Steveo48 said:
They're both expensive. A 9 drawer sortainer is over $100.00. As Julian suggested, look at the kind of storage you could get for that money. Really GOOD storage that a 5 YO with a T ball bat or a fall down an unfinished stairway won't destroy.
I agree the locking box thing is pretty cool. Having everything look uniform is very professional. They all utilize space very well but I would never call them a great value, there are more cost effective ways to get it done. These things don't do the work, they just organize stuff.
I believe the price of Festools in general scares away a lot of potential users, the price of sortainers and systainers is an easy example. It is, after all, just a plastic box to hold stuff. It didn't take a degreed engineer to come up with the design, nore require that it be built in Europe under stern German supervision. The same box of the same quality could be pumped out of Asia for a small fraction of what they are asking for them.
Again I'm not saying they are bad, I just don't see them as a good value for the money.
I think the vast majority of people would agree with you that they are expensive - including me. The same applies to most items marketed by Festool, from router bits to saws, and dust bags to drills.
Whether they are "good value for money" is a different kettle of fish, as it depends on several factors and the perspective of the user. There are many who would argue that buying cheaply-made items is a false economy, as they often don't last as long as more expensive items. To keep the price down, inferior materials are used, less thought and testing is put into their design, and quality control is skimped.
If we take a sander as an example, then for someone who only needs it for light tasks around the house might well be happy with a cheap sander. It does the job, it doesn't cost much, and he considers it good value for the money. The fact that it vibrates a bit and produces quite a lot of dust doesn't concern him too much, because he doesn't use it for long periods.
However, if the same sander was used day-in day-out by a tradesman, it might only last a few months before it wore out. If the cheap sander has to be replaced after a few months hard use, then the cost of buying replacements mounts up over time. There is also the inconvenience when it breaks down whilst trying to meet a deadline, and the downtime and travel/shipping costs involved when getting a replacement. The vibration and dust, which didn't bother the occasional user, would also be damaging to the tradesman's health.
Many tradesmen would rather purchase more expensive tools which were designed to last much longer, and have better ergonomics. And when they did break down, they could be repaired rather than replaced. To
some users, it is therefore the more expensive sander that would be better value for money, and the cheap sander would be considered a
waste of money.
The same can also apply to tool boxes. A cheap toolbox, made out of thin plastic, with plastic bendy hinges and thin steel catches might be considered by the occasional user as being good value for money. He just wants an inexpensive place to store his tools, and it might last for a few years if opened a few times every weekend.
In the hands of a tradesman, the toolbox is quite liable to fall apart after a few weeks of normal use carrying tools - the handle might break, the catches might slip, or the hinge might crack. If that happens when the box is being carried across a concrete floor, a muddy worksite, or a newly-installed wood floor in a customer's home, then the result could be
very expensive. The tradesman is very unlikely to give the thumbs-up and consider it good value for money!
Instead, he'd probably prefer something that is well-designed, made of sturdy materials, and can be used for other things too. Festool's Systainer and Sortainer range are designed with heavy use in mind. For example, the handles are rated to 440 lbs, and the lids have been designed so that you can stand on them. In the words of the manufacturer:
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Systainers are made of ABS plastic. The advantage of ABS is that it combines the strength and rigidity of the acrylics with the toughness of rubber. The most amazing mechanical properties of ABS are resistance and toughness. Impact resistance does not fall off rapidly at lower temperatures.
The handle is rated at 200 kg, or 440 lbs. Due to the latches, your actual capacity will be significantly less, but don?t be afraid to pack them and stack them. These rugged cases are designed for demanding tasks.
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Given the number of tasks that they can be used for, their durability, their space efficiency, and their stackability, I suggest that many tradesmen might indeed regard the Systainer as being good value for money!
As regards just being made of plastic, the Sortainer actually contains quite a bit of metal, as the "shelves" have aluminium strengthening. I can take a photo if you'd like to see how it's constructed.
In summary, there's little dispute that Festool kit is expensive. Whether the kit is "good value for money" very much depends on the user's perspective. If you don't see them as being good value for money, that's fine by me, but quite a few will hold the opposite opinion!
Forrest