Good idea, Bilzee. Not fair though, 'cos I have two to appraise! Okay, oldest first:
Elu 3401 12" throat, 6" depth, 2 speed 0.75 Hp motor. Now sold as the DeWalt something-or-other and pretty much identical as far as I can see. Can't remember how long I've had it, or what I paid, but it's been worked hard. A good workhorse; more of a blunt instrument than a finely tuned tool - no 0.5mm thick resawing here. Lousy fence; it works but it's too easy to loosen the knobs too far and lose the nut, and it's not really much better than a straight edge cramped on to the table. Possibly worse in fact. Other bad point is the tension adjusting bolt, which is just a M6 carriage bolt in an ordinary nut. I've managed to strip out 2? 3?and DeWalt charge a tenner for 'em. :shock: Found a better & cheaper solution, if anyone needs to know feel free to ask. All in all, it works pretty well but I'm not sure I'd put it top of the list of 12" bandsaws these days.
Axminster JBS180L AKA Jet JWBS16 , 16" throat, 10" depth, single speed 1.5Hp motor. Not had it long, cost £910.85 including delivery right into the workshop (special offer :wink: ). Came in a crate, silica gel bag to prevent rust during transport etc and generally a machine the makers seem to want to be well cared for. Provided blade hopeless as usual, so an additional £25 odd on a couple of blades from Dure Edge. Built like a brick privvy, and generally very sound. Changing blades is a bit of a fuss, particularly as the lower guides aren't micro-adjustable like the upper ones. Also you have to wait for it to stop buzzing when you turn it off before you turn it on again, which takes some getting used to. :? Fence very solid, but not adjustable to allow for blade drift although there's a point fence to use instead (not had to use that yet because the Dure Edge blades are so good). However, will resaw to ridiculously fine tolerances and has all the oomph I need. GWW's review was in fact bang on the money about it in all respects. So far I'm very pleased indeed.
Cheers, Alf
