the trip can attest, I tried for 5 minutes to see if I could get it to fall back into the detent with no luck.

 

[Dan Clark]

..............The advantages really do not become glaringly apparent until you have it in your hot little hands.

Struggle with your old saw a 1/2 degree out of detent? Constantly. (The competition all slips).

Put the saw where you want it stays. Like a rock................

My standard is 1/4 degree, if a saw can't be adjusted to a 1/4 degree I can't make money with it. The Kapex had no problems locking a 1/4 degree even at the detents. As the guys at the on the trip can attest, I tried for 5 minutes to see if I could get it to fall back into the detent with no luck.

Yep, I can confirm that!  First I watched Per and Brice try it over and over.  Then I tried it.  Positive lock with no slippage.  It's extremely precise. 

Another feature I liked a lot was the bevel adjustment and the bevel scale.  The scale is much bigger and more precise than my Bosch.  The combo of the scale and bevel adjustor makes it trivially easy to dial in a very precise bevel. 

One issue that concerned me was the vertical handle.  I thought that it would be a big issue for shorter guy's like me.  It turned out to be non-issue.  Pulling the big green trigger to the first detent released the handle allowing it come down.  Then pressing the top green button and pressing the green trigger to the second detent worked very nicely.  It only took me a minute to get used to it.   

I'll post more pics later.

Regards,

Dan.

p.s. I posted more pics this morning in the Las Vegas gallery:http://www.festoolownersgroup.com/CoppermineMain/thumbnails.php?album=96.  If anyone wants to use them, go for it.

 

[Dan Clark]

CT22 with the top completely removed:

Regards,

Dan.

What was this about?

Is this an example of cork flooring we've been hearing so much about lately?

The cork flooring was very nice, but that wasn't the point of the photo.  Brice, Ned, Dave, and I poked and prodded the CT for about 20 minutes.  The CT22 had several features that I knew nothing about:

- The top can be completely removed.  This makes it very easy to empty out if you have a bag failure.

-The "Dust Trap" "Dirt Trap" bucket can be very useful when using the CT as a wet vac because you can just lift out the pail and empty it.  (Use the  Wet Filter Elements in place of your standard filter elements.)

- Below the CT motor is the exhaust plenum.  This routes the exhaust from the hepa filters out the side of the vac.  It's NOT obvious, but it's got foam noise reducers built in.  (Look in the Exhaust Port.)

- When you raise the vac lid, a little trap door closes off access to the vac exhaust pleanum so that dust and dirt doesn't get down in the exhaust plenum.  Slowly raise the CT top and watch the trap close off.

- It's not obvious until you look closely, but the CT has two separate air paths.  The most obvious is the path from the hose to the bag, through the hepa filters, down through the exhaust plenum, and then out throught the Exhaust Port and vents.    The less obvious is a second air path for the motor.  It draws in air through a completely separate vent and out through a complete separate vent.  (Apparently some Fein vac users think that Fein is the only one that does that.)

- The exhaust port on the left has some useful features.  When you plug a hose in there, it shuts off the other two vents above it and you can run it outside so that dust doesn't blow around.  Exhaust Port and vents:

Hose in Exhaust Port:

One thing this examination proved was the depth of Festool engineering.  There are a large number if very nice, very sophisticated features in Festool products that are hidden away inside.

I'll post more pics this evening.

Regards,

Dan.

 

[Ned]

Bet no one returned home with much in their wallet... 

If it hadn't been for the gambling in our hotel, none of us would have seen any.  "Good luck at the tables" means "Got your MFT perfectly aligned."

Some other trip notes:

There was a convenient kennel between the hotel and the training center to stash Pico the FesPoodle.

April has got to be the perfect time to come to Las Vegas.  Sunny.  Lows of 55 F (13 C), highs around 85 F (29 C).  Low humidity.  Extremely comfortable.  Not really "high desert", the altitude is only 1900 feet (580m).

Even if you have no interest in gambling, Las Vegas is an interesting place to visit, based on my past experience.  This time, we saw nothing but the training center and dinner, and I'm not complaining.

Ned

 

[Madtown Rob]

Guys  - I am very jealous - but not quite as jealous as I was when my wife got to attend Festool U in LV last fall.  :-X

Looking froward to the right-ups on the new tools.

Keep up the good work!

- Rob

 

[GreenGA]

I'm very impressed that Festool hosted this event!

When I worked as a software developer at IBM and at Microsoft, we had large user groups and hosted annual meetings that representatives of those groups attended.  It was a great way for us to stay in touch with our users.  It's great to see something like this being done by a tool manufacturer.

If it was at the same time (IBM & MS), that almost sounds like OS/2 development...

 

[Jack Reeves]

Did anybody get a picture of the winner? I heard he was one good looking dude!

 

[Brice Burrell]

Did anybody get a picture of the winner? I heard he was one good looking dude!

Hey Jack, good to see you here, Jack and his son Kyle were the Woodcraft winners that joined us on the trip.

 

[Ned]

Did anybody get a picture of the winner? I heard he was one good looking dude!

Can I take that as permission to post your picture?  It came out pretty well.  Considering...  ;D

Ned

 

[Michael Kellough]

It's not obvious until you look closely, but the CT has two separate air paths.   The most obvious is the path from the hose to the bag, through the hepa filters, down through the exhaust plenum, and then out throught the Exhaust Port and vents.    The less obvious is a second air path for the motor.  It draws in air through a completely separate vent and out through a complete separate vent.   (Apparently some Fein vac users think that Fein is the only one that does that.)

Dan.

I think all dual stage (Turbo) vacs have a separate cooling air supply.

 

[Jack Reeves]

Sure, Ned... but considering what?????

 

[Dave Ronyak]

..............The advantages really do not become glaringly apparent until you have it in your hot little hands.

Struggle with your old saw a 1/2 degree out of detent? Constantly. (The competition all slips).

Put the saw where you want it stays. Like a rock................

My standard is 1/4 degree, if a saw can't be adjusted to a 1/4 degree I can't make money with it. The Kapex had no problems locking a 1/4 degree even at the detents. As the guys on the trip can attest, I tried for 5 minutes to see if I could get it to fall back into the detent with no luck.

I would like to add to what Brice and others have said about the Kapex, although I am not a major user of any CMS in my woodworking and DIY house repair and remodeling as a hobbyist.  The Kapex impressed me in many ways.  Its large scales are very easy to read while standing normally in front of the saw.  No stooping or squinting is needed like on many other saws.  To adjust the bevel angle, you simply twist the handle on the right side of the blade (like a throttle on a motorcycle), which gives you very exact control over even a little tweak.  Similarly, the trenching depth control is a small green lever on the right side of the blade that you push-pull to engage-disengage, and you twist to adjust the depth of cut.  Very simple, and very quick and precise to adjust.  The fences are likewise precise and quick and easy to adjust/remove.  The hold down clamp works much like the clamping elements for the MFT.  You simply slide the head of the clamp to contact your workpiece, then flip the lever which advances the clamp to apply more clamping force and to lock the clamp and workpiece in position.  Much better and faster than the screw clamps common on other mitre saws.  The dual lasers shine dashed lines which exactly identify where the sides of the kerf will be.  The lasers can be turned on/off separately from running the saw.  They are fully adjustable if needed, but should be dead-on when a new Kapex is delivered.  The frame of the saw appears to be very robust where it needs to be to maintain alignment.   The guide rods on which the saw traverses the workpiece are quite large compared to some competitors and are widely spaced apart, which should enhance stability of the cut line during movement of the saw along the rods.  Dust collection is 91 percent according to Festool, which they measured by comparing the weight of the board before cutting and the combined weights of the cut segments of the board and the sawdust collected by a CT vacuum through a 36 mm AS hose.  Very impressive.  But you must use this larger hose and a vacuum to get these results.  Cut quality was excellent, as expected.  Festool supplies a high quality blade.  Due to clever arrangement of the fence relative to the blade arbor, baseboard stock over 4  inches tall (4 1/2 I think, but others may need to correct this)  can be cut standing up against the fence.  Even little old me can lift and carry it easily due to its relatively low weight of 47 pounds and conveniently designed in grip points.  I'm 5' 8" and 61 years old, and don't work out in a gym.

Dave R.

 

[Ned]

[attachimg=#]

Considering I wasn't using a flash.  Top that, Clark.

BTW, Jack, welcome to FOG.  What a great start on the slippery green slope!

Ned

 

[Jack Reeves]

You did get a picture!  Wish you'd had a younger subject. Speaking of which, did Kyle dodge all the cameras?  He wasn't exactly photoshop ready.

 

[Dave Ronyak]

I would like to hear more about the MFK 700, that tool has really caught my interest. Also I seen Per wasn't wearing a dead animal on his head, was you able to recognize him without it? ;D

Rob,

Here's what I learned about the MFK 700.  The Festool representatives stated that the motor is nearly the same as that of the barrel grip Trion jigsaw.  It is rated at 723 Watts (746 W =1 Hp).  The MFK 700 should be great for banding and inlay work.  You can set the centerline of the banding/inlay without the router motor in its base.  When trimming a banded edge, a sensor bearing runs on the banded edge spaced away from the edge being cut which reduces/avoids ingress of debris into the bearing.  The aperture of the vertical motor position base is threaded to accept standard PC bushings.  The green bit depth control knob is large and clearly marked to indicate which way to turn it to adjust the depth of cut in one-tenth millimeter increments.  There are two short, spaced apart guide rods that support the motor relative to the base to prevent any tipping of the motor relative to the base.  The range of depth adjustment is limited, but is very precise and repeatable, in either direction.  During the hands-on demonstrations we saw and used both the 1 1/2 degree horizontal motor base and the vertical motor base.  With the 1 1/2 degree base, the depth was adjusted to get the trimmed banded edge exactly even with the face of the pre-finished maple plywood, and upward and downward to show the effects on the cut edge following a very slight adjustment of the depth of cut.  Turning the height adjustment knob merely a click or two downward below perfectly flush allowed the bit to cut a gentle ramp (one and one-half degrees) on the face of the panel.  Raising the bit the same amount eliminated any cutting into the face.  With the motor installed into the vertical base, we trimmed a panel that was coated with plastic laminate.  As with the 1 1/2 degree horizontal base, the adjustments were easy and precise.  Dust collection in both operational modes was excellent.   A traditional edge guide is available for the MFK 700.  It was shown to us, but was not demonstrated.  This edge guide would be useful for inlay banding work.  The zero degree horizontal motor base was not demonstrated.   The MFK 700 was relatively quiet, as expected, given its relatively small motor.  

Dave R.

 

[Brice Burrell]

You did get a picture!  Wish you'd had a younger subject. Speaking of which, did Kyle dodge all the cameras?  He wasn't exactly photoshop ready.

Here's Kyle, he had a run in with a turkey, no not Dan Clark.  

 

[Jack Reeves]

[attachthumb=#]
Here's Kyle, he had a run in with a turkey, no not Dan Clark.  

He definitely did that!  Fortunately the score was:  Kyle 1, Turkey 0