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This is a very nice tool. Light, compact, cuts well and good battery life. I hope they will come out with a Lithium-Ion battery that will fit it. I also hope they will make a Lithium-Ion that will interchange with all their 19.2 volt tools.
So far I am happy with it after a year. I am on my 3rd charger in 4 years and the first two just outlived the one year warranty. pc told me it grips better and will last longer. I replaced it with the new all metal chuck from pc not available on all of their drills. I have used the combo kit for about 4 years. You will get much longer run times with this new technology. The batteries and charger have given me fits. Except for the occasional cut I have not been using it much for these reasons.You would have to have a big pouch full of batteries to get any serious work done with this saw.
I have also gone through 3 batteries. This probaly explains why some people can not get more than 30 cut 2x4s on a charge.If everything is set up right you can get over 100 2x4 cuts. The drill has a lot of torque but the chuck gave up it's grip after 3 years of occasional use. PC had nothing interesting to say about it. Now to the saw: It cuts okay when the battery is fresh but if anything is binding on the blade such as when the work is not properly supported you will use up the battery in a hurry.Torque drops off quickly as other reviewers have pointed out. Also for some reason plywood eats up the batteries faster than cutting 2x4s. Beware that there are various capacity replacements out there and make sure you get the largest available.After using Makita batteries, Bosch batteries, and older Portercable 12 volt batteries I would say I got the shortest life out of the 19.2 volt pc batteries.Now that Lithium Ion technology has arrived I would get a different brand such as Makita , Milwaukee , or the yet to be released Dewalt. KS Maryland
And when the battery even starts to get low it completely looses all torque power. This is is nice quality saw that works well, but has one drawback. It eats batteries very quickly. The only way to work with this saw is to have at least 3 batteries available and charged before starting work. But it will cut like a workhorse as long as you feed it batteries.
PURCHASED THE QUAD PACK BUT HAD SOME SPECULATION ABOUT THE SAW DUE TO PROBLEMS FROM THE PAST WITH OTHER BRANDS. THIS SAW , IN MY OPINION , IS HANDS DOWN THE BEST I HAVE USED. AFTER ABOUT A DAYS USE I AM COMPLETELY SOLD ON THIS SAW. HAS ALL THE POWER YOU NEED TO DO WORK THAT IS MADE FOR CORDLESS TOOLS. IT FEELS SO COMFORTABLE WHILE USING I PURCHASED TWO SPARE BATTERIES SO I WONT HAVE TO BOTHER WITH A CORDED SAW. YOU CANT BELIEVE HOW MUCH TIME THIS SAVES YOU IN A PRODUCTION TYPE ENVIRONMENT AND HOW MUCH NEATER THE SHOP LOOKS WITHOUT CORDS EVERYWHERE.
But, since I had to remanufacture it to make it satisfactory. Now they work fine.Overall, once I got the kinks out, I'm very happy.
Couldn't square it up until I filed down the little housing plate stop. Took a little fine tuning, but after that, I've been happy with it.
Had to set the cutting lineup guides, which were pretty worthless untill I learned how to set them for how I use the saw. And batteries had awfully short charge life until I had used them a while after which they seemed to do a lot better.
Probably had been sitting in a warehouse for a while and needed to be conditioned with use. Typical Porter Cable excellent quality and well designed.I'd have given it five stars if it had come out of the box in a more ready to use condition.
only 4 stars.
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