Hands-On: Skil 4690 Corded Jigsaw
By Sean O'Hara
In Use
Instead of just firing up the saw and carving up random pieces, put the newest saw from Skil to work building an old four legged favorite — an 18-1/2 foot plywood Stegosaurus. We choose for our pattern a scaled up version of the balsa wood, flat-packed design you might find in a museum gift shop. Once we cut out our parts and traced them onto the 4×8 sheets of plywood, it was time to go to work. For more info on the actual build process check out our overview on how to build your own.
Since our target was 3/4 ply, the fast cut/wood blades that came packed in the case with the saw seemed perfect for cutting large pieces. Later we switched to Skil’s multi-purpose blades for a bit finer cut.
As we cut what felt like a thousand pieces, we were able to spend a great deal of time with the 4690. We found it offered plenty of power to plow through the plywood quickly and was easy to control.
We cut dozens of pieces and made a huge dusty mess, but the 4690 never seemed to cause any issues. It really didn’t matter who picked it up — or how much experience with a jigsaw they had before the project began — operating the saw and getting it to cut what you wanted was simple.
After about three hours of cutting our arms were a bit sore from the vibration, but not overly so. The 4690 vibrates less than other jigsaws we’ve owned, and it shows in our lack of fatigue. Since the surface you’re cutting holds most of the weight of the saw, the actual weight of the tool isn’t really a factor. We did go through a few blades during the project, but that was more due to the fact we were in a hurry than to any design issue with the saw.
You can see form the pictures that this was a down-and-dirty project, and we treated these saws like they would be treated at the jobsite — that is to say we handed out some serious abuse. Workbenches and extra tools were a bit short of supply, so we cut on whatever we had available. And we used the 4690 as a hammer, adjustment tool, trim saw — whatever we needed. The result: nothing at all. They just kept on cutting.
For the most part we used these saws with the laser system turned off — it’s not much help when cutting curves — but later when we used the 4690 to make a cut we’d have normally made with a circ saw — a large, straight cut across ply — the laser helped quite a bit, making the cut easier to “eyeball.”
Read on to page three for our conclusions.
May 19th, 2008 at 7:55 pm
I bought one of these on sale from the Depot a couple of months ago to help with a new entertainment center project I was working on. I have to agree with your assessment, not only does it rock, but it does it at a great price too!
May 19th, 2008 at 11:46 pm
I have the older version of the same jigsaw. I hate it. The keyless holder has never been quite straight and the lever on the foot can’t be tightened, so it wiggles side to side. Lots of bad cuts and broken blades. It even caused a blade to catch and the jigsaw to jump up and hit me in the face once. Spend the extra dough and get the Bosh model.
May 20th, 2008 at 1:31 am
Buy it now, it’s only 70 bucks. Consider yourself lucky, in Europe same specs model goes for 170 USD!!!
May 20th, 2008 at 3:50 am
I really like the addition of a blower, but ever since owning a cordless one I feel *not* having a cord is the best feature a jigsaw can have.
May 20th, 2008 at 7:06 am
I got a new Bosch 1587AVSK on eBay last month for $81.00 including shipping, no sales tax. Previous experience with Skil tools tells me I made the correct choice.
May 20th, 2008 at 1:53 pm
I’ve got the cordless 14.4V Skil model, one of the few cordless jigsaws out there. It works great for what it is, but it sucks the life out of the battery incredibly fast, so is only useful for occasional use. I’ve used a Bosch corded model, and it was definitely a lot more solid and heavy duty than either Skil model.
May 21st, 2008 at 3:22 pm
The Skil name used to be synonomous with high quality circular saws and the produced decent drills too. I think that when they were acquired by Bosch - that a decision was made that they would be to DIY’er line - like Black & Decker became to Dewalt and Porter Cable. I don’t see any more saws like the old super sawcat bearing the B&D name - whereas PC may offer a fairly decent product (although we will not trade in our old Skill 77’s just yet.). That probably makes good marketing sense - but it also means that the Skil Jigsaw offering will not compete with the Bosch (which was always the standard to judge others by.) If you make your living with using jigsaws to cope moldings etc. - buy a Bosch.