Do You Need a Track Saw?

Written By Keaton Beyer

If you are like me, you don’t want to invest in a tool you know you don’t need. I had a circular saw and I used it for years to break down plywood. I would lay out scrap 2x4s on the ground, put my plywood on top, mark where I want to cut, use my 4 foot level as a straight edge (or if it wasn’t long enough, grab the longest, straightest piece of wood I could find), figure out my offset on my circular saw, layout my straight edge, clamp it down, and cut. It’s a long process, but it works.

I don’t like all that setup time though. I don’t have a ton of time to spend in the shop and spending it all just to break plywood down is a waste of my time. So I took the plunge and bought a track saw. I was able to justify it because I had an upcoming project where I was going to need to break down some plywood and I figured it would be a good investment to speed things up.

I went with the Makita corded saw. It had great reviews and was a good price. I decided to go corded because I figured 99% of the time I’ll be using it in my shop, therefore I’ll have power. Plus I’ll want to connect a vacuum to it anyway so if I have to drag a hose around I might as well drag the cord with it.

The saw came and I was ready to go, then the project fell through. I put the saw back in it’s sustainer (or whatever Makita calls their plastic tool boxes) where it sat for months. I used it a couple of times when I needed to flush up the end of a wide panel, but that was it.

Then, I had a project with some big pieces of white oak. And that’s where this saw shined.

First of all, I don’t have a jointer. I used to but it was a small thing and more headache than help, so I got rid of it about a year ago and replaced it with my DeWalt planer, which has been awesome, I highly recommend it.

How I typically joint boards to create a straight edge for glue ups is by using my old Stanley #5. It works fine, especially on smaller boards, but when I’m trying to plane a perfect edge on an 80 inch board, that becomes a lot of work. Plus I would have to do it 6 times. Then try to run each of those through my little jobsite table saw terrified me.

So I broke out my track saw. I only had a 55 inch track so I bought a second track with a connector kit so I had a total cutting capacity of 110 inches. Let me tell you, this thing worked wonders. I setup my first cut by laying out the track to take as small of a pass off of one side as I could to create a straight edge in the board, then I cut. That was it. Simple, easy, and it was perfect on the first go. I was sold. There was no fighting or struggling to heft this big board through my jobsite saw. I didn’t have to spend 10 minutes laying out a straight edge and double checking it. It was a revelation.

And if that wasn’t enough, I’d estimate that 90% of the sawdust was sucked up my the attached vacuum. My old method was vacuum-less and sprayed sawdust everywhere. When I cut off the ends of the boards with my skill saw the other day I ended up with two dustpans full when I swept up. And those were just cross cuts. After all of my rips I ended up with less than a dustpan full.

For perspective, the cross cuts equated to a total of 204 inches of cutting for all 6 boards. That’s 2 cuts per board, each board being roughly 17 inches across. I ripped the same 6 boards, but each rip was 80 inches long and I made 2 cuts per board equaling 960 inches of cutting. That’s 4.7 times the amount of sawdust I made, but it all went straight into the vacuum instead of in the air and on the floor.

To answer the question, do you need a track saw? My answer is, it depends. Do you want to be more efficient with your time? Would you benefit from increased accuracy over a circular saw? Do you have the space to store another saw plus the tracks? Do you have the budget to spend on a track saw? Mine wasn’t cheap, between the saw, two tracks, and connector, I spent nearly $550. If you answered yes to those questions, then get a track saw. It’ll help you out so much.

If not, there are alternatives to accomplish the same task. I do recommend saving up and getting a track saw when you can.

Here’s what I purchased and recommend.

And if you’re wondering, these are affiliate links. If you are interested in this track saw, please purchase through these links to support me and my blog.

Keaton Beyer
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