Which bandsaw do I get - Axminster AC1950B or Record Power 250 or something else entirely?

[Steduk]

Hi all,
Looking for some advice on bandsaws. Limited budget of £300-£400.
It seems the 2 above mentioned saws are in that bracket. The Axminster seems to have a slightly bigger cutting capacity.

Just looking for thoughts or advice.

Thanks

 

[Spectric]

Depends what you are expecting from the saw, bigger is often best if for no other reason than a larger table but many buy something and then realise it is to small. What are you expecting to cut?

 

[Steduk]

Thanks for the reply. I’m a relative newbie and have a cheap parkside bandsaw but its not powerful enough, has a small cut depth and throat, so i know i need something else. Using it mainly for resawing hardwoods for cutting boards etc. I want to try collecting drying as sawing my own logs for other projects

 

[Superchippy123]

Havnt had a small bandsaw similar to the one's you've mentioned i would 100 percent save your money for a bigger bandsaw. Have a record power bs350 now and i love it for resawing and ripping boards. Got it 2nd hand for €550 so not far off the top end of your budget

 

[Ttrees]

Still there in Manchester waiting to be snapped up at only £695!
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/12456553...:dtQAAOSwatdgIcVa&LH_BIN=1&LH_ItemCondition=4
New fence and vfd and blade likely all that's needed,
A practical solution for one who has only a 13a household supply,
but needs a good machine that won't trip the breaker,
which one might be pushing with a 16" saw with a 2hp motor, as its the split second starting draw on the machine which uses the juice,
and the VFD/inverter has easily adjustable to suit, soft start capabilities to run a 24" no bother at all.
Even on my 100 quid cheapie, I have all the features I need.


This machine would do most of what a tablesaw does compared to a wee machine your looking at, which wouldn't be up to the task of anything more that cutting a few wee curves or making very short boxes.

It can take a 3/4" blade or larger which has enough 'beam strength'
to not need rely on a thrust guide for keeping it in position.
This means the machine can run without using the thrust guide constantly, so its use is only for brief periods where you are pushing too fast, and the noise goes away.
Interchangeable guides can be replaced if needed on the Centauro CO600, but you don't need anything but a single thrust guide with this machine.

Compare that with a lesser machine, and you will likely see screaming thrust guides, if you look for some clip where that's not cut from the video, or sped up with music added.

That's meant to be the interesting part of the video, where you get to see the machine working honestly.

Just my 2 cents, and might be of interest to some if not yourself.

Tom

 

[rs6mra]

I have owned 2 bandsaws and got rid of them without hardly using them. The last one being the Record Power 250 which I found wasn't up to the task for resawing. The one I had was bought second-hand for £100 and I have seen them going for £150 recently. It was practically new and but changed the blade immediately after I got it and the fence was rubbish which also got upgraded to an Axminster fence. I will buy another at some point but when I get round to having the contents of 3 sheds in one workshop! I would not consider anything less than the Record Power Sabre 350 in the future and they do the Sabre 250 version also which you might have noticed.
So essentially what I'm saying is go as big as you can.........

 

[johnbs]

I'd be inclined to save up a bit and go for a secondhand Startrite or similar (351/352 range) . You'll need 1.5 hp upwards for deep cuts.
John

 

[dickm]

My usual vote for a startrite 352. The best £180 I've ever spent (but that was 30 years ago!)

 

[Keith Cocker]

I have had the Axminster AC1950B for a couple of years and have been very happy with it. Withe the right blade it does a good job. Of course, I would like a bigger capacity (effectively it will go to 135 x260) but I haven't the space. But as a starter it does a great job.

 

[sneggysteve]

+1 for Startrite

 

[AJB Temple]

Practically any reasonably heavy duty second hand bandsaw of 16" and above is going to be miles better than your suggestions for small new machines. Bigger saws will take wider blades, more tension, have proper capacity, be a great deal more rigid, be better made and will probably outlast you. Waste of money to buy these small, budget, Far East made saws.

 

[Orraloon]

I am not familiar with UK brand saws but having worked up from small saws in a few steps loosing money at every step I agree its best to save the pennies and get something decent to start with. My view is anything less than 14'' throat saw is a toy. To resaw you need a decent depth of cut and that of course needs the horsepower to drive it.
Regards
John

 

[Seaside Donkey]

I was in the same position as you, saw this Badger Axminster 1950B review and bought one.

Mainly used for small resawing jobs. It's been ok. Not fantastic but it's let me expand my woodworking to do things I otherwise wouldn't have been able to.

If I had more room and more money I would have probably bought something bigger but I don't so I haven't.

 

[Stevebod]

I do buy into the "buy a bit bigger than you think you will need" philposophy, but how far do you go, and a lot depends on what you actually want to do and also the space you have to accommodate one?

I got a "toy" bandsaw from Aldi a few years ago as a "spur of the moment" purchase and it has probably been the most useful power tool I currently have, (best £80 I ever spent on DIY). But then I got it to help to cut small pieces of timber to repair a rotting conservatory.

I am now upgrading to a 12inch (assuming I can find one), on the basis that a 10 inch would probably be OK, but due to a new shed project I have a bit more room. There seems to be a hike in price between 10 and 12, but and even bigger hike from 12 to 14?

 

[Richard_C]

I'm happy with my recently acquired 1950 but never owned one before so can't compare to Record. It struggled to cut straight at first and I saw that the casting for the top blade guide was drilled at an angle, about 3 degrees out, which meant the gude faces were at an angle to the side of the blade so any sideways pressure from grain direction on the blade tried to twist it. I contacted Axminster who sent me a replacement very promptly and with no arguments. Once fitted, it's all good. My first contact with Axi customer service and I am impressed.

Like everyone, I would like bigger but for the space I have and the £££ I spent its a good compromise. Its not a top notch trade machine but they are 2 or 3x the price. Setting the bottom blade guide fore and aft following a blade change is a pain, adjuster head almost hidden from view. Rest of adjustments OK. The stand is better than I thought it would be, machine fixed to stand by 4 bolts but you immediately take one out because you can't open the bottom door with the head of #4 in. Gravity and 3 bolts are enough. Dust extraction works well enough through my existing shop vac/diy cyclone set up but the odd time that I have used it and forgotten to turn the vac on you immediately realise why extraction of some sort is a must.

It comes with a decent 6tpi 1/2 inch blade, I ordered a 1/4 inch 6tpi with it and later got a 4 tpi 3/8 from Tuffsaws. Blade changes are not too bad because you turn the blade and take it out through a sideways slot in the table, no need to take off fence and fence rail like on some. Main use is woodturning blanks plus 'odd jobs' - I think it would struggle with a lot of resaw work on bigger stuff but if you are in no rush it should do it.

Before you get too excited check stocks and delivery. I got mine just before Axminster went 'out of stock' on most of the range and Record is hard to get as well. Maybe its getting better but it all seems a bit random.

 

[Trainee neophyte]

I went with the Axminster 2880, and it's not big enough, especially not for putting whole logs through. The amount of waste turning trees in to planks is astonishing, and 200mm of tree doesn't give you much useable wood at the other end. Anything smaller than that and you will be processing twigs into toothpicks. I have resorted to riving logs with wedges, because I just can't face the endless chainsaw chaos.

So for milling, go big or go home. For everything else, the Axminster saw seems perfectly usable and not at all underpowered for its capacity. If I had access to a second hand market I would have bought some cast iron monster, even though I have nowhere to put it. I had to go new, so you do the best you can with what you've got.

 

[Richard_C]

Fair point on logs. My main use is the 'planks to blanks' way round rather than logs to blanks. But whatever you get it will never be quite big enough so its always a compromise.

 

[Stevebod]

Pre covid I was going to get a Scheppach Basa 3 which is 12 inch saw and not much more than your budget and seems to have some good reviews, however they seem to have gone "off sale" for the time being...

 

[fleyh]

Depends on how you plan to use it.
If you only ever work with single thickness of material then AC1950b is OK.

I have AC1950b and would not recommend it as it encourages unsafe working practice.

This model has a design flaw - upper blade guard column (which holds upper blade guides) shifts side to side when its is lowered or raised to change cutting height.

On a normal bandsaw one would expect to setup blade guides (upper and lower) once after each blade change.
On AC1950b you have to adjust upper guides every single time when changing the cutting height.

There is a few mm gap at the top between the rail on which the blade guide column sits and the blade guide column itself.
When you rotate the cutting height adjustment knob - the whole column wobbles left and right.
When you reach desired height you always find that blade guides are completely out of alignment because the bottom of the upper blade guard has moved a lot to one side or another.

As a result one would usually set whatever average/max height, adjust blade guides, and don't change height any more - whether you are sawing 18mm ply or re-sawing a small log.
On thinner materials excessive upper blade guard/guide height height causes blade to wander (because blade guides are too high) or - danger zone - if blade happens to snap there is plenty of blade exposed to hurt the operator.