Okay - 2 saws, now what?

[dwk]

A search indicates there hasn't been a frankensaw thread for a while, and since I'm ripping some plywood for other purposes this weekend I figured I'd start on the torsion box and need to figure out what I'm doing.

Background (longish, but I'm new so it's a bit of an intro)

I'm in a single-garage shop, and so am limited on space. Decided to replace my jet contractors saw with the BT3000, partially due to space - a half-rail wide cabinet that integrates storage and a router table is about the same size as the Jet. After looking at the price of the wide table kit and thinking about the wisdom of replacing comodity technology with custom technology that has just been discontiued, I jumped on a 2nd BT3000 off craigslist to ensure I had spare parts. (of course this was AFTER I bought an extra fence to replace the broken one and an blade guard that was missing from my first one....)

So, the opportunity presents itself for two approaches - conventional wide table or some type of frankensaw. I'm limited to about 66" width (I was originally thinking 60 but I can probably stretch a bit), and looking at things, that looks to be about the minimum width for a frankensaw - you get 5 'slots' which would presumably be configured:
SMT-saw1-smt/access-saw2-access/router

I'm not entiely convinced that the two-saw approach is overly useful, as I don't really do wide rips and with this 'narrow' a setup a dado station would require removing the saw1 guard. Also, the router table setup becomes a bit odd - I'm planning it on the right edge with the working space to the left, but I don't think that's how it was intended. OTOH it makes for a very easy way to get a wide table setup quickly - no need to build rail support or adjust/level additional surface area. For this reason alone I'll probably try it to start with. (well, plus I don't really have anywhere to store the 2nd saw :-))

Some questions, I guess (since the thread would be pretty useless without them)
- is 66" too narrow to realize any benefit of two saws? I obviously need to be sure of the config before cutting the rails, and I have very little 'seat time' on the BT so far and am still getting a feel for the flexibility and spacing.
- has anyone ever done a setup where you can slide the 2nd saw left/right to alter the configuration? Hard to see how this would be done easily (miter track in the cabinet top that the saws slide into?), but it might allow for dual active crosscut stations (eg different miter angles on each) without giving up right support for dados. ie you could convert from the above config to
smt-saw1-access-access-smt-saw2
- what am I missing? At the price these things are going for, I would have expected more folks to try the dual-saw setup. I'm suspicious that since they seem to be rare they must not be too useful in the real world.

Sorry for the long first post - hopefully some of you made it this far :-) Thanks in advance for any comments and/or advice.

Doug.

[Knottscott]

Wouldn't a wide table setup or frankensaw kind of defeat the space savings objective?

[TheRic]

Wouldn't a wide table setup or frankensaw kind of defeat the space savings objective?

"Forget it, he's rolling!"

Boon - Animal House

[Knottscott]

"Forget it, he's rolling!"

Boon - Animal House

Maybe we should be talking about that shop addition...

[John Hunter]

I have two saws. A BT3000 and a BT3100. I have the BT3100 set up with a wide table and an runout table, the BT3000 is separate and set up as a permanent dado saw with the side left open for quick access and width adjustments. Works great for me.

[dwk]

Wouldn't a wide table setup or frankensaw kind of defeat the space savings objective?

Not at all - it's apparently been a while since you looked at a Jet contractors saw. In a space that is about the same width as the Jet but about 16" shallower I get a saw, a router table plus some extra storage in the mobile base. I come out way ahead. That motor hanging out back is a big space eater.

[Russianwolf]

Too bad you already replaced the blade guard. If you had opted for a Sharkguard you could remove the guard very quickly and easily.

[Knottscott]

Not at all - it's apparently been a while since you looked at a Jet contractors saw. In a space that is about the same width as the Jet but about 16" shallower I get a saw, a router table plus some extra storage in the mobile base. I come out way ahead. That motor hanging out back is a big space eater.

Guess we'll hold off on the barn raising for now...

[tropicaffair]

Doug,

There are quite a few older threads on frankensaws, and recently in the past few months I was able to purchase another forum member's BT3100 to compliment mine - Thank You Vinht! I too am space challenged ( my shop is 7'6" wide by 30' long, an old job site trailer) so I joined the 2 saws with half rails for now (I think I'm in the 62"-66" total width range). I haven't finalized my cabinet plans for this frankensaw setup but for now I mounted the 2 saws on a 3/4" plywood base mounted on top of one BT3000 rectangular stand with a Delta mobile base. This is my temporary setup which works fine for now, plus I need the saw and the dado head (mounted in the left saw) to construct the new cabinet.
As far as usefullness, this setup works for me as I do a fair amount of sheetgood construction and I can roll the assembly 90 degrees off the wall and do long rips.

I've included several photos of the construction of my "temporary" base. Hope this helps.

The first photo is my 3100 and the second photo is teh 3100 I purchaced from Vinht. The rest are assembly and final orientation related.

[wwday3]

I never thought of that....

Boy, you guys are making me feel stooopid. Here's why...

I've owned a BT3000 - with it's original stand (I built a "mobile cabinet" setup for my CMS instead) - plus a wide table kit. I sorta have room for the wide table if I keep my saw setting diagonally in my garage bay shop, and move everything else around it if I need to change it's orientation.

Recently, because of all the talk about the BT3100 possibly being discontinued - plus the fact that one was on sale at HD - I bought a new 3100. My thought was that I could use the tops and some of the hardware - sold the rails on eBay - and I would "save" the saw itself as a "spare" in case I burned up the 3000 motor someday.

Recently I was looking at the 3100's "box", wondering if I should remove the top, and use it as part of the wide table setup. But, as of yet I have not done that since it seemed to be a bit of a questionable practice (I might lose something, or break something, etc. etc).

*** I never thought of using both "boxes" at the same time. Duh!!! ***

So, now I have new food for thought. Hmmm. Different blades in each saw, perhaps orienting them for rips vs. crosscuts, even having them both set up for different miter cuts. Wow - the possibilities.....

[vaking]

I do not have 2 saws but I have a wide table kit. Your space saving approach is correct; in a small shop you save not by going small but by going multifunction. I have a wide table kit with full 2 sets of rails (that is 84" total) mounted on a mobile base and giving me 66" cutting capacity to the right from the blade. My shop is in the basement with narrow staircase which means I have hard time getting full sheet of ply down to the saw. And that means I very rarely use full 66". Furthermore - I believe in a magic number 48" to the right from the blade which gives you ablility to cut to the middle of a full sheet. Anything beyond that is a luxury.
My mobile base incorporates a router table mounted between the rails and the accesory table with second router in it for roundover jobs. Combine all this with very flat surface 84"x22" which I use for assembly sometimes and you get the space saving. Long rails come in handy because I have a saw fence and a separate router fence and both mount to rails. Router fence works with both routers.
My rails are mounted absolutely solid and never move. I took time and calibrated the measuring scale on the rails to have a 1/64" precision to the blade. Now I use this scale all the time for my cuts. I know most people here are against using scale but I disagree. I am religious about never moving the rails to the point that my mobile base allows me to flip the saw for maintenance around the back side without disassembling rails. Somehow I am not buying into ability to move rails easily when you have wide table kit installed. But the good part - with wide table kit there is absolutely no need for it.

[eezlock]

frankensaw.....

really nice looking rig, we'll have to call it the new bt 3200 super saw!
eezlock

[dwk]

Wow, lots to catch up on - thanks for the feedback.

Russell - awesome! Basically exactly what I was thinking about.; thanks for the pics. I'm a bit surprised that you can get both saw bodies on a small-ish platform on the stand. This may indeed make for a very nice temporary setup. I was originally thinking I'd have to get my mobile base up and running before I could experiment, but I may give your arrangement a shot.

Russianwolf: A Shark is almost certainly in my future, I just balked at the price. Since I needed a new fence anyway, I picked up the stock blade guard for cheap so I could eval how much of a pain it was before deciding on the Shark.

vaking: Thanks for the thoughts. I probably wont' decide on a final width unti I've used it for a while, as I will probably also use it as a workbench/assembly table as well. I am also hoping to be able to trust the scale, since that's what I'm used to from my Jet - I never directly measured since I had calibrated to my satisfaction.

wwday3 - Yes, once you start thinking about it, the flexibility is very attractive.

I'm not sure I'll be able to get to the point of starting to assemble things this weekend, but I should have some time to start the process.

[tropicaffair]

Doug,

Thanks for the kind words. A couple of things about my temporary setup. My dado head is actually installed on the right hand BT. The dimensions on the 3/4" plywood under both saws is something like 21" or 22" deep by 42" wide. I was able to get the space between the two saws down to about 3". That's the closest I could get them with overly stressing the electrical connection from the left hand saw. Ultimately, I am going to finish building a mobile base from an old Wood magazine article (that Pappy has been using for several of his tools, most recently his lathe). On the mobile base I am still going to use the old 3000 stand with cabinet inserts on the sides and underneath. If I ever get a chance to finish it I will definitley post some pictures. I am trying to pressure myself into completing this so I can then finally adjust all my bench and tool platform heights to the same dimension off the floor. We'll see.

[wwday3]

A Shark is almost certainly in my future, I just balked at the price.

You might want to check with Lee to see if he has any deals. Last year - because I did something really dumb - I ruined my SharkGuard. Lee happened to have a return (wrong color or something like that) that he sold me at a discount.