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Saturday, August 22, 2009

What's New?

Last night the nice UPS man brought me a present.....Not exactly, but it felt like Christmas.

I ordered a new Micro Lux scroll saw from Micro Mark on Sunday. My old Dremel(almost 30 years) was just hanging on by the skin of it's teeth and I felt like they were falling out one by one.

Walter has been telling me to order a new one for months now. I did a bit of research and didn't like anything about the new, heavier Dremels with the round table. I wanted one that could still be used with a fence to cut straight lines. I have been drooling over this one for a few years now. I asked around and only had one negative comment on it. They said that it ran too slow. It is a variable speed and the high speed is fast enough for what I want to do. It goes around corners far better than the old Dremel. I do a lot of intricate curves when I do hand carved headboards. I do a lot of straight lines on other furniture, so I need a fence. This little guy does both.

I took him out of the box this morning and put him together. Yup. He came in pieces. Only two plus putting in the saw blade and putting the table clamp, that I ordered separately, on the bottom. It was very easy to do.

I fired him up and cut some wood for the class that I am going to teach. He cuts like butter. I was cutting cherry and he made quick work of it.

Tessie showed up right after I finished cutting the pieces. She insisted on a demo. I kept having to tell her to watch her toes.

Her first question was "Why?" I assumed that she meant why the new saw.

I told her, "Because it will be easier to cut wood for new furniture."

She thought about it for a minute then, as I new it would be, the next question was "What are you going to build for me first?" I didn't answer. I just kept sawing.

She climbed up to the top of the saw and took control of the adjustable clamp that holds the wood in place while cutting. It unscrews with the little black knob that she has a hold of. You can set it for the thickness of the wood that you are using and unlike the old Dremel, you don't have to keep lifting the clamp to get the wood under it. I like that feature. It makes cutting a lot of the same thickness so much faster.

I also like the fact that the on/off switch and the variable speed control are in front. On the old Dremel I had to reach around to the right all the way to the back of the bow to turn it on and off. a couple of times I scraped my fingers on the sanding disk at the side of that saw.....I don't think that part was well thought out.

I quit sawing and came in here to tell you about it. It was very quiet in the kitchen.....I had left Tessie with the saw plugged in. Maybe that wasn't such a good idea. I went out to check.

There was Tessie. She was sitting with her back against the saw. She had the Micro Mark catalog in her lap. I heard her say...."If we get one of these the sanding will go faster. We need one of these to hold things together while the glue dries. Yes! Lots of extra saw blade, in case they break."

The last I saw of her and the catalog, she was happily turning back corners of pages to mark things that she thinks will help make new furniture for Spiderwort Manor faster. She had just about every other page bent.

I am a bit concerned....Some of the things that she has marked look suspiciously like mini torture devices to use on Zar. I am NOT buying her the "Heavy Duty Chopper II- Made for Serious Craftsman" Can anyone say Guillotine? And I am not telling her that I have Chopper I hiding in a drawer somewhere!

Anyway, I am a very happy camper today and I am going to leave you now to go play with my new friend Lux.

See you tomorrow.

8 comments:

rosanna said...

Bello bello bellissimo!! i want t, i shall ask Baby Jesus for it at Christmas!!

Tabitha Corsica said...

Casey, do you think this is a better option than the table saw? Well, I guess it is since you can do curves also. Looks great!

Tabby

Kathi said...

Wow. This looks awesome! I got my Micro-Mark catologue in the mail yesterday and did just what Tessie did! I will put this saw on my Christmas wish list for sure!

Caseymini said...

Susan, It depends on what you want the saw to do. I do a lot of intricate cuts for some of the furniture that I do and I do some straight cuts for table tops and chair bottoms etc. If I were only doing straight sawing I would want a table saw. Since I do more curves than straight lines, this is my choice. This one can do both if need be. The table saw can't.

George the Miniguy said...

I agree with Casey about saw choices. I have both a jig saw and a Micro Mark table saw. I cut lots of wood into smaller pieces, and use the table saw to do that regularly. If you want to cut long, straight pieces of wood from thin sheets of wood, the jig saw is okay. But if you need to cut normal, 3/4" thick wood, the table saw is the tool for that.

Jo Raines said...

Very nice purchase! I'm afraid I would cut off fingers but dream of working up to making mini furniture.

Jody
Mini Leaps and Bounds

marlies said...

It looks a verry handy saw, I put him on my wishlist too.
* marlies

Kathi said...

Okay, now I'm confused. I need a saw that will cut straight and do miter cuts. I don't need anything fancy to do scroll work. At least not now. Guess I'll have to go check out the table saw. My dremel won't cut anything. In fact I haven't found a way to even use it yet! Might just take it back?