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the bolts. This gets the fence almost exactly parallel to the miter slots.Once you get the fence parallel - just don't overtighten the bolts holding the auxillary fence on - its just aluminum and can warp if you apply too much pressure via. I recommend the Rigid blade sold at home depot (excellent blade that stays really sharp). FENCE: The fence is easy to get parallel to the miter slots once you figure out the trick. I'm happy with my purchase and am glad i made the decision to buy this saw.
The miter gauge is satisfactory. I was surprised at how easy this saw plowed through it as Brazillian Walnut is almost 3 times harder than oak, so I know that I put this saw through its paces. Mine was Made in USA as well - a bonus for me. 2). The blade included is junk - get a better blade.
The Cons: 1). In fact, I just completed laying 1000 sq. The trick is to let the auxillary aluminum fence fall into the miter slot and then snug the auxillary fence face up to the edge of the slots and then tighten down the fence adjustment nuts (the three bolts on top of the fence). The wings are held onto the main table by five bolts. The trick is to use a good quality thin kerf blade. I have used this saw for over 4 years now and it still works great.
pretty generic miter gauge. That being said I did upgrade one of them to the cast iron wing. This saw cut through it like a hot knife through butter. The stamped steel wings were not hard to level to the table. The fence locks down as solid as I've ever seen - never had it move on me even a little. MOTOR: The motor is plenty powerful enough to cut everything I've thrown at it over the years.
Once its on it works fine, but it takes 10 minutes to get the thing on/off. Dust control is adequate, but not stunning. Then you can get the wing perfectly level and then tighten it down so it cannot move. Hand tighten all of these bolts so that the wing is stable, but still adjustable. the blade guard is disgustingly hard to attach and remove. all in all an excellent saw.
The dado insert that I bought seems beefier and thicker steel than the standard throat plate - a little weird.3). throat plate that is standard seems flimsy. feet of 3/4" thick Brazillian Walnut hardwood flooring and used this saw to do the rip cuts where I needed thinner pieces near the walls. The steel wings are adequate and help increase the table size. It's easy to get it set accurately so that you can rely on reading the fence setting and not having to use a tape measure to set the fence.
The blade that came with the saw is junk - get something better. Just snug it tight.
After initial adjustments for precise parallelism and correcting the 90 and 45 degree stops, this saw is dead accurate. No other saw offers this feature at such a price. But please, Dewalt, include at least one decent cast top extension. The slidding table is still dead-on on accurate. My top is dead flat. The sliding table is excellant and well worth the cost. And this is definately not a cheaply made saw; overall quality is very high. By the way, we build large one-off custom furniture and cabinet items.
Oh yes, the included cross-cut guide is absolutely wonderful. I find friendly new features every other time I use it. I don't quite understand why Dewalt insists on including the utterly worthless sheet metal table extensions. It is used very heavily in my furniture shop with no problems. I could go on forever.
My copy of the DW746 is a joy to use. This was surprisingly easy: the mounting holes are pre-drilled. (No experience with the Dewalt rip fence). In the stores, these make this saw look so cheap.
Well worth the cost. I am still very pleased with the saw. Our saw sees heavy use. This saw is worth what they charge for it. After using table saws at several friends shops, this saw is still the king of hybred saws in my opinion.
Precisely machined arbor shaft. The DW746 scored at the top in a major woodworking magazine. This saw fits right into our small shop. Can't imagine how I ever worked with out it.10/23/2009 -- Looks like the testing people got it right this time. I have the sliding cross cut table and use a Vega rip fence instead of the Dewalt fence.
Ditch the sheet metal.It's 05/19/2009 and the saw is still chugging along nicely. I ditched the odd 2 inch dust collector and installed 5 inch dust collection underneath the saw. The sliding cross cut table provides an amazing 26 inches of cross cut capability: great for cabinet makers. Almost unmeasurable runout on the arbor.
3HP Beast, and does not claim to be. It is wrong. And the guy rolled it into my garage. I also added the sliding table and this is a nice add-on. So if you plan on mounting a mobile base that would be the time.The saw runs true with little vibration.
It was deeply discounted as I didn't actually need a new saw. It came in a big yellow box upside down. At the price at the time I decided to roll the dice despite the listing title. After a little fiddling I was able to get it dead square and consistent. Amazon's free shipping had it to my house in a couple of days. Cutting is cutting, but the noise while running doesn't leave me feeling guilty about turning it on after 8pm in my development.
You won't have a clean room, but I had a reducer for my 4" hose already and it gets a good 85-90% of the below table dust. I paid $600 for the saw and rails delivered to my garage. However my Craftsman vibrated even less and consistently passed the nickel test. My previous SMT was nice, but this one is more heavy duty. At $1,200 I would buy a Grizzly or Jet in the $800-$900 range. I recently purchased this saw from Amazon. I think it all comes down to price. DeWalt sells the rails (either 30" or 52") as a separate accessory.
It probably streamlines their inventory. It makes up to 30" cross cutting feel a lot safer with the miter clamp and being able to keep my hands away from the blade. Definitely not good, and I would highly recommend swapping it out for even a low end 40-50T General Purpose or Combination blade.The fence is easy to adjust and locks tight and square. My previous saw was the Craftsman version of the BT3100 with the gravity rise stand.I will start by saying the title on the listing at the time said "(no fence)".
It is well made, and made in the US, and will serve me well for many years. If you are in the market for a great hybrid saw this will serve you well as will many of the others. It saves me from sweeping the 10-15% for a few days.As for the final verdict. Dust collection is pretty good. At that price a great value, no regrets.
It is also pretty quiet running.
However at the list price it is overpriced.
The stock blade is not bad.
It is not a 500lb.
The base model dw746 does in fact come with a fence.
To keep the dust off the floor I slid a 20"X20" el cheapo furnace filter underneath.
Most of what a fence is supposed to do.
The saw comes equipped as described on the DeWalt site with a fence, but no rails.
Rips are clean and glue ready.
I wanted to wait until I have used the saw extensively before passing judgment on the saw. Because of the 52 rails, some assembly needed to be removed to install rail components. learning curve is necessary for any type of new equipment especially something as often used as a table saw.I bought the saw packages with the 52 fence, cast iron (steel) extension wings and mobile base. Replaced this blade almost immediately with a Freud blade, could not be happier.Assembly of the saw with all of the additional do-dads took a couple of day, spending an hour or two at a time.
Just recently (still waiting for shipment) invested in a true cut system to replace the stock one, never could get it to sit right.and with the addition of a Incra 5000, makes cross cuts a snap. Not a big deal, but added time to the entire assembly.Now to the operation, saw was pretty set, right out of the box, with some minor tweeking.needed for fence. Fence remained dead on and repeatable cuts have not been a problem. All in all, the saw was a good deal for the money spent, a year and 5-600 b/f of oak later, it might have been better to bite the bullet and get a cabinet saw, but what the heck, I can get another couple of years out of this one before looking for a replacement. Dust collection is fair, I have a steel city DC 1200 cfm connected but still I get a lot under the saw. I have found that a break in period i.e.
Powerful and quiet the best way describe the beast, I do a lot of ripping on 4/4 red oak and have had very little saw related issues. As other reviewers have noted, the blade that comes with the saw is something that should end up on a chop saw, not making rip cuts. Instructions were generally straight forward, but would recommend going thru all of it before actually assembling the saw.
There are some features that I would like to see improved. I use the blade that came with it for most of my cuts and I never have to sand or plane any of the cut faces. - Solid machine: This is a very solid and heavy machine that will serve you for a long time if you take care of it. - Smooth: This goes for the saw itself (no vibration) and for the cuts it makes.
I bought a Freud blade for the cross cuts but have not had to use it yet. There are splitters that you can buy which do not require tools for removal and installation and DeWalt should learn fron them. Also, the splitter should be seperate from the blade guard so the latter can remain in place for non-through cuts. - The wings that come with the saw are made of sheet steel and not cast. So many features about this saw impress me but I will try to be brief. - Power: This saw has all the power you need in a small shop and more to spare. - The fence: Smooth-sliding as other reviews mention, very accurate, extremely easy to operate and calibrate. Smooth solid controls for the blade height and angle.
Large power switch that is easy to bump off with your knee in an emergency. These are few and none of them diminish the value of this saw but I wanted to include them for completeness. There are optional ones that you can buy from DeWalt but they should be part of the saw to begin with. This is inconvenient and time consuming when you need to remove them for dado cuts (or other non through cuts). - The table: Solid and smooth table. - The splitter and guard assembly is one piece that has to be removed by using wrenches.
Nothing seems to slow it down, not even for a brief moment. Make sure you get the deal with the mobile base (see heavy above) which is so smooth and easy to operate. - The controls: just what you need and right where you need them. I made a zero clearance insert for it and now it even cuts the cheapest, thin plyood without chipping or noticable marks. The wings should probably be upgraded since they are not as smooth as the main table (made out of sheet steel rather than the cast iron as the rest of the table.
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