jonny round boy
Member
- Joined
- Jul 21, 2007
- Messages
- 3,227
Just got back from my visit to the Festool roadshow at Ellis & Sons in Bradford. Met up with a couple of the Festool UK guys I knew previously (Gordon and Trevor) and had a play with the new EHL65 planer.
I've never used the old EHL65, so can't tell you if it feels any different to that, but it feels really nice to use. Nice finish too. Easily took 4mm at a time off a piece of 2" beech, with no clogging to the 27mm hose (which was a bit of a surprise).
There's not much that's new on it, other than the addition of the plug-it and the soft-grip handle, but it is slightly lighter than the old version, or so I was told.
Found out a few interesting things. Some new Festool tools coming out in September (brand new tools, not upgrades to existing ones like the TS55R or the EHL65...). I don't have any details though, I'm afraid [sad].
Seems this whole roadshow was a last minute thing - Festool UK were only told by Germany just before Christmas that it was going to be happening, so they didn't have long to plan it. Also, the Festool UK guys didn't even see the truck, or know what tools were or weren't on it, until the morning of the first day. One of our Scottish members said that when he went it appeared that the Festool UK guys didn't know what they were doing - that's 'cos they didn't!
I saw the Centrotec forstner bit set & loved it so much that I bought one. I also got given another £50 voucher, and may have 'accidentally' bought a PS420...
Unfortunately I didn't get to bring them home today, as Ellis didn't have any left. One of their guys said they'd ordered £30k's worth of Festool stuff for this roadshow day, but most of it had already gone by the time I got there! [eek] It was a great day for them, they'd sold over 50 machines by 1pm. Festool said it was the best day they'd had so far in terms of sales and footfall.
If you get a chance to go to any of the forthcoming dates, I'd definitely recommend it - there's not not much 'new' stuff to see, but you can have a play with all the stuff you don't already have (unless you're JMB and already have everything [poke]).
I've never used the old EHL65, so can't tell you if it feels any different to that, but it feels really nice to use. Nice finish too. Easily took 4mm at a time off a piece of 2" beech, with no clogging to the 27mm hose (which was a bit of a surprise).
There's not much that's new on it, other than the addition of the plug-it and the soft-grip handle, but it is slightly lighter than the old version, or so I was told.
Found out a few interesting things. Some new Festool tools coming out in September (brand new tools, not upgrades to existing ones like the TS55R or the EHL65...). I don't have any details though, I'm afraid [sad].
Seems this whole roadshow was a last minute thing - Festool UK were only told by Germany just before Christmas that it was going to be happening, so they didn't have long to plan it. Also, the Festool UK guys didn't even see the truck, or know what tools were or weren't on it, until the morning of the first day. One of our Scottish members said that when he went it appeared that the Festool UK guys didn't know what they were doing - that's 'cos they didn't!
I saw the Centrotec forstner bit set & loved it so much that I bought one. I also got given another £50 voucher, and may have 'accidentally' bought a PS420...
Unfortunately I didn't get to bring them home today, as Ellis didn't have any left. One of their guys said they'd ordered £30k's worth of Festool stuff for this roadshow day, but most of it had already gone by the time I got there! [eek] It was a great day for them, they'd sold over 50 machines by 1pm. Festool said it was the best day they'd had so far in terms of sales and footfall.
If you get a chance to go to any of the forthcoming dates, I'd definitely recommend it - there's not not much 'new' stuff to see, but you can have a play with all the stuff you don't already have (unless you're JMB and already have everything [poke]).
