Gemini’s Tile Cutting Ring Saws
Monday, June 26th, 2006
Utilizing a ring instead of a straight or band configuration, Gemini’s ring saws give you the ability to cut inside and outside radius curves from tile and stone up to 6 cm thick.
The ring is covered in a diamond-based abrasive, which cuts hard materials such as stone, granite, marble, glass, non-ferrous metals, acrylic and plexiglass, yet won’t cut you if you happen to stray into the “blade.” (Gemini says skin bounces off the abrasive where as immovable materials don’t.)
The ring also cuts in all directions — as opposed to one direction with a band saw – which makes shaped cuts easier, and it doesn’t vibrate like a reciprocating saw. The drive belt in Gemini’s saws draws water up to cool and lubricate the cut, so no pump is needed.
The entry-level Taurus 3 saw (pictured here) is available on the street at around $375, though Gemini does offer much larger and more sophisticated versions.
Tile-Cutting Ring Saws [Gemini]
Street Pricing [Froogle]
(Monday, June 26, 2006) Discovery delivers tonight with a 6-hour-long build-it block starting at 6 with How It’s Made followed by Motorcycle Mania, and three consecutive episodes of American Chopper. Or, if you get sick of bikes (yeah, right) you can swap over to MTV at 8 for back-to-back Pimp My Rides.
We saw Kevin Kelly’s mention of the Skil iXO cordless palm-size screwdriver this morning and thought we’d pass it on. We actually received a tip about this tool from a reader as well, and we’re looking forward to checking it out in person.
If your workspace isn’t large enough to accommodate both a knee-mill and a small lathe — much less their big brothers — Smithy’s offers a variety of combination lathe-mill-drill machines that may just fill the bill.
If you’ve been busy in the shop this week and haven’t had time to keep up with Toolmonger, we recommend checking out the following posts when you have a chance:
In a pinch, it’s possible to create small-diameter bends in rebar by pulling it around a piece of pipe, but that can get old fast if you’re dealing with a whole house foundation’s worth of it. Hitachi’s VB16Y rebar cutter/bender makes the whole process a lot easier.
Ok, so you can draw. But can you draw with a router? If not — and who can? – Trend Routing Technology has the answer to turn you into a routing artist in no time flat: the Routasketch. It’s an attachment system that allows you to trace an image with a stylus while your router follows the same path.
Here’s another one of those “why didn’t I think of that” tools: Rockler’s Clamp-It assembly squares. They’re just simple polycarbonate squares to which you can clamp any two pieces of wood you’d like to assemble in a 90 degree angle. Rockler suggests that they work weel for simple joinery, as a drill press jig, for drawer assembly, and for deck rails, but we can think of hundreds of other uses as well.
Removing old, hardened grout from tile joints can be a major pain. There are a lot of ways to go about it, but almost all of them involve either damaging the tile, generating tons of grout dust, or both. (We can tell you first hand that grout dust is not good for your health.)
When you’re building a staircase or deck, it’s difficult to get a good smooth finish on edges with a belt sander. You can always use the fixed spindle sander, but that takes a bit of planning. 
We came across the Gage-It hardware gauge this week when we were at Home Depot picking up some fasteners. It’s an 8″x4″ piece of plastic with cut holes and slots and printed markings to help you measure all kinds of fasteners, drills, rod, tube, pipe, etc. 
A reader turned us on to this deal from Cummins Industrial Tools’ Amazon store. Apparently they’re selling factory reconditioned versions of Ryobi’s 5 pc. “One+” combo kit, which includes a drill/driver, reciprocating saw, circular saw, wet/dry vac, and flashlight as well as two batteries and a charger for $149.99.
We noticed a press release over on the DeWalt site a couple of days ago regarding their introduction of a new 10″ compact table saw — the DW745. For some reason, though, there’s no information about it on the site and the press release has apparently been removed. 
Most of the new lithium-ion power tools to hit the market this year have focused on high-voltage applications — utilizing Li-ion’s ability to provide higher amp loads for longer periods to create some incredibly powerful tools. Though no one can accuse Bosch of shorting the market on power — see our post on the release of their 36V Li-ion 1″ cordless rotary hammer — they’ve also applied Li-ion technology to the low-voltage end of their Litheon line to create some truly unique task-specific tools — such as the recently-released PS20 pocket driver, and the PS10 I-Driver which should hit store shelves in August.
No fab shop is complete without a tubing bender. It quickly gets old only building things that are square.
