its a dream compare to a jigsaw! dont waste the same amount a a good jigsaw if your thinking about upgrading or replacing your old one... thats waht i did and i maybe wont use my new jigsaw anymore cause the shear works so well.
I had only ooone problem with my HF shear. The top blade sat about a 1/16" from the back of the blade holder. When I was cutting cures the bolt s that old the blade got bent all the time. I had MadMatt put a small bead on weld in there and then I filled it down so the bolts don't get bent anymore.
You want to gap the blades 15 to 20 percent of the material thickness. If you're working with .065 material then you want to gap about .012. Use a feeler gauge which you can get at the autoparts store.
------------------ The artisan formerly known as Willing Pell, then Juan Santell and then Willing Pell again. Hey, Prince could do it, why not me?
Mine worked great right out of the box as well. The only modification I made was to add a post of the bracket that holds the lower blade. When I would adjust the blade and try to tighten the bracket would shift causing the gap to change. Adding the post solved that problem. I just drilled a hole through the bracket and the base and stuck a chunk of rod in there. Big thanks to Pathfinder for the idea and letting me try his shear before I bought mine. The only other trouble I had was with chipping. That was primarily with stainless and the original blades. I bought a spare set and they worked much better with much less chipping.
I got a bad one, I have to shim the bottom blade to adjust it. They drilled the adjustment screws to low , and the blade would 'jump' over them under even moderate cutting. I added the post to help with slipping when tightening the bottom blade as well. I had to drill out and retap the tighting bolt , it broke off cause I was torquing on it to keep the blades in place. These are good shears, IF quality control was better, you roll the dice and take your chances of getting a good one, or one that will take a lot of refitting. I would order a set of replacement blades right off the bat, the original ones are too hard and chip easily.
Mine worked fine. I was borrowing a B2 before I got the HF - and there definately is a difference. I found you can afford to be lazy with the B2 - but with the HF, it is less forgiving. (also smaller ...)
