Thread: My Sherwood (Timbecon) BAS-350

Anyone thinking of a bandsaw couldn't go too wrong with a BAS-350 from Timbecon.

I have had one for 4 weeks now, and I am very happy with it.

The bearings on the guides need to be replaced with good sealed ones, I am yet to do this, and I have just used some compression tape to make seals on all the edges of the two doors, (I can now get most of the dust into my small VAX - Dual Cyclone DC system - see my post in the General section.) The tape has also made the using the saw much cleaner, as it stops the dust falling out the sides of the doors, and reduced the saws noise level further again. Other than that I have found the saw to be very easy to use, quiet, and well balanced with little vibration.

I did have to tune the wheels to get them co-plainer, but it was very simple to do with a small level, a length a wood, a clamp, a rule and one spanner. Adjusting the bearing guides was a bit fiddly at first, but now I can change a blade in around 10 minutes, or less.

As stated above I would have liked to have seen better bearing supplied with the machine, the ones I currently have feel a little stiff, but they seam to work okay. The manual says to leave 0.5 mm gap between the bearings and the blade, but I have found that having the bearings just touching, so that I can still turn them with little resistance, keeps the blade running much better. I also adjust the two thrust bearing so that they just don't spin when the saw is running, but not cutting.

One other thing I have done is to put a small piece of tape in the shape of an arrow on the top tension knob so that once I have found the right tension for a blade I can note the position of the arrow, and release the tension on the blade, by turning the wheel anti-clockwise three times. With the arrow on the knob, I just have to turn the wheel clockwise three times, and line up the pointer again, no fuss, the blade is back at the tension I first set it at.

To alert me that the blade is un-tensioned I have attached a plastic ring that I got off the end of a new extension cord, via a piece of sting, and some tape so I don't lose it. I then place this on the big, round, red, stop button so that I remember that the saw is not tensioned. (I also unplug the saw.) No more cutting with an un-tensioned blade for me now!

The 1.5 horse power motor, the little brush on the bottom wheel, the extra 18 months warranty (total of 30 months), the bonus Timbecon points (worth approximately $20.00), the price $599.00, the fact that Timbecon have spare parts right at the store (my saw doesn't have to go east for a service), the fact that Timbecon is a WA store, and the physical location of the Timbecon store (it's very close to me so I could just get the saw home in the back of my Camry with boot lid left open and tied down, and then by sneaking around a few back streets...) were most of reasons that I went with this saw, and not the Carbatec version.

(I get the feeling that Timbecon is keeping Carbatec honest in Perth, after reading some of the posts in this forum about the price of this model in the East.)

There are a number of comments in these forums about the quality of this saw that I beg to differ with. I find the table very sturdy, and having the big size is really handy. Not having a riser attachment could be a pain, but the saw has a 205 mm height cut, which is more than other models that I have seen without a riser. Getting the right tension has not been a problem at all for me. The fence works well (when you have it sticking out in front, like one of the Timbecon guys told me to do when ripping, you can make a very good Harry Potter scar on your forehead, like I have had to put up with for the last couple of days, along with all the jibbing I got about it at work! :eek: ) I even find the mitre guide works well.

The saw is not perfect, some simple improvements would make it far better, but for the price I feal I got my monies worth, and I have been able to improve it with little effort and cost.

So if you are thinking of getting a bandsaw, then as I have said at the top of this thread, you might want to consider the Timbecon BAS-350 when you are reviewing models, and don't judge it via the model at the Carbatec store. If you live in Perth it’s a no brainer, if you live in the east they will courier, but you will have to add the freight costs to the overall price. (Checking their website the cost to ship to Melbourne and Sydney is $12.00 insurance and $47.00 for the freight, to Adelaide it $12.00 + $35.00 and Brisbane $12.00 + $69.00. For most states that is still cheaper than an Eastern States Carbatec BAS-350 which currently lists on the main Carbatec website as $689.00 - and remember if you can't transport it yourself you will have to pay for delivery anyway.)

And no I don't work for the shop.

If you feel you bandsaw is better than the BAS-350 than I am very happy for you too, but I don't have your's do I, so how could your's be better than mine!

I hope that this post gives a little balance to the current view of the BAS-350, and highlights that just because they all come form the same workshop in China, if infact they do, they are not all exactly the same.