hotshot

I had a chance at the big EX with stand from china, returned to Amazon, but still in the box. Could have walked home with it for $250, but I had already talked to the folks at Woodcraft, and heard horror stories about those saws, so decided not to risk it. Instead, carried a new in the box Delta home for $99, abeit there was some damage from shipping. There were a couple of parts needing to be replaced. So my main fear with Delta has always been support and parts. Well, after all this time, parts is still an issue. Delta listed the part an unavailable. I ordered it from somewhere else, but it's been backordered for going on 6 weeks now. Some have said that parts were not interchangeable with the new updated design, other have said the opposite. Anyone have a junk Dewalt they can send me a part to try out on it?

https://www.facebook.com/Scrollriffic-Crosses-483543871739970/

The thing I most interested about this saw is the table as all the excalibur type saws up until now have that easy scratch surface, which is my only complaint with those saws (and a minor complaint at that). I'm hoping Pegas tried something different. If you use the saw heavily, you will be able to tell us pretty quickly if finish holds up better than the prior version.

$80?, it did a pretty good job. Probably cheaper than those custom branding irons.

Time to put a nickel on the very end closest to you, crank that speed to full on, and see how it does. Also, if you have a new fancy phone, try taking a normal speed video, then slow motion video of the blade from the side, and front with the saw wide open. That will show the stability of the blade. ------Randy

I'm always trying to tune the aggression out of my saw, but once you learn to tune it, you will find you can take it to the extremes if you so desire. It will be interesting to see where you end up with this. Many folks remove the plastic dust collection membrane. I took mine off almost immediately. The membrane and the dust collection holes in the table are the only things I don't like about the design. Overall, I love these Taiwan saws, regardless of the Brand stuck to the side. The Pegas clamps do rock!

Kevin, it isn't just one bad review. My BM came from someone not happy with it. I know someone else on the forum that got another BM from someone not happy with it. Iggys complaint was initially with vibration, but in the end, the more serious complaint was about how it cut. I have very serious concerns about multiple design decisions on the Hawk, including the knobs/clamps and the stand mounting. I know someone else on the forum that made the trip to Bushton to tour the facilities, and was concerned enough to change direction and go the Hegner route. I know a few others that were happy with their purchase, as I'm sure you will be. As for the Excalibur, your not the first person I've heard complain about various aspects of it either. I know a couple of folks that left EX to go to Hegner and so on. So, at the end of the day, it doesn't matter what any one thinks about your decision. You have the right to drive a Ryobi or a Hegner, or anything in between, so that is your decision alone. When you discuss your decision on a forum, and the complications that arise from that decision, then everyone else is going evaluate that choice. I'm just glad you are not trying to cover up the consequences of that decision, to protect the Bushton Hawk reputation. I think the light you a shedding on them is good, and people can base their decision on your actual experience, as they also did with Iggy.

I was thinking more about the making of the one off part that they have been waiting forever to get to fix the CNC, but since they have that part in now, they are on to the next thing. Their run of bad luck can't last forever, so I suspect this saga is winding down now.

Did anyone think these guys "were a machine shop." I thought that was their background. I figured they would go to their own standard mill/lathe and not rely on another machine shop to do something they could do themselves. I know the history of Prewitt/RBI was as a machine shop, but maybe I'm wrong about Bushton. It just seem fascinating to me that they would own a CNC, but not any old school mills.

I was calling them for something, and either Nicole or the girl that covering for her during her pregnancy was excited about their new business. If they were trying to market their other business, it worked as I had to go check it out, and admire the work. Not sure how responsive they are on their other business, but the pictures of those covers sure look good. Also, notice that they set the expectation of custom CNC covers to be about 10 days, because they understand their customers are concerned about timeliness.

As far as being financially unable to stock parts in advance, I would just add that there were folks reporting delays before they bought yet another business: http://www.advancedautographics.com. They had just acquired this business back when I was working with them on some parts for my BM26, which luckily they did have in stock. At the end of the day, family business or not, many of their potential customers are looking for a stable, reliable, responsive company to back their > $1200 purchase. If someone doesn't mind waiting out what ever crisis happens to be happening, then that is great, but many folks want to have a certain comfort level with a company before they lay out that kind of money.

If a person used a New Hawk for their livelihood, and only had the one saw that needed one of those CNC parts, these kinds of service interruptions would be hard to take. Sometimes Bushton says they are waiting on motors/parts, other times they are in harvest, or backed up, or someone just had a baby or other family issues, etc and etc. If they had longer production runs where they built up their inventory in advance, purchased enough motors and or parts to cover a longer span (or thought to order before they ran out) issues like this wouldn't be so impactful. When making parts, there is machine setup time and etc, so after spending the time to get everything running smoothly for a specific part, they should make "a lot" so that they keep those efficiencies of scale. Keeping inventory levels that low feels like the business might be struggling. Those that enter the Hawk club pay an extravagant price for that privilege, but it doesn't feel Bushton is honoring their side of the deal in terms of their service/responsiveness. Thankfully, once you get your machine, these machines don't break down often.

Alex, for metal I use "Pike Jewelers" blades. For this coin 3/0 is a good size. Pegas and Pike are both brands of SCIES.

Pretty Easy pattern offered by Ashola in one of the facebook pattern groups. This was cut in a Kennedy, but could have been scaled down to a quarter.

Bob, if you need to get more tension than what the lever gives you, I can help you on this, as I've had to do this many times. The trick is to press down on the arm a bit while tightening the blade in the clamp. This gives it a bit of tension, before using the lever, so that when you add the lever tension to it, you end up with more tension that what the lever alone provides. You might ask, "How do I press down on the arm, if I have one hand on the blade, and one on the clamp knob, well, I'm embarrassed to admit . . . . . I lean over and press it down with my chin . . . . yep . . . . . . did I admit that outloud? I learned this approach after I screwed up my "Blade Travel" setting by using the back knob. Now, I never touch that back knob. -----Randy

Ok, now I'm really Jealous . . . .

I may suck at it, but I love TIG welding. I have a cheap Lotus Tig/Stick/Plasma cutter combo that has worked very well for both Stick and Tig. If I ever upgrade to a dedicated TIG machine, I'll probably go with the very well regarded/and reasonably priced AHP Alpha-Tig. Have fun in your class, I'm jealous. -----Randy

On the Mac, it is Shift-Option-8

If you are doing double bevel inlay, the angle determines how far down the inlay piece will sit. So, I always do test cuts and adjust angle until the inlay sits flush. If your saw will allow you to jump to precise angles, you can make a note of your optimal settings, and get to the desired inlay setup much more quickly. Even then, I would still test cut to verify angle is spot on. If you are doing bowls, if your angle is off, the rings won't line up correctly. This is usually fixable with a lot of sanding, but it's better to have that angle right. If you are doing puzzles or puzzle boxes, you need that blade at exactly 90% or the pieces won't slide in and out freely. If the blade is not at 90% when you are cutting a narrow slice in a thick piece of wood, your blade could come out the side of your cut towards the bottom, or be thicker at the bottom, messing up your piece. In intricate 3D pieces (like chess pieces), this is very very important. That said, the angles other than 90% that I use would not be helped by the "stops." However, the Wixey is very valuable for those odd angles that have to be exact. Hope that helped -------Randy

I had that exact same thought. His EX is "Green" so it doesn't have the dust collection nor does his Seyco, but his Jet does have a similar-ish system, so he should have been somewhat familiar. Also, he has been to clubs and woodworking shows and such, so it seem surprising he hasn't seen the underside of the Newer Ex style saws as they have been on the market since that first Black "Anniversary" edition years ago. I guess he never looked.

I think to be happy with Bushton, you have to take a very relaxed attitude towards them. Just be patient, and it will come when it comes. One of our members visited them at their facility and mentioned they had zero motors on hand. I don't think they keep a lot of inventory of some parts. On other things like legs/stands and such, they inherited a large inventory from RBI, so they don't have to make those new yet. When I ordered my longer BM legs and extra clamps, those came very quickly. You have to remember, Scroll saws are only one of several Bushton products. I suspect it is a very small portion of their overall business. When I was talking to them, they mentioned how they had purchased another company and were now making some custom valve covers. When they do build saws, they probably build the saws in short production runs, so if that is so, your saw may be built on their next production run. To be fair, when I purchased my Green EX21 from Seyco, at that time, it took 3 like months as they had zero inventory and were waiting on the next production run and then shipment.

Right now, they are not attached. I have a few options for finishing this piece, haven't decided which way I'm going with them yet. If I decide to attach them like the original design, I would solder them together Jeweler style

Saw the recent Hummingbird pattern by Alex Fox and the idea of a stacked design on coins appealed to me, so I bought the pattern and set out to cut the three layers. I used an Eisenhower for the top, flattened bronze Costa Rica coin for the middle, and flattened Kennedy for the back. As you can see, the scale is very very small, so the little bronze outline from the middle layers isn't hardly even visible. So, I was a success in that I got it cut, but not so much in the final result. I do like the top layer by itself though.

Hey Brad, I think you must have misunderstood something I said. I didn't say anything critical of you at all and consider you a friend. I was just enjoying the memories of my first CW40 and the similar pcb370 saw that I learned on. I did create an "extra/dupe" post accidentally, and couldn't delete it, but that was nothing to do with you or any of your posts. Sorry if something I said came across differently than I intended.