Craftsmanship in Wood

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oezp-_DcUgg

I wonder if Mafell are any better in the areas where AvE points out weaknesses?

Always fun to see sacred cows turned into burgers.

To be honest I'm shocked that brushed electric motors are still the standard in power tools - is there a reason brushless motors aren't used other than making it cheaper?

TBH he sounds a lot like some of the blowhards I know at my work (a college), i.e. a little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing. For example, he doesn't understand something (the plugit cord) so it must be useless fluff. Of course some might argue the plugit is useless fluff, but to some it's a valuable feature. He feels the ribbing on the mag base is overly complex.. Well, I'm sure there are some engineers in Germany who would argue otherwise - I'm supposed to take his word over theirs because he has a YouTube channel?

You can't really argue about some of the cheaper components and cost-cutting, but to be fair I doubt his "contractor saw" is much better these days. My Chinese SkilSaw seems rugged enough, but who knows what evil lurks within..

Mafell's probably no better - the MUF has documented some failures in their supposedly "perfect" jigsaw that are probably due to a cheap underengineered part (or overzealous users, or a mixture of both).

I would agree that the plug-it idea definitely has some merit and he doesn't seem to get that.

I'm not overly enthused with Festool myself, but it's better than most of what's out there, at a price of course.

I learn a lot from that guys videos in terms of how to assess different materials, and he's had lots of tools apart and the comparisons are interesting.

Interesting video. I think his critique has some merit, but a lot of what he brought up had me wondering the alternate point of view. There may be more to it than what he sees, such as the helix gear and the windings. I have about 5-6 years on most of my festool stuff and this point and it has held up without issue so far.

FWIW I think it's a general opinion in america that at a certain price point the object should be indestructible, but I think the international opinion is more of one that it should be easily repairable with easy to access parts.

Festool is not the be-all-end-all for me but I think it's good stuff. Also not sure where he gets $1000...my TS55 cost me about $600 IIRC and that included one track.

I think his point about the mag base being over-engineered was a terrible one, there is plenty of reason why you would want a base that stays flat for a long time, especially since it must run on a track.

Overall I like what he is doing with this, it's interesting to see these things come apart and for me it's interesting to see where they really put money/effort in.

He's in Canuckistan. A US $600 item here is about CDN$1000 there these days. 18 months ago the currencies were on par...

Thanks to the link, I found another channel that has some really good videos. "Clickspring" He has videos for clock making and tool making in a smaller shop. Shows that quality work can be completed anywhere with the right mindset and know how.

I have the TS75 for breaking down bigger stock and it hasn't given me any issues but the videos were interesting.

Ahh, I see.

I cant complain, a strong USD has been good to me lately.

I have regrets of not getting the 75, I think the 55 is weak for anything more than 3/4" in hardwood.

Yeah, the comments section has some guys in it that bring up some other issues with what he says, for example he says CE means "China Export" when apparently in this context it does not. There are also claims about why they may not have used a ball bearing for the rotor or why they didn't dip the windings.. It might be interesting to hear what a Festool engineer's response was, but given the tone of the videos I'm not sure one is forthcoming.

durbien wrote:Yeah, the comments section has some guys in it that bring up some other issues with what he says, for example he says CE means "China Export" when apparently in this context it does not. There are also claims about why they may not have used a ball bearing for the rotor or why they didn't dip the windings.. It might be interesting to hear what a Festool engineer's response was, but given the tone of the videos I'm not sure one is forthcoming.

I'm thinking he was making a joke in regards to the 'CE' mark, referencing this:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CE_marking#China_Export

Same link as you gave, but further down the page.... He jokes around a lot, so I take many of his comments as tongue in cheek.

I have a bunch of Festool stuff, and I don't feel defensive in the slightest about aVe's look at the tool. Festool is better than a lot of the competition, for sure, and at a price of course, but it is hardly perfection.

I found, for instance, that their track sections were not cut precisely 90˚ on the ends, so if you butted two together you would have a kinked cut line. That's a simple factory QC issue and nothing else. Their router edge guide is marginal, and I've never used mine as there's too much lash in the adjustment mech.

I think for power tools that retail at $1000 or less and are produced by the thousands for a throw-away society, you're not going to get super precision and top quality materials throughout. Lord I wish their was a more precise router than the Festool product, but no such luck.

Check out aVe's review of a Hilti tool and you'll see that he found something he liked.