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https://www.askthetrades.co.uk/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.pl DIY Forum >> Carpentry Questions >> Cordless jigsaws https://www.askthetrades.co.uk/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.pl?num=1113520345 Message started by Raptor on Apr 15^th, 2005, 12:12am

Title: Cordless jigsaws
Post by Raptor on Apr 15^th, 2005, 12:12am

Been offered a Bosch 14.4 jigsaw (green one )anyone got any experience of one?. Do they flatten the batteries rapidly considering this one only has 1.5 ah batteries?Will it cut 40mm worktop?

Title: Re: Cordless jigsaws
Post by bstyle on Apr 15^th, 2005, 12:28am

Cant comment on the green ones but my 24v Bosch is amazing.

I would be a little worried whether it was man enough for the job being only 14.4v. I had a go of a friends 24v green combi drill and I found it gutless.

Hope this helps! Sorry if it' not what you wanted to hear!

Title: Re: Cordless jigsaws
Post by WOLF on Apr 15^th, 2005, 1:04am

The 1.5 ah battery will not really have the staying power for things such as work tops, for cordless sawing, 18v, 2.0ah and over is essential if the tooling is going to be asked to perform on a constant basis.. anything below the 18v area, will be okay for "small works", such as 1/2" ply, cutting to length t & g etc
and as for BOSCH colouring of tooling, the BLUE is listed /aimed as the PRO range, where as the GREEN is for the diy/semi-pro ....
in answer to the question will it cut the 40mm WT's, then yes, given the correct blade, but it would struggle on a sink cut out , needing more than one battery for this distance!!!
like BSTYLE states, sorry if it is not what you want to hear, but at least you asked for advise before you bought it!!!

Title: Re: Cordless jigsaws
Post by Raptor on Apr 15^th, 2005, 7:07pm

Thanks for the replies,i was offered a hardly used 14.4 drill and cordless jiggy ,2 batteries and charger for 60 quid ,as the batteries would fit my blue Bosch drill that was my main interest.Was not bothered about the drill but thought the jiggy and batteries would be usefull.

Title: Re: Cordless jigsaws
Post by bstyle on Apr 15^th, 2005, 10:46pm

Sounds like a good price but only if it works OK!
I would ask him if you can give the jigga a go to see how long it lasts, if you're looking for a couple of spare batts then maybe it's worth it even if they are only 1.5's.
I still reckon you should go for the 24v blue jigga!

Title: Re: Cordless jigsaws
Post by CWatters on Apr 17^th, 2005, 1:12pm

It might be interesting to do some sums.....

1.5AH cells are so named because they can deliver 1.5A for an hour. In practice a power tool draws more current than 1.5A but that's no problem, the same battery can supply (in theory) ...

15A for 6 mins or
22.5A for 4 mins or
45A for 2 mins etc

To work out how much power that is just multiply the figures above by about 12 or 13. Not 14.4 because under load the voltage of a 12 cell NiCad battery will fall below it's nominal 14.4V. A reasonable rule for high current use is 1V per cell hence 12V.

So That battery can supply..

15x12=180W for 6 mins or
22.5x12=270W for 4 mins or
45 x 12 =540W for 2 mins

however at 45A you would probably loose a lot in the switch, wires and motor inefficiency. In practice the motor in the power tool is likely to be only 70-80% efficient so we should probably multiply the above by say 0.75 to get a more realistic figure for the output power.

A higher voltage battery is better because:

a) the max current you can draw from a certain size of cell is limited. Therefore the only way to get more power is to increase the voltage.

b) higher voltage motors are more efficient.