TS 55 req went up in smoke

[Vanquish]

I was on a job yesterday and needed to make a couple of shelves out of 3/4 plywood. Was on the 4th cut and it felt like the saw started losing a little bit of power. Didn't think anything of it till about 5 seconds later when smoke started pouring out of the motor housing. I thought it may have been on fire with the amount of smoke coming out. The saw is completely dead now.

Im kind of bummed about this. The funny thing is I was working with two other guys on the job and had just finished telling them how great this saw was, and ten minutes later it died. [unsure] The thing is I've only had the saw for 3 years, only 13 days left on the warranty actually, so I'm boxing it up today to send it in for repairs. But it's had very light use. Since I own 2 table saws, the track saw only gets sparingly. If I had to guess, I'd say that it only has maybe 1 hour of run time, but probably less. It's still one of my most favorite tools in the shop though, and it has come in very handy when I needed to use it. 

I'm not sure if this is a common occurrence with these, but it has got me wondering how durable these track saws are.. Maybe I just got a bad one, but in 25 years I've only had one other tool go up in smoke. Kind of disappointing for a $600 saw.

 

[Mark Johnson]

Mine just did the same only 6 weeks old and less than 15 mins total run time.  It will be going to Festool Service after Xmas!

 

[peter halle]

Sorry to hear about your saw.  I would venture a guess that it is an anomaly based on the sheer number of users here for years that have used theirs without issues.

Mine for instance is ten years old this Xmas.

FESTOOL will take care of you.

Peter

 

[Rip Van Winkle]

Most of the Industrial brand power tools that list the information in their manuals, usually list service intervals of 250 hours of use, or more, before a tool needs to be sent in for cleaning and service. Some of the manusls list service intervals of 1,000 hours or more. I don't recall whether Festool lists service hour interval numbers in their manuals, but their saws should die that easily, with that little use unless the gear house leaked all its oil out. The only other thing I can think of is maybe the saws should be run under low or no load for a certain amount of time to make sure the motor brushes have worn in, and the gears have gotten burnished a bit to reduce internal friction and amperage draw on the motor.

 

[DzordanoBruno]

How long was your power cord?  When You use tool with long, thin power cord, than maybe you burn tool.

 

[jwick]

I once had a festool sander housing melt and fry out from the "Plug-it" cord not being fully engaged in the tool. Way out of warranty but I was surprised how inexpensive the replacement housing and connector was. Back up and running in no time.  Just something to consider. I often double check the cord now before tearing into a pile of work with any of the plug-it tools now.

 

[Holmz]

Most of the Industrial brand power tools that list the information in their manuals, usually list service intervals of 250 hours of use, or more, before a tool needs to be sent in for cleaning and service. Some of the manuals list service intervals of 1,000 hours or more. I don't recall whether Festool lists service hour interval numbers in their manuals, but their saws should die that easily, with that little use unless the gear house leaked all its oil out. The only other thing I can think of is maybe the saws should be run under low or no load for a certain amount of time to make sure the motor brushes have worn in, and the gears have gotten burnished a bit to reduce internal friction and amperage draw on the motor.

The OP mentioned that the saw has ~1 hours worth of use.

 

[Vanquish]

Yeah, I'm really surprised it had such a short life. I've heard of people having motor issues with the Kapex, but not really much with the track saw I didn't think. I know that sometimes expensive tools will just die for whatever reason, but when you have a saw that cost this much I guess I would expect it to last quite some time.  I mean the little 20v Dewalt circle Saw I got about three years ago gets used almost every day is still running just fine. Come to think of it I don't think I've ever had a motor in any of my Dewalt tools burn up like this.

Not bashing Festool, I love everything I have of theirs, but it does make you wonder I guess.

I'm pretty careful with the drop cords I use. 99% of the time the saw is plugged into the ct36 which is plugged directly into a wall outlet. In the rare occasion that I need to use a cord, it's a 12ga, and it's 25' or less. Also the plugit cord is always on the saw. I've probably only taken it off 2 or 3 times since I bought it.

Does festool give any new warranty after they send the tool back? I only ask because once it is returned to me there will probably be less than one week of warranty left on it.

 

[Rip Van Winkle]

Most of the Industrial brand power tools that list the information in their manuals, usually list service intervals of 250 hours of use, or more, before a tool needs to be sent in for cleaning and service. Some of the manuals list service intervals of 1,000 hours or more. I don't recall whether Festool lists service hour interval numbers in their manuals, but their saws should die that easily, with that little use unless the gear house leaked all its oil out. The only other thing I can think of is maybe the saws should be run under low or no load for a certain amount of time to make sure the motor brushes have worn in, and the gears have gotten burnished a bit to reduce internal friction and amperage draw on the motor.

The OP mentioned that the saw has ~1 hours worth of use.

I saw that. My point was that the two above mentioned saws should have far longer lifespans than it was mentioned they had, since Festool tools are supposedly manufactured for proffessional users who will use there tools repeatedly for long stretches at a time.

 

[mark60]

I think I'd cry if my 55REQ went up in smoke. About a month ago I thought mine was dying. At times it had no power and it stopped dead while cutting 3/4" ply. I checked the brushes, changed the blade but still had occasional losses of power. Always plugged directly into my CT26 with that to the outlet. I happened to plug my portable compressor into the same outlet one day and it sounded sick for a few seconds then popped the breaker. It was then that I realized I had a dehumidifier on the same circuit and figured out the problem my track saw had. Since running a dedicated circuit my saw has performed wonderfully.

 

[Job and Knock]

I don't know about the TS55REQ, but I have the older TS55EQ and it has now reached 5-1/2 years of age and has probably been used 4 hours a week (some weeks that will be 15 or more hours a week) for 30+ weeks a year for its' entire life (so maybe 600 to 700 hours use, asa minimum). To date I have worn out one base plate and one Systainer, but the motor keeps going on and on. Just posting to show the other side of Festool tools in use