Anyone have a Cold Saw (wet)?

[variant22]

I am considering purchasing a H&F / Metex Cold Saw (the wet type) but have not found much information on them. I am not talking about a Brobo as they are well outside my budget. I am thinking one of the Chinese/Taiwanese saws. Anyone have any experience with these?

I am at the point where I have had enough of the dust from the abrasive saw. I do not really have the space for a full sized band saw so I figure a Cold Saw may well be the go. The idea of cuts that are square and "ready to weld" has me interested.

[Keith_W]

Hi variant22,
I have a HF S827 Cold Saw and am very happy with it, it has a blade with 315mm OD so does most size materials that you would be looking to cut. It cuts reasonable size solid bar as well if you just take it easy.
I have used the Brobo and Estelle Saws and they do have larger blades but find the S827 cuts well and is straight and square. Depending on what you cut you may need to consider having a few different type of blades to accomodate.
The S827 is single phase but note it has a 15 amp plug so draws more current than the normal 10 amp units.
I put Castors on the base and it wheels arround easily so I can put it out of the way when not in use.
Regards,
Keith.

[matthew_g]

Everything Keith just said.
I love my Brobo, I have a wet hacksaw, bandsaw and abrasive chol saw,
but I always seem to gravitate towards the brobo or the big hacksaw.
Matt

[Jekyll and Hyde]

I have one too (315mm), and it's great for all kinds of tubing, flat bar, and smaller solids (up to about 2 inch round in ally, and 1.5 inch in steels). Bigger solids take a fair bit of patience, but it does it.

The biggest drawback is the cost of blades - you can get them recut for about $40-50, but that doesn't help if you need a few different teeth counts on hand as I do...

[Jon_77]

I was lucky enough to pick up a SOCO MC370 not too long ago that required a bit of a clean up, a new handle and some replacement components on the jaw vice for under a 1/4 of the price of a brand new unit and i'm stoked with it.

As many have said they do accurate clean cuts with the downside being the cost of the blades (I'm only running 350mm blades in mine, as the 370mm units are another 50% more in price).

I believe the Metex runs a dual jaw vice which supposedly aids with blade life whilst the H&F units do not - yet neither do the Brobo's so what does that tell you?

Either way you go, you'll be a happy camper.

Cheers
Jon

[variant22]

Thanks for all the comments on Cold Saws. It is good to hear that the H&F cold saws are solid machines. I was not really sure what to expect. I would go with a Brobo but it is so far outside my budget it is not even in the equation. Chinese/Taiwanese is pretty much my only option.

[malb]

I ran a 315mm Soco (very similar to the Metex that I saw on ebay last week) and a 370 Brobo for about 5 years. Both good saws for moderate work, but the Soco was easier to work with for mitre work as the saw head swivels arround the centre of the jaws and there are less complications for sorting cut length for work mitred both ends.

The SOCO was a 3phase 3HP unit and was cutting everything from 6mm sq thin wal tube through to 100 x 18 SS bar. Had a variety of blades in different configurations for the tasks required, ranging from 40 tooth for the bar to 100 tooth for the small thinwall tube.

The signicant difference between the unit we had and the Metex (apart from being single phase) was that the vise jaws had longitudinal V's in them, which was a big advantage for cutting rounds, flat bar and suprisingly square or rectangular tube above 12mm. We discovered that running tube through in the V's for square cuts was much quicker than clamping it conventionally in the vice as there was more consistent wall in contact with the blade that way.