fanatic
starting to spend too much on rocks
Member since October 2007
Posts: 233
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Post by fanatic on Feb 25, 2009 6:43:13 GMT -5
The new WF design has hit the shelves in my local Home Depot. Still listed at $88. The new model did away with the water tray and now the entire base gets filled with water. The table flips up to gain access to the water tub and the blade. The display model didn't have the guard installed so I'm not sure what that looks like.
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Post by akansan on Feb 25, 2009 8:14:05 GMT -5
That's the same way the MK 145 is set up - the table flips up both for access to the base and for 45 degree angled cuts with tile.
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Post by Hard Rock Cafe on Feb 25, 2009 14:11:29 GMT -5
Yes, it's been here for a couple of months. The guard is pretty cheesy: a flimsy piece of sheet metal with a plastic guard on top. A little hard to move and no way to keep it up.
I had one (actually the Sears equivalent) and returned it when I found an old stock previous model.
Chuck
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Post by Michael John on Feb 27, 2009 14:22:20 GMT -5
Although the WF is undoubtedly a great deal for the money, in the end, for me, it's just a base with a saw blade sticking-up. To make it completely useful for rocks (instead of tile) it has to be stripped down to the bare necessities, so, to me, it's actually sort-of a waste.
A while back, someone posted about a different tile saw they bought at HD. It was a Ryobi, priced at about $150. When I saw the picture of it, I could see that it had the potential to be much better for "our" uses than the WF. After reading user reviews, I found that it's cheap price tag goes hand-in-hand with some functionality issues, but nothing that can't be pretty easily remedied. So, in the end, instead of a stripped-down, very limited machine (like the WF), with a little effort you can have a very good machine, with functionality rivaling tile saws costing twice as much.
Given that I haven't yet purchased one of these Ryobi saws, I can't actually make a recommendation, but it definately seems that the extra $60 spent on this saw is probably well worth it. No doubt that the WF has been a great tool for a LOT of us here, especially for the price, but bang-for-the-buck doesn't always go hand-in-hand with "inexpensive". Sometimes spending a bit more can give you much better value, as seems to be the case here.
It would be great to hear user experiences with the Ryobi saw from people on this board who have bought and used it.
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buckwheat69
noticing nice landscape pebbles
How do we get out of here ??
Member since July 2008
Posts: 96
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Post by buckwheat69 on Mar 2, 2009 2:24:08 GMT -5
Hello, I had purchased the ryobi from HD @ 149.95 with stand and no water pump. As you can see more blade exposed the the other one. got about 3 1/4 inches if cutting room.(has 7 inch blade) I have been cutting rough for about 2 months now and it works pretty good for our uses. a few draw backs are anything over the 3 1/4 and it hits the blade cover. you can move the slide tray and cut a larger rock but you will have to hold it by hand under the blade(little tricky but I have managed to cut about 6 or 7 inch geode in two passes . Gonna see if I can get an 8inch blade to fit. the other draw back is the slide tray. although very nice cause you can hold the rock against the two gates and get a nice cut with out sliding the rock you slide the whole tray. straighter cuts as long as the rock is square to the blade. The flaw is the deep grooves that are in the tray it's hard to hold a small piece of rough square without it leaning into one of those grooves. FIX: I cut a piece of sheet metal the same size as the tray, clamped it to the top, cut a slot down the middle where the blade runs so no contact with the blade and now it is much easier to handle the small stuff. also needs a water source no tank to fill. you will need a pump or direct water hook up. yo can get a small pump and put in tub to pump water up onto blade or you can hook up a larger pump and a 5 gal. bucket let the water drain back to bucket for recirculating system. I plumbed mine from a sink with a shut off at the saw (suggested method). i ran it with bucket till i could run some lines in and after a week or two the supply line in the saw started to get clogged up from the rock gunk not to mention i had to keep cleaning the pump screen for good water flow. fresh water no problems. All in All I think it was a much better buy then the W/F with a few modes. next I am trying a vise and weighted pulley set up so i can lock the rock and let the weight pull the tray Through the blade I have used the W/f to do some tile and the ryobi is much heavier duty. hope this helps and sorry for the long wind Steve
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