First day of work for my new P1CC
May 17, 2019 15:59:30 GMT -5
MrToolJunkie, aas, and 3 more like this
Post by juhan on May 17, 2019 15:59:30 GMT -5
Hello all, new user here, and a fresh owner of the p1cc.
First day of work for the saw was 2 sheets of 18mm thick 1.5x3m birch plywood, to be cut into 20 curves that needed to be 3m wide with a 2.55m outer radius and a 2.475m inner radius, so just a tad out of range for the included option. The quick release sole is perfect for DIY plywood circle cutting jigs, very convenient to not have the body of the saw in the way when screwing it down.
Really simple. Made 1 8mm hole in the scrap piece of plywood I used for the pivot point and 2 holes in the arm of the jig for the inner and outer radius, used the same drill bit as the pivot point(keep it simple, also a perfect tight fit!). I planned the pieces so that if I moved the sheet I was cutting further exactly 10cm each time I got the parts I wanted with minimal waste.
I did what? Oh yes, on the first day of using it I took the pretty baseplate and roughly screwed it into a piece of plywood. in 18mm plywood I used the included Cunex blade, it didn't even flinch(the heat marks on it are from other initial torture tests I did in even thicker material). Other regular blades didn't make it past 30cm of cut before wondering off in a random direction. The included Cunex one did 120 running meters in 3.5 hours and asked for more. I bought several spare ones just in case, but apparently they're really durable.
And the result?
Material I needed on the left, leftovers on right. Had I had the material cut by CNC I would have needed an extra sheet of plywood(~50€) since cnc routers need a much wider cut path. I was also quoted about ~200eur for the cnc cutting(and a few days of waiting, and a van and 2 guys to take the sheets to be cut). Took me 0 eur in jig materials and 3.5 hours to cut those with the P1cc. It literally made back half of it's cost in that time, and I have many, many more circles to cut. I had a grin on my face the whole time I was cutting.The finished pieces had a tiny bit of variation(about 1mm max variance) but that was due to me using only a 6mm thick strip of plywood for the radius arm and the general rigidity/flex of the jig. For my purpose they're more than good enough.
Spot on anywhere, all the time.
Actual notes and impressions on the saw:
It's a hefty piece of equipment. Feels like I could cut a car in half, hammer in a few nails, throw it and still produce a perfect 90 degree cut, for years. Shape is super comfortable, on/off switch has amazing tactile feedback. Rear speed knob not so much, it wobbles a tiny annoying amount when using the saw.
It gets warm quick, but after running it through 18mm plywood for prolonged periods of time it very quickly reached a state where it didn't get any hotter. It's 900w after all. Great for colder periods in the workshop.
The Cunex blade is a beast, but it really needs a zero clearance insert to help with tearout and chipping on the upper surface of the cut in plywood. The underside of the cut was pretty much immaculate. In 45mm thick timber it turned around in a ~1cm circle with about ~0.5mm of blade deflection at one spot. Very impressed.
Quick release removable sole is super useful for all kinds of jigs.
The included multifunction parallel fence is nice and seems really solid even with plastic moving parts, but honestly the circle cutting pins are hard to get out and will be easy to lose, and for straight cuts there's a tracksaw, so it'll probably stay in the case most of the time.
Motor blowing air across the cut path works impressively well even without a vac attached. Hard to go back to blowing on your cut path to see the line and getting a lungful of sawdust now.
Next up, need to save up for the kss40 m bl, going to be using 39x66mm plywood framing for a lot of projects this summer, it's like a match made in heaven.