Milwaukee 12" 6955 miter saw

[Mike Golka]

Anyone here on the Creek have one of these? I'm in the market for a new miter saw and want a high end machine that is acurate and repeatable. I know the Kapex is the cream of the crop but not sure I want to go that far price wise. Any reviews greatly appreciated.

[Tom W Armstrong]

A lot of us do, but mine is still in the box (from recent $299 sale) and can't comment much. Hopefully others will jump in. It has/had great reviews and that's why I purchased one.

I'm still looking for a good portable stand if anyone has an opinion on these.

[Mike Golka]

"(from recent $299 sale)"

Wish I had had that oppertunity, I'm looking at $700.00

[Tom W Armstrong]

Mike, don't pay that much as it seems to be on sale quite often, at least here in the states. If you were closer, I'd sell you mine for much less than that as I haven't even taken the shrink wrap off yet.

Amazon has it for $610, hmmm, and I don't see at Home Depot anymore, must have been why they sold them out.

[Dave Hasson]

I bought one when HD was clearing them out. The saw is a monster, but I'm really glad I bought it. Everything was setup perfectly right out of the box (I even tested crosscutting a 14" x 3/4" piece of plywood and the cut was 90 degrees). I really like how the lights illuminate both sides of the blade. The sliding motion is very smooth and the stock blade isn't too bad. The dust collection is decent and I've heard they sell an adapter that allows hooking up to a DC. Great tool!

[Van Huskey]

I also picked one up at HD for the 299 price. It is a great saw equal to the Bosch and the only thing I have used better would be the Kapex but it isn't worth my money. I haven't used it a lot but did all the measurements and test cuts and it was dead on out of the box. If I was paying "full" price it would still be it or the Bosch. BTW it won the FWW 12" CSMS evaluation.

[John Peterson]

Or a refurb for $450 with free shipping.

http://www.cpomilwaukee.com/factory-reconditioned-milwaukee-6955-80-12-in-dual-bevel-sliding-compound-miter-saw/milr6955-80,default,pd.html

[Callan Campbell]

Please bear in mind, the jump to the Milwaukee was from my old Ryobi 220 8 1/4" saw, so although they're both sliding cross-cut saws, it's a world of difference.
I got lucky, all my settings were right-on as built, no fussing around needed. We have seen a few posters on the SMC who bought this saw and found a tiny amount of adjusting to get a true angle to their needs.
The Good/Great: Plenty of power, I haven't bogged the saw with anything yet, but haven't cut any thicker in hardwood than 5/4, and regular construction 2x pine. Soft start, and electronic held speed. Nice features both, you don't "scream" right off the bat when turning the saw on, and you're a bit less likely to have a piece shift on you if you're holding it against the saw with your hand since there isn't a massive jerk with the power coming on. The motor seems to be regulated for load maint., I think the Kapex has the same feature.
Fairly light saw for the size. Although you may never move it if you're not working portable or trucking to a job site, it's still nice to know you won't break your back carrying a 12" SCMS by yourself if you do have to.
The saw does not have a laser system, but instead uses a simple light set-up to illuminate your cutting line or the blade. The switch is by the operating handle.
Digital read-out of the angle setting: Once you plug the saw in, there is a read-out at the outer edge of the lower section that gives the current angle. It's always on if the power is connected to the saw, I don't think there's a sleep mode if the saw isn't turned on for awhile, so if the power drain bothers you, you have to unplug the saw when not in use. The system is supposed to be self-calibrating, and it seems to be. I played with it when I first got my saw this X-mas. You CAN fool the read-out or loop it up, but you only need to return the saw to a locked or detent angle, like 90, unplug the saw and plug it back in to reset it. That seems to work well. Bear in mind this is for the cross-cut angle, not the compound bevel angle.
Two height fence system: Milwaukee went with cast alloy fence system that allows you to keep the fence low, or slide taller fence pieces into the lower sections to raise the height. Works ok for me, but I haven't removed the taller fence sections since I put the saw together.
Saw Guard, clear, moves easily with the movement of the saw, and I haven't found anything to dislike about it. Yet.:p
Con: Dust Collection- Even with the hard-to-find adapter, it's not really a step-up from my old Ryobi, even with a vacuum attached. The sneaky fitting from Milwaukee is a plastic, straight-bodied attachment that allows 2 different hose sizes to be used. I have a Festool CT-22 working with the saw, and you can use either Festool hose, but of course the larger 36mm will help with air flow. The main issue is the design of the dust baffles behind the saw. I think they're WAY too small, too narrow in their "catching" ability. Even if you're at an open job-site, and don't really care about catching dust, don't expect much to end up in the dust bag that the saw comes with. Once you slide back away from the base of the saw when making your cut, you're worlds away from the brunt of what the saw blade is throwing out since the plastic baffles can't extend back to the saw to help channel dust. It's almost like someone took a regular chop saw dust system and tried to intergrate it into a sliding saw, but didn't get how far away the rear of the saw gets with a wide cross-cut. I don't know how to explain it better than that, maybe someone else here can chime in. For the record, the Milwaukee part# is 48-03-0200, and while it's a good first step in getting some sort of add-on vacuum to the saw, I think some mods are in this saws future once people start to want to improve on it with DC collection.
I'm going to try my Rigid vacuum with its short hose over the next few days to see how much that helps things. Other than that, a telescoping system of baffles that always have one end mating with the rear fence/base no matter how far back the slides are pushed is the way to go, I think. This way you can pull the saw through its full travel and always have some dust channeling intact. The problem with this idea is once you move from a plain 90 degree cut and into angles . I'm going to play with the full range of the saw's movement and the stock baffling system this weekend to see where that falls into place. :rolleyes:
No built-in support arms for material: What I mean is, I miss the short slide-out arms my Ryobi had to help with material that was longer than the base. Not a deal-breaker by any means, and I KNEW the new saw didn't have them before I bought it, but you miss those stupid round support arms once you've owned a saw that has them. I've since added some decent support stands from Rockler that work well for where the saw's at in my shop, and if you've built-in your miter saw anyway, this is a non-issue since you've added support for ALL your cross-cuts. I have a regular miter saw stand to do portable work with the miter saw, so I'm covered either way whether the saws at my workbench or outside.
Last grip: No hold-down clamp with the saw. I added one from a Bosch model for now, but I will address this known issue better at some point.
Bottom line, strong saw, Accurate cuts with no blade wander that I've seen, nice power control and soft start-Rugged build from the short time I've owned mine. Poor or maybe just average DC[It's no Kapex in that dept.:D] No add-ons like lasers or support arms or a hold-down clamp. Strange about the hold-down clamp, but again, I knew this going in.....

[Mike Golka]

Thanks for all the feed back, I really appreciate it. I pulled the trigger and bought one, came with the stand at no extra cost.

[Callan Campbell]

Thanks for all the feed back, I really appreciate it. I pulled the trigger and bought one, came with the stand at no extra cost.
Mike, you should enjoy the saw. I DO like mine, just needs a few tweaks;) By the way, what is the stand that you are talking about? Is there a picture of it to show off?

[keith micinski]

I have mine mounted on my old dewalt stand that Lowes currently has on sale I believe. It's really handy to have it mounted on a portable stand. The Milwakee stand actually looks a little better but I already have the Dewalt.

[Mike Golka]

By the way, what is the stand that you are talking about? Is there a picture of it to show off?

This is the stand

[Callan Campbell]

This is the stand
Very nice. I bought the steel folding stand from Ryobi about a year before I bought my Milwaukee, no wheels, but light enough and sturdy enough for my needs. So, they THREW in the stand with the saw???:eek: Did NOT see that deal anywhere around here when I was thinking about buying my 12" SCMS. Niceeeeeeeee......:rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes:

[Harry Hagan]

Mine’s also still in the box from the H-D closeout. I think one’s in there.

Some time ago I posted inquiring about your stand but no one admitted owning or using one so I’m interested to learn what you think about the stand.