kmw
02-19-2006, 11:04 AM
Hi All,
Well eventhough I wanted wanted a TS3650 the cost and popularity of the Ryobi BT3100 enticed me .... so I bought the BT. Well today I am going to pack it up and return for a Ridgid TS 3650. The BT seems to work great for many people (see www.bt3central.com) but its tolerances and just not as tight as the TS3650 that I looked at. Anyway, for those looking that were considering the BT here are my thoughts:
First let me say that Ryobi does and excellent job packaging the BT's.
- Sliding Miter Table (SMT): there is side to side play in the sliding grooves of the table (I could not find a way to remedy this).
- All three tables seem to be at different heights (yes they were seated properly).
- The SMT was as flat as my straight edge, but the main table was concave and the accessory table was convex.
- The accessory table would does not lock securely at the rear (where it slides into the rear fence rail). This causes the table to tilt or wobble depending where pressure is applied. So it would need to be shimmed, which is annoying since one is constantly moving the table about.
- Where the Fence attaches to the locking handle asssembly there is a ridge that does not allow the work piece to feed flat against the fence. I suspect the could be remedied, but I did not try as I had already decided to return the saw.
- The saw is just cheap overall and kind of annoying to tune...actually mess with until you get close is more like it.
- Plus move one foot and you have to recheck alignments.....
- So to me and this is my opinion only the BT3100 is a quite frustrating tool to use (if you get to use it since you could spend so much time tuning it). The overall concept is great, but the final product is cheap feeling and would have to be "babied" when compared to a contractors saw that will hold its adjustments/alignment. I assembled and aligned the saw according to the manual and using some of the info i found at this link ( http://benchmark.20m.com/tools/BT3100/Alignment/bt3100_alignmentindex.html ). Once I finished I did not even turn the saw on because I knew that I would not be happy with it. If you like tinkering with your tools then the BT3100 is for you; however, if you are like me and you prefer to "work wood" and not your table saw then save your $$$ and but the TS 3650 or any other quality contractors saw.
Once, again this is my opinion and i don't mean to step on the toes of any happy BT owners.
kmw
Well eventhough I wanted wanted a TS3650 the cost and popularity of the Ryobi BT3100 enticed me .... so I bought the BT. Well today I am going to pack it up and return for a Ridgid TS 3650. The BT seems to work great for many people (see www.bt3central.com) but its tolerances and just not as tight as the TS3650 that I looked at. Anyway, for those looking that were considering the BT here are my thoughts:
First let me say that Ryobi does and excellent job packaging the BT's.
- Sliding Miter Table (SMT): there is side to side play in the sliding grooves of the table (I could not find a way to remedy this).
- All three tables seem to be at different heights (yes they were seated properly).
- The SMT was as flat as my straight edge, but the main table was concave and the accessory table was convex.
- The accessory table would does not lock securely at the rear (where it slides into the rear fence rail). This causes the table to tilt or wobble depending where pressure is applied. So it would need to be shimmed, which is annoying since one is constantly moving the table about.
- Where the Fence attaches to the locking handle asssembly there is a ridge that does not allow the work piece to feed flat against the fence. I suspect the could be remedied, but I did not try as I had already decided to return the saw.
- The saw is just cheap overall and kind of annoying to tune...actually mess with until you get close is more like it.
- Plus move one foot and you have to recheck alignments.....
- So to me and this is my opinion only the BT3100 is a quite frustrating tool to use (if you get to use it since you could spend so much time tuning it). The overall concept is great, but the final product is cheap feeling and would have to be "babied" when compared to a contractors saw that will hold its adjustments/alignment. I assembled and aligned the saw according to the manual and using some of the info i found at this link ( http://benchmark.20m.com/tools/BT3100/Alignment/bt3100_alignmentindex.html ). Once I finished I did not even turn the saw on because I knew that I would not be happy with it. If you like tinkering with your tools then the BT3100 is for you; however, if you are like me and you prefer to "work wood" and not your table saw then save your $$$ and but the TS 3650 or any other quality contractors saw.
Once, again this is my opinion and i don't mean to step on the toes of any happy BT owners.
kmw