Earlier today, I wondered if Milwaukee would design a portable 10″ table saw around their new M18 High Demand 9.0Ah battery pack. Maybe a 7-1/4″ saw? In either case, what are the chances such a tool is in active development?
Hmm…
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Brainstorming
A Milwaukee cordless table saw could potentially be hybrid powered, with M18 High Demand battery compatibility, and also a port for attaching an extension cable for AC power.
Of course, if Milwaukee did come out with a cordless table saw, it would be an M18 FUEL table saw, with brushless motor for power, efficiency, and runtime.
But what about Dewalt? They came out with a 20V Max cordless miter saw. Why wouldn’t or couldn’t they also reduce a smaller-than-corded but still versatile 7-1/4″ portable cordless table saw?
I suppose we would see a Dewalt brushless circular saw before something as game-changing as a brushless or brushed motor cordless table saw.
Then there’s Makita, who has been expanding their 18V X2 cordless power tool lineup. Makita recently announced – not in the USA but overseas – an 18V X2 cordless miter saw. Oh yes, and it’s brushless.
Does Makita even make a corded portable table saw? Oh, according to these Amazon listings, they do. If that listing date is right, their smaller saw has been on the market since at least 2004. Makita, it’s time for an update, so how about an 18V X2 model with brushless motor?
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Speaking of 18V X2, there’s no reason why other brands shouldn’t get in on that multi-battery pack action. Festool’s TSC 55 cordless brushless circular saw takes things further, as it can run off of one or two battery packs.
That seems like a great idea other brands could potentially adapt. Makita and Festool aren’t the first tool brands to experiment with modular battery pack configurations.
Does anyone else remember Black & Decker’s VPX line of cordless power tools? I wrote about it for another website back in 2007, a year before ToolGuyd was founded. Black & Decker’s VPX cordless tools were based on a 7V battery pack. Some tools accepted just one battery pack, others took two and operated off the combined 14.4V.
Before that, there was the Black & Decker VersaPak system, with tools accepting 1 or 2 3.6V battery packs.
If any brand takes the cordless table saw approach, whether with 1 battery or even 2, I would like to see a hybrid AC power option too. Even if it wasn’t built into the tool, in the form of an extension cord adapter or built-in power cord, maybe we will finally see AC power adapters similar to the Los Gatos AC battery adapters we recently wrote about.
Oh, and let’s not forget Bosch. The only reason I bring them up is because they’re a popular name in the portable table saw industry, perhaps beating Dewalt – I’m not sure.
If there’s a household brand name that will bring a cordless portable table saw to the USA, Bosch could be the one.
Yes, Metabo’s got a new cordless miter saw on the market, and we’ve seen a promo flyer that shows a cordless future jobsite, complete with a cordless portable table saw. But Metabo’s not a household name – yet.
Metabo’s acquisition by Hitachi could very well change that, keeping in mind that Hitachi and Lowes announced a partnership and that readers have since reported seeing a limited (but better than nothing) Metabo presence at Lowes retail stores.
But Metabo’s saw isn’t yet on the market. And sadly, if they are the first to come out with a cordless portable table saw, lots of potential customers might never know about it. Metabo is best known as a metalworking tool brand, and they’re also not a very household name. Yet?
As for other brands, I can’t really see Hitachi, Ridgid, Porter Cable, or others being the first to come out with a cordless table saw. Maybe I’m wrong.
Brand Predictions and Potentials
Bosch – While I would like to see Bosch be the first major brand to come out with a cordless table saw, I don’t think they have it in them. They’ve had some great recent cordless innovations, but I think they’re living in the shadows of Dewalt and Milwaukee.
It sounds harsh, but I don’t think that Bosch has the same fight in them. Dewalt and Milwaukee are fighting for dominance. That leaves Bosch fighting for what, 3rd place? 4th? Are they even fighting, or are they comfortable where they are?
Dewalt – I think there’s a possibility for Dewalt to come out with a good cordless table saw. Since their miter saw features a brushed motor, and not brushless, and they have yet to come out with a brushless circular saw, I’m not sure what to think or hope for.
If we do see a cordless table saw from Dewalt, it might be a 7-1/4″ model, rather than a 10″ saw which would be larger, heavier, and possibly underpowered with a brushed motor.
Maybe it would be 6-1/2″, matching the size of most cordless circular saws, saving Milwaukee’s M18 Fuel model.
But also let’s not forget Black & Decker’s dual battery tools. Dewalt has come out with 40V Max outdoor power tools, and there’s also a chainsaw expected out sometime soon. Maybe we’ll see a 40V Max cordless table saw? It’s possible, but I would much rather see a cordless table saw that runs off of two 20V Max battery packs.
A pair of 5.0Ah battery packs should be able to deliver quite the punch.
Makita – It would make sense for Makita to have an 18V X2 cordless table saw on their tool development roadmap, but it doesn’t seem like they updated their corded table saws in quite a few years. I could be wrong, but they might not be at all interested in developing an 18V X2 cordless table saw, at least not anytime soon.
Milwaukee – Milwaukee has come out with an M18 cordless miter saw, but for whatever reason it was released overseas and not in the USA. How come? Are they working on something better for us?
They do make a corded miter saw that we posted about back in November, but it’s not very visible (for lack of a better word) in the current market.
This begs the question – even if Milwaukee has the capability to develop a cordless table saw, are they interested in doing so?
Final Thoughts
If I had to guess, I would think that Dewalt and Milwaukee are the two brands most likely to have a cordless table saw on their development roadmaps. Dewalt’s would potentially be smaller and more portable, and Milwaukee’s would be brushless and more capable.
This all brings up some more questions:
Does anyone WANT a cordless table saw? I do, but I’m not a professional user who puts one to use on a daily basis.
What would you want to see in a cordless table saw?
Nitsan
I’m not a tradie but I’d want one due to the much lower noise from most cordless tools compared to mains powered tools. And since I mostly only cut small amounts of material I’d prefer the convenience of cordless, as long as I had two batteries so I can always have one on charge.
But I’d be just as happy with a quiet mains powered one.
Thanks for the great blog. Keep up the good work.
fred
I’ve expressed my opinion before in a prior post – and I still think that a cordless table saw is a much bigger challenge than a cordless miter saw. From a safety standpoint if a miter saw blade slows down – it’s a big nuisance and may ruin the cut. With a table saw if the battery starts to die –there is a potential for a nasty kickback that may ruin your day – if the anti-kickback pawls are not yet engaged with the trailing end. Maybe the electronic wizards can design around this by preventing the blade fro spinning if the battery is not up to snuff – but I’m guessing that this is one issue perplexing the tool designers.
BTW – I’m betting that underpowered motors on some jobsite saws – coupled with lack of training, user misuse and other factors contribute to accidents. When I bought my 5HP saw – my thoughts were that a powerful motor, sharp clean blade, well aligned fence, zero-clearance throat plate, appropriate use of push sticks the saw’s sliding table plus my being alert – made for a safer saw.
Patrick
Fred, I couldn’t agree more with you. I see a cordless table saw as being underpowered which can be dangerous. Plus what happens when your batteries die? That circumstance creates the same risky situations for kickback etc. If I remember I also recall a similar discussion here awhile back when talk of cordless full size routers came up.
Mike
Milwaukee has never had a table saw so I think they will have one dewalt , bosch or makita would be my guess
Andy
Dewalt makes a cordless miter saw, and this miter / table saw combo. http://www.toolstop.co.uk/components/com_virtuemart/shop_image/product/resized/xbcb5ff1c7380cf6e972e6c5979333674.jpg.pagespeed.ic.NUoxeZ2Orc.jpg
I could see them making a table saw of some fashion being cordless. I’d buy one in a heart beat.
duke5572
I’m not sure if that thing is genius or the stupidest tool I’ve ever seen.
Chris Fyfe
Milwaukee might have a shot , using two 9Ah. Batts . Festool has a very workable cordless track saw . A table saw isn’t too different from an upside down track saw . Hell , I wouldn’t have believed a credible 7.5 Circ.
Chris
Nathan
I just don’t see any advantage to a cordless table saw. I barely see an advantage to a cordless mitre saw.
To that end – cost will be high, if for no other reason that a quality – portable table saw costs a pretty penny. So cordless would be more so. Going less than 10 inches on a table saw wouldn’t make sense to me for the cost you would most likely start off in.
I too would thing Dewalt would have the leg up on this but Milwaukee and Bosch would easily be able to gain ground.
I think this is another application where moving up the voltage base of the battery would go a long way to making it more useful SO again Dewalt 40V packs.
size vs weight – might as well have the ability to cord in when you can – and might as well let it me a charger too. I do think to do that right you’d need 2 battery slots. One for drain use, one for charge because of the complexity of charging a LI-ion/polymer battery correctly.
Don’t see it being needed.
Tom
I don’t get it. For tools that you “take to the work”, cordless makes tons of sense. Both mitre and table saws are tools where you have to “take the work to the tool”, so I see a lot less benefit of cordless. I maybe kind of get mitre — it would be kind of nice if you were trimming a room to be able to bring the saw around with you, but even then, not a huge benefit in my mind. For table, I always set up my saw in an area with space for indeed and out feed and to safely maneuver. Unless you were working off grid without a generator, the trouble of plugging in is much less than the trouble of managing batteries (not to mention cost!) in my mind. If we can make an electric car, we can make an electric table saw, but why?
Sam
I agree completely. These are the tools that you go to, not the other way around. And, when you have a work area setup, chances are there’s power there to power battery chargers, worklights, what have you. I don’t get the point of cordless chop saw, table saw, etc. Maybe different people have vastly different jobsites and having a clear work area with a power wip is not always an option.
fred
We would even bring one of our Unisaws and set it up on a jobsite where the work was going to last several weeks or longer.
Sam
Yeah, that seems to make sense to me. I am sure this is all situational, but in general I cannot imagine most job sites being so short on space and lacking power that one needs to have battery powered benchtop tools.
ken r
i help join double and triple wide mobile homes for a living. we are almost always in a position where we dont have power in the summer they spend all that money keeping us in heat in the winter and they just throw the jobs at us in the summer as fast as they can. it is so great to be able to do a job without the sound of a generator and compressor going full time. we have a very small generator that we start to keep battery’s charged but i cant even hear it most of the time. i am working to turn my work van into a portable solar charging station right now so i can cut out that sound- i now run this for cordless tools ( impact drill, regular drill, 1/2 heavy duty drill, saws-all, circular saw, compound miter saw, jigsaw, multi-tool saw, palm sander, 4 job lights, brad nailer, crown stapler) and i am working on more tools its amazing to not have cords and hoses running in the house to trip on and the nose level is great but the biggest surprise is time saving for what i do and when i show up to a repair job man that’s the big one it cut my repair time in half
Sam
This makes perfect sense to me. Like I said originally, I am sure there are many different jobs where this makes sense, I having a limited view did not feel there was an application in the way I work and how I see others work.
Ralf
I see a few ways around this by using a two battery system. The first battery would obviously power the unit and the second would be a backup battery that the unit would switch over to in case the first gets drained while it’s on. Possibly the unit would require one full battery to even run since that would be the safety device. But then it would probably receive a number of complaints due to the high cost and the chore of making sure the batteries are always charged. Some things are just better left alone…
mnoswad
i’ve also thought about the idea of a cordless table saw recently and think its a great idea, even to the point of musing about how it could be homebuilt.
What the other commenters are saying about kickback is much less of a concern with a cordless tool. What happens when a cordless circular saw binds up?……..the blade stops, at least more so than a 120v tool. The kickback on a cordless circular saw and a plugin circular saw is considerably different. I imagine that would the same difference with a battery powered table saw.
Yes, an electronic package that prevents the tool from operating at a lower battery charge is a good idea. Dewalt’s old 18v cordless nailers had that feature as an example.
id think that it would be a 8 inch blade not a 10 inch.
id like to see Dewalt start the trend, as their rack and pinion fence is probably the safest fence design to prevent blade binding.
I would absolutely buy one.
Zack
Agreed! I work in the trade and currently own two different 10in table saws which consistently get left at the shop because they are loud, big, bulky, heavy and just not all the easy to lug around. More often than not, I end up trying my best with a cordless circular saw which I’ve never had die comepltly in the middle of a cut.
I bought the cordless miter saw the day it was released and I wouldn’t give it up. I wish it was brushless but it does get the job done in-spite of that. 9 times out of 10, that bigass 12in miter saw is sitting back at the shop with the “portable” table saws.
So I say lets go with a dual battery 20v 8in brushless table saw. I’ll buy it the day it comes out!
Jerry
My experience with lithium batteries is that they go from working fine to dead/off with almost no in between. Because of this I wouldnt fear kickback so much as an incomplete cut I’d have to deal with. I could see how some might like a cordless table saw but personally I consider a table saw something you set up, then bring the work to it. For the extra cost of cordless, I’d rather put towards making a corded one more accurate, convenient, and safe.
Matt E.
For all intent and purpose, I’d argue we already have cordless table saws, we just call them “cordless track saws”.
Think about it: any of the tasks you’d assign to a relatively under powered cordless table saw (on a job site) could be done using a track saw (brushed or brushless).
A cordless table saw would never be able to safely use dado blades or have the cross cut capability to rip down 4×8 sheets of ply, but at least the track saw can do the latter with a long enough track.
In addition, while a corded (and presumably powerful enough) job site saw can rip faster, as you can set the fence and get to it, a corded saw would bog down, need battery changes, and lots of in/out feed support for it’s (presumably) smaller table surface area. So no real time, accuracy, or safety advantage over a track saw.
Finally, since track saws are close cousins to circular saws already, working a brands current 18V packs into the product is more straight forward.
Justin
I mean yes and no. The track saw is a great tool however it wouldnt take the place of a table saw on a job site. When trimming out windows and you’re ripping 4ft or 5 ft pieces of pvc almost all day i wouldnt be setting up a track saw to do that task. It would take forever.
On a different note i did just purchase the battery operated Makita Miter saw which is brushless and the thing is amazing. Every guy on my crew wants to use it. I would be someone very interested in a battery operated Table Saw for sure. Less cords, less setup time and break down time, and convenience is key.
Dominic van Lievenoogen
A dual battery setup has the biggest chance of providing the amps needed for bigger and more powerfull motors.
Makita’s 18x2v Setup has 4 rows of Lithium cells ( 2 rows in each battery ) that can provide current.
This setup will always be better then a single battery setup ( If weight isnt a problem of course. We’re talking about table saws here )
Dylan
What makes you say Milwaukee and dewalt are the two most likely? Milwaukee doesn’t even have a portable table saw according to Amazon. And both are kinda limited in the cordless woodworking tools. I wouldn’t put anything cordless past Makita. And dewalt is on the right track with the cordless planer and cordless miter saw
mnoswad
either way…….its going to be difficult to beat this setup.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qrfsjLiqfgs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GFnYRUyBQg4
skip to 3:00 above
Stuart
Yea, that’s the “Power8”:
https://toolguyd.com/power8-full-cordless-workshop/
https://toolguyd.com/power8-cordless-workshop-to-be-refreshed-with-lithium-ion-batteries/
I’d sooner use a Rockwell BladeRunner (https://toolguyd.com/rockwell-bladerunner-x2-saw/) than a Power8.
The Power8 doesn’t look to have changed a bit since coming out years ago.
It’s pretty pricey too, at $600 via Amazon.
It looks to come with just 1 battery, and I can’t find any USA source for another. It’ll take a lot to convince me of the Power8’s worthiness.
Hilton
Triton essentially had the first cordless table saw, way back in 1976.
Their Workcenter MK1 was designed to be used with your existing circular saw so there was no reason why a cordless circular saw would not work (if they were around back then).
Granted you would have to reach under the table top to switch it on or somehow MacGyver the switch.
Cr8ondt
Frankly I’d take a cord. I see no place a cordless table saw would benefit any job site. There is simply no need for one…. Worst case scenario would all ready have a generator on site.
Rami
More than a cordless table saw, I would like to see a cordless heat gun. Wonder if any brand is planning on releasing such a tool?
Stuart
That… I’m not sure about.
Heat guns take a lot of power and are often run continuously. Until there’s a cordless heat gun, butane heat guns or torches are the only non-corded alternative.
Mark s
A cordless heat gun would probably need at least a 5ah battery to last 20 minutes. I think the energy drain would be equivalent to an angle grinder.
Keith
Metabo has one coming out this year sometime – due to their new battery technology.
Hugh
If you can’t see the benefit of a cordless table saw the you aren’t the target audience. I can think of a many applications for such a tool. I wouldn’t worry about the safety concerns the tool companies will take care of those like they have with many cordless tools.
I wouldn’t think a cordless table saw could replace a corded, but it would be useful were power isn’t close and all you need to do it rip some fillers.
I wouldn’t count Milwaukee out of the mix for making a cordless table saw either.
john
The more that is cordless the better for me.
Just for speed of work and flexibility.
Mark DeRoncey
As a contractor who does a lot of small jobs, a cordless table saw would be a god send. I manufacture small pieces of mountings, do cabinet conversions, rebuild wood window frames, doors furniture and flooring repairs and installs, splicings, and the like, that require concise cuts on small parts or limited runs. I basically do all the projects that no one else wants to take the time to do or bid and therefore can charge well to do them. I refularly net $200 -$300 per hour on these so-called nuisance jobs. I would pay well for a cordless table saw.
Steve Watton
This Summer guys. Milwaukee will be coming out with an 18V tablesaw. Only 18V, but a large battery (Bigger than 9Ah). I’m still hoping for a surprise from Ridgid or Makita. Simply because they offer Sanders and routers etc and the fewer battery platforms I’m in – the better.