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  • Author Author: shabaz
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Miniature Table Saw (Bench Circular Saw): Proxxon KS 230 Unboxing!

shabaz


I purchased a very small (less than A4 paper sized footprint!) table saw called Proxxon KS 230 , and it arrived today. It's not my first Proxxon tool:  Proxxon Rotary Tools Review: Micromot 50/EF, FBS 12/EF and NG 2/E  

The KS 230 comes in a box not much dissimilar in size to a couple of reams of printer paper.

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I have other cutting methods, but I deliberately wanted something compact for small woodworking and the occasional metalwork. The KS 230 is designed for up to 8 mm thick wood, or 3 mm plastic (which is the most popular thickness of plastic that I work with) or for metals (excluding steel and iron) up to 1.5 mm.

The KS 230 is intended to (possibly temporarily but I’m waiting to try the KS 230 out first – and see my comments later!) replace my older table saw, which is the Bohler Minitool 320 305. It must be at least 20 years old; I’ve had it at least 10 years, and I purchased it second-hand. It’s always been slightly underpowered. Recently, the saw blade has started to stall when slightly too much pressure is applied. I don’t know if the toothed belt needs replacement, it doesn’t look in best condition.

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You’re supposed to attach a dust extractor to the table saw, and if you don’t, this is the result; probably an extreme fire hazard too when all the dust sits inside.

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Anyway, back to the KS 230:

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It came with grease on the top surface. Not sure why, since it’s plastic and aluminium. Maybe the supplier did this to protect it in storage. I wasn’t too happy that the mains plug had scuffed the metal, but it’s a minor thing.

The KS 230 has a saw cover visible in the photo below; it’s non-removable, and just lifts and hinges up while you’re sawing. You’re supposed to resist the temptation of ripping it off, because the metal thing it is attached to is supposed to keep the material that you’re cutting straight, because table saws are quite dangerous (the material can grab on the saw blade and propel precisely in the direction of the operator).

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Here are all the supplied accessories. The angle guide stinks, it is made of plastic with the metal bar secured with one screw. You will need a square (unsupplied of course) to set it to precisely 90 degrees.

I have other Proxxon tools, and I wish they would do something about their angle guides, those are always poor quality.

I might machine up my own all-metal angle guides for say 90 and 45 degrees one day.

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The photo below shows the guides installed as they would be used. Incidentally, that hole next to the saw blade is used with a supplied 2 mm hex key, to hold the shaft locked, while replacing saw blades.

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The photo below shows the power switch, and to the right of it, one of the two holes that can be used to screw the table saw to a surface (I won’t be doing that).

The deep recess in the plastic top surface, on the left-hand-side, serves a purpose not currently known to mankind. No supplied accessory fits it.

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You can see the dust extractor port in the photo below.

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The side of the unit has a removable 3 mm hex driver, which is used to unscrew the saw blade, by first unscrewing the side cover, which is held in place with a captive hex cap screw latch.

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With that side cover removed, you have access to the saw blade so that it can be swapped out.

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No additional saw blades are supplied, but I purchased the following ones, intended for (from left to right) balsa/plywood, wood/plastics, and alu/brass/copper.

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I’ve yet to use the tool, but at first impressions, it seems of OK construction for the price, apart from that stinky angle guide. It wouldn't have hurt the manufacturer to stick a 'push guide' (i.e. something you can prod the material that you're cutting with, to push it toward the saw blade) in the box, and perhaps a cheap square, to align that angle guide.

One thing I’m extremely unimpressed with, is that there’s no way to angle the blade, nor any way to raise or lower the blade. Seems quite a loss of functionality compared to the older Bohler tool, which supports all this. I'm glad I still have the Bohler tool (which doesn't seem to be manufactured any more, but maybe I'm mistaken) to repair one day, if I find the Proxxon tool's lack of functionality to become too much of an irritation.


Overall, at first impressions, I’d rate this product 6.5 out of 10, good from far, but far from good. There’s just not a lot of options at this price point, for a compact table saw for precise cuts. Do you think I'm being too picky and over-critical? Let me know.

Thanks for reading.

  • in reply to michaelkellett

    I was thinking last night that maybe I was a bit harsh with the scoring! Proxxon tools do cut accurately. I have a lowish-effort plan for partially working around the limited table area.. basically make a fixed 90 degree replacement for the plastic angle guide, but with a longer metal piece that sits in the table groove, and extend the plastic portion of it slightly to the right too. I won't go too extreme with the length extensions, just enough to say handle 100-120mm or thereabouts width material.

  • Nice... I wasn't even aware that such a compact table saw was available.

  • I have one and its big brother as well. I bought a cheapo bench to sized vacuum cleaner for extraction (well worth it !) because I suspect that breathing in fibre glass dust is bad for me.

    I also have the Proxxon high speed drill.

    All their stuff is a bit less good than you would have liked but it is cheap and conveniently small, so on ballance I'd recommend the three things I have.

    I mainly use the small saw for trimming PCBs and the larger one for cutting bits off sheet material before milling it.

    I have a small blade circular saw but it is truly terrifying to use.

    I don't know what the big slot is for either.

    MK

  • I've been trying to make the most of the crazy-small table. Here's how I'm using it to cut wood to lengths greater than I can measure off with the table, this method is working quite well, I've cut half a dozen pieces using it now.

    First off, straighten up the edge by just trimming the wood as shown below. Obviously, make sure that the yellow plastic angle guide is set to 90 degrees, a small engineers square is helpful to do that.

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    Next, use a steel rule with adjustable stop, and set it to your desired length. Push the wood against the stop (i.e., the straightened-up edge of the wood), as shown with the green arrow in the photo below. The other end of the ruler should be just touching the blade.

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    In theory, you could now remove the ruler and proceed with the cut. However, in practise, you'll need to offset the ruler very slightly, a fudge factor to account for the teeth on the saw blade causing the cut to have more thickness than most of the blade. For my blade, that fudge factor is about 1 mm, you can see in the photo below that I pulled the ruler apart from the blade by a millimeter (which is easy to eyeball, I didn't measure that), With this method, the error is within about half a millimeter with the final cut.

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    I'm sure there are better techniques, but this one seems easy enough to do, and the results so far are good, I'm getting very accurate cuts.