Track Saw versus Cabinet Saw

[Jim Summers]

Hello All,

I am in need of freeing up some shop/garage space.

It seems that track saws have come a long way and may be a viable alternative to a cabinet saw for me. I currently have a PM2000 and I think if I could get by without it, then that would solve my space problems.

I have been building basic home furniture projects, like bookcases, beds, small tables, etc... I generally buy wood and joint, plane, rip and glue-up to make the wide pieces as needed. Some more tables and bookcases are on the list for future projects. Just a hobbyist, not-professional.

I do not have any experience with track saw setups or what they can do. But from what I have read they seem to be able to do some accurate rips with the right setup.

Experiences / opinions.

TIA

[Van Huskey]

I am surprised there haven't been any answers yet but it is a somewhat involved topic and maybe people don't like to type long answers on the weekend??

http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?184363-Track-saws&highlight=track+saw

Thats one thread with lots of insight in general. There have been lots of discussions specifically about what you ask so along with any answers here you may want to spend some time searching the forum because this does come up from time to time.

I don't use my tracksaw as a replacement for a TS so I won't comment much but from what I have seen it certainly is doable and even less of an issue if you have a good bandsaw (which has a much smaller footprint than a TS).

[David Hawxhurst]

its my belief that with the right circular saw you can replace a table saw with a track saw. festool or eureka zone would be my choices for replacing the table saw. i have the eureka zone track(s) and makita saw. accuracy of the either of the systems comes down to how well you line things up. they both have accessories to aid in speed and repeat ability. i generally use my track saw over my table saw. with the exception of the bigger sliding saws a track saw system would be the best way to break down sheet goods. today if i were to buy a track saw system i would get the festool. festool didn't have a track saw system back when i got mine. i also built a table that is 2'x4' that has extension. it will fully support a 4'x8' sheet of plywood. similar to but not as fancy as this http://www.garymkatz.com/ChartsDrawings/tom-c_assembly-table.htm

[Cary Falk]

I got a killer deal on the DeWalt Tracksaw earlier this year and love it. It is so much nicer then a straight edge and my crappy circular saw. That being said I would never give up my table saw for a track saw. The table saw is just too versatile. I would give up every tool in my shop before I would give up my table saw, but that is just me. I started out with just a curcular saw and a drill. I would not want to go back.

[gary Zimmel]

I have a Festool track saw. Every time it is use it does an exceptional job.
I'm with Cary though, I wouldn't give up my unisaw for it.

[Keith Hankins]

I have the Festool TS55 and the MFT/3 and a fuill size table saw. You can do a lot with the ts55 and I love my MFT/3, however, nothing takes the place of the CS IMO. The issue is cutting small things with the TS55 is not possible (without a lot of hassle), .vs. the CS. Now I will say this cutting large pieces down is perfect for the TS55, and If crosscutting large pieces its the bomb. Don't get rid of the CS they are complementary tools not replacements. Just my humble opinion

[Mike Goetzke]

I've had a track saw system for almost ten years now (Eurekazone) and I just sold my Unisaw earlier this year. I just finished a big job of making a full set of kitchen cabinets and only used the TS for ripping long rail/style stock and dado-ing box parts. I too am tight on space in a garage shop so what I did was pick up a Bosch GTS-1031 portable TS. It had good reviews, only 50#, all accessories store on the saw, and you can store it on it's end vertically. My track saw bench (EZ-One) is stored at the ceiling with a cable lift system called heavy-lift by Racor.

Good Luck,

Mike

[Jim Becker]

Festool actually just did a survey on this very topic and it will be interesting to see if they ever publish the results.

A good track saw can do a whole lot of the same work that a cabinet saw can do, so depending on your projects you may be able to consider moving in that direction. I will state, however, that I don't feel comfortable with narrow rips with the more portable solution. If you have a good band saw, then that aspect could be covered in a functional way given you also have a jointer and planer to clean things up. There are some construction techniques, however, that go better with a sled on a table saw. So what you might consider is reducing the footprint of your cabinet saw so you can use it for ripping and sled/miter cross cutting work, rather than being a "do everything" tool, and employ a good track saw for bigger material, such as sheet goods.

[johnny means]

I have a track saw, cabinet saw, and a slider. They all excel at different tasks and suck for others. I recently had to do a lot of on site work using the Festool. Cutting accurate clean seams with it was enjoyable and improved my work. Ripping build up with the track saw quickly became a miserable job. Shaving a hair off of a two inch strip was almost impossible.

[Seth Poorman]

I have a track saw, cabinet saw, and a slider. They all excel at different tasks and suck for others. I recently had to do a lot of on site work using the Festool. Cutting accurate clean seams with it was enjoyable and improved my work. Ripping build up with the track saw quickly became a miserable job. Shaving a hair off of a two inch strip was almost impossible.
+1 What Johnny sais !!!!

[Rick Fisher]

I don't use my table saw much, 50% of the work it does is probably dado's .. Having said that, I would not get rid of it .. Squaring up panels, dado's .. Its got applications that it really excels at ..

[Larry Prem]

A tracksaw is not a replacement for a tablesaw. The tracksaw is married to the tape measure, which is very inaccurate.
The tablesaw is faster and more accurate at what it does.

That being said, you can use a tracksaw exclusively, if you are willing to work around its limitations.

[Dan Blackshear]

No way could a tracksaw replace my tablesaw.
It does not have near the surface area for piling miscellaneous crap on. :D

[Lex Boegen]

Earlier this year I bought a track system from Eureka Zone, and some accessories for it too. I still have my tablesaw, but find that I use it less and less. If I need a really precise miter joint, I'll use the tablesaw with my Incra miter gauge, but other than that, it's pretty much tracksaw for most things. I have their "cabinet maker" which is a miter square that attaches to the track, and two "repeaters" which are extendable arms that touch the wood for repeatable spacing of repetitive cuts. With those, I can square up a 4x8 panel, then crosscut and rip it down to finished size. There are other accessories that I don't have which would give me even more capabilities, but I don't have the budget for more tools. I can do everything that I need to do with what I already have. Although there is a great deal of overlap on the capabilities of a track system and a table saw, each tool will excel at some tasks but be useable on others. I can do narrow rips on the track saw, but it's easier on the table saw. I can do plywood sizing on the table saw, but it's lots easier (and much safer) with the track saw. A lot of it boils down to what tasks do you do most? Do you work mostly with sheet goods or solid wood? Do you make pens or bookcases? Those with more experience with track saws than I have often say that after using them for a while, you start to think differently about how to approach cutting the wood and think of new ways to use the track system.

[Charles Wiggins]

Jim,

I have a Festool TS55 and love it. I use it primarily for breaking down plywood sheets, but I do not consider it a full replacement for a table saw. I cannot imagine trying to rip a 4" x 10' piece of stock with it, especially since I only have ~8' of track. To work properly, the track needs to sit on the work being cut to hold it down. I also have a Jet ProShop TS, and love it as well.

If I wanted to get rid of a cabinet saw, I'd look into getting a portable contractor table saw and some support stands. I used to have a Delta Rockwell Homecraft 9" TS/4" jointer combo on a mobile base, which was the 1950's equivalent, and it was quite a space saver. I did spend a lot of time setting up support stands and leveling them with the TS top, but that was the tradeoff for working in a small space.

[Jeff Duncan]

I only briefly glanced through the responses so I may have missed it, but one thing I haven't seen brought up yet is joinery? You can use all sorts of jigs on a table saw for different types of joinery, which cannot be done easily or practically with a track saw. I love the track saw but if I could only have one saw in my shop it would be a table saw without any question or thought. It is just so much more flexible in what it can do there's really no comparison.

good luck,
JeffD

[Peter Kelly]

The Festool Compact Module System and bench saw adapter unit for the TS 75 will eventually be available in North America though no release date yet. Would certainly allow you to get by without a traditional cabinet saw if your needs are relatively light duty.

http://www.festool.co.uk/Products/Pages/Product-Competence.aspx?foc=ol_comapct_modul_system_9317

[Kyle Iwamoto]

No way could a tracksaw replace my tablesaw.
It does not have near the surface area for piling miscellaneous crap on. :D

I thought that was why it's called a TABLE saw.

As many said, the table saw can make small cross cuts and rips way better than a track saw. I would not give up my table saw. I would have to build a bench to put all my stuff on:eek:.

As a side issue, I made a cover for my table saw, and use it as my workbench. That could also be an option. Most cannot get along without a workbench......

[Joe Jensen]

I've owned a Unisaw, PM66, Sawstop and I now have a large sliding table saw. I also have a Festool track saw. Cabinet saws are extremely versatile. Rip and crosscut. With a sled you can cut things very square and with excellent technique you can get good results ripping and crosscutting things that are not huge. If you have a lot of space you can put a cabinet saw into a large table with huge space on the left and out feed sides and the results are great with sheet goods. Sadly most home shops don't have the kind of space. When I owned cabinet saws I had trouble handling the first rip off a large sheet of plywood so I bought the Festool to break down sheets. The first thing I noticed was how perfect the cut was. The Festool creates a better cut that I was ever able to achieve with a cabinet saw. The other problem I had with sheet goods was getting perfect 90 degree cuts on large parts. My saw didn't have enough crosscut capacity cut fresh 90s and the factory corners aren't square enough. With the track saw, you can make a perfect edge, and if you can align the track well to the line or marks you can make great parts. Slower, and not perfectly square but pretty good. Ripping requires a jig to make perfectly parallel parts, or perfect marking and aligning of the track.

I ended up selling the cabinet saw and sacrificing valuable shop space to get a slider. Now I can cut perfect 90s and rip perfectly parallel parts and the cut is even better than the track saw.

If I could only have one, I'd have a cabinet saw. If I could afford both but not a slider I've have a cabinet saw and a track saw. The best solution IMHO is all three but I don't have the space for a cabinet saw too.

[Brian Kincaid]

A tracksaw is not a replacement for a tablesaw. The tracksaw is married to the tape measure, which is very inaccurate.
The tablesaw is faster and more accurate at what it does.

That being said, you can use a tracksaw exclusively, if you are willing to work around its limitations.

My track saw has a parallel fence so I am not married to a tape measure. Lots of folks are familiar with table saw workarounds but tracksaws are new so there are new solutions unfamiliar to those that have not been keeping 'track'.

Table saw rip fence = track saw bridge and parallel rip fence either attached to rail or cutting table
Table saw miter gage = 90deg fence and/or adjustable fence attached to rail
Table saw crosscut sled = 90deg fence on rail or bridge table with 90deg fence
many more...

If I give someone a table saw with no fence, miter gage, or jigs how far would they get?

-Brian

[Jim Summers]

Thanks for all the replies.

It seems the responses are pretty much what has been banging around in my head. The track saws will do things well and probably could do the majority of tasks I need to carry out. If I was just starting out it would be the way to go. Get the best track saw and a real good bandsaw and I would be good to go.

I do not think my old CMAN 12" bandsaw would be able to rip stock well enough to help me out, so that would mean I would also need to upgrade that. Since I would have to sell the PM2000 to help pay for the track saw setup then I would not be upgrading the BS for a looong time.

Some interesting ideas were posted on potentially shortening the rails to decrease the footprint or doubling up the footprint for use as a workbench. Once the oppressive heat backs off a bit, I may try to get creative with how I have things setup to see if that may help.

Thanks again for all the responses!

[Peter Quinn]

I could see shrinking the rails on the TS to make it more compact and adding a track saw to break down larger items, but its hard for me to envision fully replacing the TS with the track saw. There are some pretty creative uses of the track saw out there, I suppose you could even jig it up to cut tenon cheeks and similar joinery. But even the best track saw set ups are a bit more time consuming to change over than the TS, and thats a show stopper for me. My most precious commodity presently is time, for the work I do the TS is always seconds away from set up, changing sizes takes seconds, I can go from rip to cross cut to joinery in under a minute. So I suppose with some ingenuity and a pile of aluminum accessories you could certainly replace the TS, but for me, I'd rather buy a smaller car or give up wood working first. Have you considered a smart car?

[Jim Summers]

I could see shrinking the rails on the TS to make it more compact and adding a track saw to break down larger items, but its hard for me to envision fully replacing the TS with the track saw. There are some pretty creative uses of the track saw out there, I suppose you could even jig it up to cut tenon cheeks and similar joinery. But even the best track saw set ups are a bit more time consuming to change over than the TS, and thats a show stopper for me. My most precious commodity presently is time, for the work I do the TS is always seconds away from set up, changing sizes takes seconds, I can go from rip to cross cut to joinery in under a minute. So I suppose with some ingenuity and a pile of aluminum accessories you could certainly replace the TS, but for me, I'd rather buy a smaller car or give up wood working first. Have you considered a smart car?

Haha, hadn't thought of that. My truck is paid for and I really like that!

So I really think I need to become waaay more efficient on my space usage. You know, do I really need so much scrap wood, piled up, that I may use one day?

[fRED mCnEILL]

"i also built a table that is 2'x4' that has extension. it will fully support a 4'x8' sheet of plywood."
That seems to be the same size as a table saw, so if you switch to a track saw to reclaim the footprint of a tablesaw where is the saving.
I don't have a track saw but have a shop made one to break down sheet goods. I find it tremendously cumbersome so I use it seldomly. Sure, with precise positioning it works OK but it takes forever to get it postioned right.

[Jim Matthews]

When a collapsible cabinet saw comes to market, I'll replace my Eurekazone track.

Handling sheet goods is dead simple, I layout rigid insulation board on my garage floor - settle the sheet over, align the track and go.
For me, it's about getting down to a manageable size without displacing a car from my garage. Crosscutting and fine adjustments I do by hand.

I can't speak for production shops that do this for a living, but the amount of money saved was considerable.

[Brian Kincaid]

...if you switch to a track saw to reclaim the footprint of a tablesaw where is the saving...

Infeed and outfeed space are not required for a tracksaw. In my shop that is a significant difference.
-Brian