khariV

I don't know what the patents cover or how they are worded, but the base technology - detecting flesh contact with the blade using an electrical signal and then removing the blade below the cutting surface - is identical. I also think that Bosch has a better implementation as it doesn't ruin the blade. That having been said, if the patent is valid, then Bosch should have paid a licensing fee. I really hate big corporations that steal ideas and hope just to bury the competition in a court case that goes on forever until the market makes the decision. Microsoft did this over and over again. This is Samsung's business strategy. The US Patent system exists for this exact reason - to protect someone having their ideas, designs and intellectual property stolen. Working in software, this topic is near and dear to my heart. Competition is good, but stealing ideas and passing them off as your own will kill small businesses and just put more money into big corporation's pockets. (If you don't believe me, google Sears vs. Loggerhead.) Lobbying to have the government require SawStop tech on all table saws - yeah, that was kind of a dick move. The last thing we need is more government mandating that we spend money, especially when that money goes right into the pocket of the person / company pushing the legislation. However, regardless of how you feel about the Sawstop guy, the bottom line is he has a series of patents and if Bosch has infringed upon those patents, they should pay.

Well, at least you got your money back and had some curly fries... you DID get curly fries at Arby's, didn't you?

I think the gift card portion of the deal may have evaporated. It's still a good deal, just not ZOMG BUY BUY BUY.

It's up to $546 now so I'm guessing that it was a pricing error. You may or may not get it for the posted price. Anyone that buys a flashlight for $550 should have their head examined.

Congrats man and remember to take lots of pics. You'll never say - "gee, I wish I hadn't of taken so many pictures when he was tiny."

Not everything listed for sale on Amazon is sold by Amazon itself. Anyone can sell goods on Amazon for any price they want to sell them. It's a little bit like setting up a store in a mall. Sometimes you see things listed for ridiculously high prices for no good reason.

I learned the hard way driving #10 screws into oak with my M18 Fuel impact driver - I hadn't quite pre-drilled a large enough hole and I snapped quite a few screws in half just on speed 2. Luckily, I could still use the piece and put the screw holes on the side bolted to the brick wall, but it was a hands on lesson in how oak is not pine.

My daughter has been fascinated by my tools since probably before she was quite even 2. She's 3 now and we talk about tools every day before naptime in the afternoon. I got in trouble today because she dismissed my wife from naptime duties and said "Can you send Daddy in? I want to talk about tools and you don't know how to talk about tools." Yeah, I'll pay for that later...

I got rid of cable about 3 years ago now. I went with a roku and plex media server. Between Plex, amazon and netflix, there isn't much that we miss at all. It's not really a solution for those that aren't technically inclined, but it works great for us. I miss having a live TV stream exactly three times a year - Thanksgiving day, New Years Eve and the 4th of July. I've been meaning to get a digitial antenna, but we live so far out, I'd have to get a big'n and climb up on the roof to mount it. Needless to say, this is a fairly low priority thing.

If you're just wanting to spend lots of money, you could always go with the Ryobi One+ Angled Finish Nailer ($269) and the Ryobi One+ portable inflator ($40) a couple of One+ batteries ($100) and a charger ($45). So for a mere $550, you can set yourself up for cordless nailing, take your inflator out into the world without a plug and have a couple of extra batteries to keep it all going. Psh, who needs a compressor with all that noise

Pretty sure it was a deal of the day - yesterday I saw it at $25, but now like everyone else, I'm seeing $40.

I had a couple of bad experiences with refurbished tools from CPO, but great experience with CPO itself. The first was a refurb Milwaukee 2604 hammer drill. I don't know who "Certified" the tool, but the forward/reverse switch was stuck in the middle, which of course meant you couldn't actually pull the trigger to turn the drill on. Really? A refurbished drill that doesn't turn on? The second problem was my Milwaukee SCMS. There was a problem with the bevel detents - they were missing so you couldn't actually lock it at 90 and had to drag out a square to get it squared again every time you moved it. Again, this was a slightly more subtle defect than the drill, but certainly making sure that you can lock your saw at the common bevels is sort of an important feature. On a positive note, CPO is a fantastic company to work with. They paid for return shipping on both items, including the 75 lb. SCMS that was outside of the 30 day no questions asked return window and the replacements are working just fine. (Well, the SCMS single degree miter knob doesn't work but I am not 100% certain that I care enough to get that fixed, but it's still under the 1 year warranty, so I might). So - is it worth going refurb? If you can get a killer deal sure, but I'm glad that CPO has such a good return/cross ship policy when I take the plunge. Just make sure that you test out EVERYTHING right away so you don't get stuck holding the bag on a lemon.

I picked up these last year as part of the BF event. They are surprisingly useful. I especially like the fact thinness of the edges which makes them a lot more useful than a standard small pry-bar.

I love my Fastback II. I've never played with the I before, but HD has a 2 pack on sale for $15, so I might have to pick them up to see if I like the thinner handle.

I'm definitely not a pro, but I can't tell you how many times I've bought a tool, used it for one project and put it away for a year or so, only to have it not work when I come back to use it again. Everything from weed whackers to drills to lights - we live in a disposable world and I've really just found that you get what you pay for. I'd rather spend more on something that I know will work every time I need it instead of using it once and having to throw it away and buy again. Better to have fewer toys than endless cheap, broken crap.

I just saw this and I'm guessing no one else has or there would have been more comments, but you'd have thought 126 pairs of eyeballs would have seen this sooner... I love auto-correct.

So, I went to my local HD today to pick up a few bolts and washers for a project. I remembered that someone had posted in the Deals forum that you could sometimes get killer deals by looking on the in-house terminal. I looked about and couldn't find anything other than the computer that just had the regular, internet version of their website, so I asked a guy at the pro desk what the deal was. He said he could look up a specific tool for me if there was something I was looking for, but that there wasn't really anything that was meant for the public to look for deals. I then showed him the screen shot of the deals that were posted here, at which time he said "You really can't trust what people post on the internet. There are all sorts of nutjobs that make up sales, screen shots and all sorts of scams trying to get discounts." He then declared the prices that I showed him on the HD terminal to be crazy because they were just too low and were obviously fake or from a store in some small town in Idaho where no one buys tools so things were on clearance, but regardless, I wasn't going to get those prices in civilization. So, there you have it - from the Apex, North Carolina Home Depot Pro Desk. This forum is full of nut jobs and crazies that live off the grid in Idaho that come into town every six months to try to buy power tools for below cost!!! I for one am proud to count myself a member, though I honestly can't decide if it's better to be a nut job or a crazy?

I was under the impression that you could use the standard fittings, just not the rings, as those were what the propex tool stretches for you.

I'm going to say hinge but I can't see if there were any holes for the nails. The other option would of course be an 18th century zombie killing spike. Could go either way really.

I really like their ECX bit screwdrivers. The rest of their screwdrivers are OK, but honestly, I don't like the fact that the end caps only say + or - without any other information. I guess perhaps I'm spoiled by the Klein screwdrivers that give you the model so you can get more info on size, length, etc. without having to pull it out and look at it. I am also a fan of their locking pliers. The comfort grips and locks just seem to work better than my old Vise-grips with the funky metal lever that always pinches my hand.

I came across this video today in my wanderings. I'm a nub, so it's not surprising that I've never heard of doing something like this before, but for the sake of sharing, I figured I'd throw it up here and see if anyone else finds it interesting.

Nalu - I think you may have lost a bit of sympathy with the bolded part... "Oh my, living in a tropical paradise, surrounded by ocean, beaches, mountains and endless sunny weather... *sigh*" But seriously, I remember 20 years ago I went to Hawaii for a friend's wedding and I couldn't believe how expensive everything was.

Quite right. The main priority is/was that the railing not fail. Aesthetics were secondary as the other option we were considering should this have failed was to install an ADA compliant steel railing next to the existing hand rail. This of course would have been significantly more obtrusive than the brackets. I do plan on going back to fill in the screw holes and the seams with wood putty, but there's realistically no way that I'm ever going to able to do more than paint the metal brackets and screws. They ought to blend, but certainly won't disappear. I haven't had a chance to get back to Philadelphia to finish it up, but I'm hoping to in the coming weeks. I'll have to take a pic or two to update the post when it's done.

I'm mostly with you on the gloves issue. My rule is - if the blade can slice right through the gloves, there's no point in wearing them and they just slow you down and make you less safe. On the other hand, if the power tool in question will give you a nasty burn or can be stopped by leather (i.e. an abrasive blade, cutting wheel on a grinder), then I'd rather have the gloves just in case. I've had a cutting wheel shatter at speed and bounce around. If I hadn't been wearing gloves, I'd have had some severe lacerations on my fingers from the shrapnel. Long hair, loose clothing, hanging threads - all of those should be banished / secured before you even pick up any power tool. I saw a video of someone going through shop safety and the thing that stuck with me was - "what would happen if you lost your balance and fell - where would you hit and what would hit you." In other words, don't lean over and across spinning blades and reach just a little bit farther just to get something done a bit faster.