scott brown here this is the makita 40 volt drop saw 40 volt drop saw
and in today's exciting episode we take a good look at it
now if you are familiar with makita there is a good chance you'll be familiar with the 18 volt
battery system it's been out for about as long as i've been building and that is 16 it's a long
time but now the 40 volt battery system is out but that's not what this video is about i've already
made a video about that this is about the 40 volt drop saw in particular or miter saw or sliding
compound saw that's what this video is about now full disclosure i was given this by making
new zealand so in this video we will talk about price because that's an important consideration
i'll pop the word advertisement here because i'm required to by new zealand law and when you think
about it it kind of is an advertisement they're giving me free products it ends up in the video
so you guys can see it and then we can all make a decision on whether it's worth buying or not
chip there's probably a chip for the bluetooth i'm guessing well there you have it the 40 volt makita
miter saw now price i couldn't find anything for here in new zealand but i looked it up and
in australia they're selling this miter saw for 850 australian dollars there's some other
currencies here i'll send a message to mckee new zealand and figure out what it is here
and we'll talk a bit more about price soon i believe one of the best things about this drop
saw is the fact that it only takes one battery one battery means less weight and weight is i think
the sword's biggest strength so the thing with mitosaurs is there is no miter saw that does
everything um i i went out and bought the festool capex to do finishing and that's a beast i can
cut most things that i need to cut but i don't want to use it daily to cut treated timber and
things that likely have nails in them you can make a finishing saw very rough that way
but if you get a smaller saw like this it has its limitations but it's light and easy to move
around and you can cut a bunch of framing with it i'm going to take it to the job right now we've
got to build a timber deck step at that villa renovation and we'll talk a bit more about it
now specs for this uh mitre saw i'll chuck them right here now if you look in particular at that
weight there that's uh that's fantastic put into context i was stoked to get a 20 kilo
drop saw when i bought the festool capex and this is even lighter than that and it's a big
improvement on the weight of the 36 volt makita miter saw it has plenty of power as well all right
let's build a step so uh i've been away for about a week i had a bit of a break and potter's been
holding the fort on the villa renovation it's pretty much done we just got to build this
last step out onto the deck here and it's a good chance to show off this drop saw but doing this
it's got these little handle things out here that slide out and give you a bit more support
it has a forward rail design and quite a distance and uh it also has the top handle design
now if you saw my 40 volt makita video you'd see that i prefer the top handle design that
is because your handle is above the blade you're not working against the blade so the top handle
in theory puts less pressure on the blade all right let's see what this uh blade change is like
all right i don't usually do ratings but blade change seven out of ten you don't have to get an
extra tool it uses the allen key that's on there but you have to pull that little window out and
hold the guard up i wish it just had like a little window that you just go
allen key put it back down that would be perfect
now the dust extraction this is just a dust bag and i don't have the battery system in
order to use the dust extraction unfortunately how do you tighten this i have to pop this off
in order to fit this on yeah still works so the dust extraction worked pretty well when we had the
demo unit we had no problems with the bluetooth you got the vacuum right underneath the drop saw
at all times so every time we pressed it the vacuum went on and it's got a cool feature
on the top of this drop saw that i use quite a bit this little button here that's the vacuum
so you don't have to pull the trigger in order to activate the vacuum and that lets you pull the
hose out and clean the top of the drop saw between cuts if you are that way inclined for me it's the
small details like that that i really like uh with any tools so i'm stoked that makita added that
controversy they included this little wee square here now makita drop saws i've heard from a few
people that i i trust that they had problems with it being square out of the box in particular i'm
talking about their 36 volt uh makita drop source i've had no problems i've borrowed a 36 volt
makita drop so i've done a video about it i'll post it in the description below and um i had no
problems it was all square it was meant let's see if this one is there we go square out of the box
but uh accuracy is something that you have to test over time and this is a first impressions video so
there you go i did like two cuts three cuts
and there's your dust so it tends to shoot it in the right direction straight into here
but because we don't have the two port system hooked up we're losing a bit of dust around here
this step here is coming out as you can see by the remove boards
quite far don't worry i'm going to get back to the dropper in a sec
the reason we have to have such a big step is because this is a large bifold opening window
and anytime you've got an opening window out onto steps the first one has to be what we call
a landing and for continuity and to minimize tripping the step has to be even so the distance
from the floor to the first step has to be the same as the step to the rest of the deck
and that's the type of decking that we're using yeah vitex sticking is like a hardwood and i think
it comes from solomon islands or something i'm not 100 on that but this is the last job that we have
to do here we've got little bits and pieces all over the place and that that there is a
i managed to cut myself last night i just moved house and amongst all this and um yeah late
opening boxes stanley knife went the wrong way and somehow cut there
one of those freak accidents but yeah no stitches hey okay all right let's talk about
price since uh this video started i got a message from a guy at makita new zealand and he said that
this saw is probably gonna be listed at around about twelve hundred dollars for the beer tool
twelve hundred dollars new zealand so here in new zealand we get what i guess you could call the new
zealand tax which is basically every tool costs a lot more than it would in australia us uk we pay a
lot more for tools so keep that in mind when i say these prices now sticking with new zealand prices
the makita 36 volt with the two batteries um the bigger one the heavy one that i found too heavy is
about a hundred dollars more it's listed at about thirteen hundred dollars without batteries and if
you wanted to get the dewalt flex volt which is super popular it's a bit of a does everything kind
of cordless saw that's sitting at around about two grand here in new zealand bare tool and another
option that could be worth considering for this price range at 1200 new zealand you'll get the
hikoki which takes battery and ac so it's got both now the main difference though between those saws
and this saw is the blade so all those tools that i just said around about 254 millimeters which
is a 10-inch blade but this one here is a 216 millimeter blade which is eight and a half inches
so it's a bit smaller let's just say that price is a big consideration for this 40 volt drop saw yeah
price price is a big one for the makita 40 volt system it's more expensive than the 18 volt system
for example this circular saw here is currently listed at 630 new zealand
just for the tool no batteries like i said before that's new zealand pricing new zealand in general
is very expensive but to give you an idea you could probably get a equivalent 18 volt for
maybe 350 400 pushing it yeah it's a lot more expensive now i've made no secrets here about
how we got these tools makita new zealand gave us the tools i guess you've got to decide whether you
want to go on the makita 40 volt system or not for convenience i think some people would pay a
bit more for a drop saw if they know that the same battery that operates it operates their
drills their circular saws their reciprocating saws it just makes your day-to-day work easier
and that's the thing that appeals to me about this this drop saw can't do everything i want it to do
but so far it's a really good day-to-day saw and when i need to do these 200 ml
skirtings like we did on this job or the scotia that's when the festool comes out
so i've got a combination i've got the portable convenience of the cordless and the high spec
high accuracy high cut capacity festool as well so dangerously expensive combination i paid over two
grand for that festival one myself yeah if i was to buy this one as twelve hundred dollars so it's
quite expensive but when you're professional when you're doing it every day and you get paid to do
this those figures aren't that high yeah how much do you want the 40 volt i guess is the question
all right questions on instagram i asked what you want to know about the makita 40 volt drop saw
okay harris underscore 51 asks could it be used as a daily drop saw for heavy and light use um
yeah totally that's the the main benefit of it i sort of touched on it before this is like a daily
for us we could doing color this could be used as a daily drop saw for framing and decking as we're
about to use just general stuff it's not until you get to the finishing stuff where i'm a little
bit skeptical of it and i will try next time we do some finishing i'll pull that out and we'll
see how far we can go with it mitch underscore karabob asks how does it compare to the milwaukee
i assume you're talking about this milwaukee the one that we've used in the videos previously
they're about the same size this one i would say is lighter
oh
yeah that's that's harder to do this one is a lot more basic i would say if you look at the
depth here that doesn't come out nearly as much as this so it's got a lot more depth on the cut
and the blade is bigger on this one compared to this one so the miter on the milky goes to 45 on
the back here the makita also goes to 45 however on the base the makita goes to 60 mil both sides
whereas the milwaukee goes to 45 one side and slightly over 60 degrees on this side
lumberjack carpentry designs asks any problems with the power in the mitre saw when cutting
into tough timber let's try it out i certainly didn't have any problems for that week that we
uh tested the saw out let's test it out on this uh native timber which is generally a lot harder
than the day-to-day stuff we use nowadays it's a little bit wet as well it's rough sawn
no problems let's try it on the milwaukee i don't think this should have any issues either
a bit more resistance but that might be because the blades not brand new
very important question from wood shed furniture does it cut
90 ml square to the fence even when the head is tilted to a 45 degree bevel
we look good there 45 that looks pretty good as well
not too bad make sure you're subscribed and i'll um
do a finishing video with that drop saw and really see how accurate it is but yeah not bad
okay i think i've got a good idea of what this saw is like
after the last day or so finished the step and literally just put the last screw in here
and that's the step there managed to reuse a lot of the um the existing decking that
was forming the deck and now we have like a very gradual step into the villa so you step up here
and in here very equal so yeah equal footing anyway cutting all those decking boards helped me
you know get a realistic idea of what the source like and one thing is uh battery
life real life battery life test i had it on three bars the battery when i put it in
three bars so i guess that's 75 full and it lasted me pretty much all day i got to around about 5 p.m
and it putted out 75 full battery so you'll get a day out of a full four amp battery
now dust extraction i'm just using the bag so i'm not actually using dust extraction and it's
not it's not even full but that's just from this morning about two or three hours i mean
i'll i'll use this saw in the coming episodes with the vacuum and give it a proper test but
with the dust bag you don't catch much dust at all and this light button up here i feel this light
button should not be there once you turn it on the light only stays on for a certain amount of time
so i found that pretty much every time i needed to make a cut i had to turn this light back on
i understand like wanting to be able to turn the light off and on but i reckon
as long as the battery's in the light should be on and the base the base has been really good
um making minor adjustments on the floor plate of this drop saw has not been a problem you can
tighten the position as soon as you're happy with it using the little dial at the end there where
the handle is so that's been really good that's it for this exciting episode and the first look
at the makita 40 volt drop saw if you have any questions comments put them down below and i'll
try and answer some of them otherwise stay tuned for future episodes and i'm sure i'll cover a lot
of the a lot of things that people are wondering about the saw as i use it more more often
and uh we've got a job coming up where we'll be doing architraves and stuff like that so we'll get
a chance to see how good it is at finishing yeah thanks for watching catch you next episode you