New Tool - Laguna 14/12 Bandsaw

 I just finished putting together the new band saw a Laguna 14/12. Big machine and it should serve me well for a lot of years to come. I already have an old Craftsman band saw but since I anticipate working with a lot of rough cut hardwood I needed something with a better resaw capacity. The throat on the Craftsman is impressive but the horsepower is just not enough for my wood working plans.

It really didn't take me long to put it together, although I would say the instructions are only adequate, they could use a little help. Good enough to get the job done though. This thing is heavy weighing in at around 250#, which means you really should have two people for some of the assembly. I didn't really have anyone that could help so I did it all myself. Not recommended but possible, you just need to pay attention to what you are doing and think through all of the steps first before applying muscle.

The main body comes assembled. With a little careful thinking I was able to get it out of the box on my own. Basically I just cut the end of the box off and tilted up into position.

Putting the base together. I have never seen screws referred to as "fixings" before.

Here I have laid the main body on its spine supported by 2x4s, with a couple extra under the motor to keep it straight. The base is ready to be attached. They sell you the mobility kit at the same time, another quick $150 bucks...ouch

Like the body I used 2x4s to support the base while I adjusted everything into position and attached the bolts.

Base attached and upright again. To get it back to standing I placed the back wheels into one of the expansion joints in the garage floor and tilted it up, carefully!

All assembled. The table is a heavy slab of metal and the fence is aluminum and moves using a sliding bar. Pretty effective.

The few tools I used to get it all together, 12 and 14mm sockets, a couple of different sized allen wrenches.  The final assembly need a 5/16th socket and yet another allen wrench to deal with a set screw. I think I made notes on the sizes of the two larger allen wrenches for reference on the back of the manual.

I was pretty happy being able to get it all together and relatively quickly on top of that. Like I said the assembly can be done by one person but you do need to be careful so that you don't hurt yourself or the band saw. I am annoyed that it didn't come with a blade, I figured for that much money they could have at least included one blade.