Quick review of my recent purchase and assembly of the PortaMate Portacube Miter Saw Stand.
I decided to take a chance on a Amazon Warehouse Deal as they were the only one in-stock that could get it to me in 2 days. Home Depot was reporting 3+ weeks to ship, and everyone else was either $75 or more higher priced, and 1 to 2 months for shipping. Box arrived in 2 days from Amazon, no cost shipping, and it was beat up pretty bad. I cut open the straps and easily opened the box top by hand, the tape was in pretty poor shape and barely resisted opening. Advise to Portamate - Spend a few pennies more on thicker tape and cardboard.
Box was pretty compactly packed, but they should have used some protection of the two grey side pieces, I could see those getting damaged in shipping. Pulled mine out, and they are decent thickness metal, and suffered no damage. Pulling the manual out and taking a quick glance, was surprised at how few steps required to put the table together. I started laying out the parts on my tables for assembly. I was surprised by finding out there was very little parts needing to be assembled. The two sides with arm extensions are fully assembled in the box. There are 12 bolts to attach the four sides together, and 2 bolts to attach the top to the sides. 2 feet and 2 tires, and then two handle locks are all that is required to assemble, and 4 screws to attach feet to legs.
Step 1 was pretty straightforward, slide feet into leg hold and screw in. And here is where I found my first damaged section
Slight bent in the hole opening. To be honest, I wasn't surprised to find some damage with the box condition. Quick use of some plyers and the bend was gone and the foot slid right in. No issues with the other side. 12 bolts later the four sides were together. Bolts were a bit tight to get together, and had some cramped angles in my small work area, but didn't take that long to get together.
Top went on rather easily, you hold it and lock into place with the levers on the side, attach the 2 washers and bolts, and then you're done.
Mounting the saw is a little bit frustrating, it's a universal fit, and the bars on the table top are held in by one bolt on each side. Once you position where needed, when you go to tighten the bolt, the bars want to move, so you have to be careful to keep them aligned. And check the width of your saw. PortaMate lists the table has fitting a 26.5" wide miter saw, mine measured in at just over 27" inches with the built in adjustable tab arms, so I just removed those which gave me enough room to fit my saw on the top.
I was a little worried how hard it would be to flip the table with the saw mounted to go between saw mode and table mode, but surprisingly it is rather easy. The table spins pretty easily, and my saw has handles in 3 spots so it's easy to grab and move and hold in place with one hand and lock into place with the other.
The adjustable tool tables on the side table arms raise up to the height of the miter saw to help with cutting longer boards. They do lack a miter saw stop built in, but do have some bench dog holes so I may looking creating something to use as a stop.
Table arms extend on both sides (couldn't open both at same time in my small shop and was raining outside so couldn't bring outside to get a picture of both opened.) 10" plastic wheels on back side and a pull up handle make moving it easy, especially considering the weight of the table alone without a saw is around 90 pounds.
Couple of issues, when assembled and spin the tabletop, it does scrape along some stickers on the inside of the table, the stickers won't last long.
Second issue is the the handle is locked into place with some plastic spring lock you mount on the backside and twist to unlock so you can lower the handle when table in use. The handle gets in the way of my saw when I have that on top, so I prefer to lower it when using the saw. When I twist the lock, it will spin easily so you can easily put it back in lock mode without realizing it, preventing you from lowering the handle. It is also only held in with two small pieces of plastic, and one popped off when I twisted it. Not sure how long these are going to last, I think they are the weakest design point of the table.
Overall I am happy with the purchase, enough that I've considered getting a second one for my planer as PortaMate says it can be used for a planer also.
I decided to take a chance on a Amazon Warehouse Deal as they were the only one in-stock that could get it to me in 2 days. Home Depot was reporting 3+ weeks to ship, and everyone else was either $75 or more higher priced, and 1 to 2 months for shipping. Box arrived in 2 days from Amazon, no cost shipping, and it was beat up pretty bad. I cut open the straps and easily opened the box top by hand, the tape was in pretty poor shape and barely resisted opening. Advise to Portamate - Spend a few pennies more on thicker tape and cardboard.
Box was pretty compactly packed, but they should have used some protection of the two grey side pieces, I could see those getting damaged in shipping. Pulled mine out, and they are decent thickness metal, and suffered no damage. Pulling the manual out and taking a quick glance, was surprised at how few steps required to put the table together. I started laying out the parts on my tables for assembly. I was surprised by finding out there was very little parts needing to be assembled. The two sides with arm extensions are fully assembled in the box. There are 12 bolts to attach the four sides together, and 2 bolts to attach the top to the sides. 2 feet and 2 tires, and then two handle locks are all that is required to assemble, and 4 screws to attach feet to legs.
Step 1 was pretty straightforward, slide feet into leg hold and screw in. And here is where I found my first damaged section
Slight bent in the hole opening. To be honest, I wasn't surprised to find some damage with the box condition. Quick use of some plyers and the bend was gone and the foot slid right in. No issues with the other side. 12 bolts later the four sides were together. Bolts were a bit tight to get together, and had some cramped angles in my small work area, but didn't take that long to get together.
Top went on rather easily, you hold it and lock into place with the levers on the side, attach the 2 washers and bolts, and then you're done.
Mounting the saw is a little bit frustrating, it's a universal fit, and the bars on the table top are held in by one bolt on each side. Once you position where needed, when you go to tighten the bolt, the bars want to move, so you have to be careful to keep them aligned. And check the width of your saw. PortaMate lists the table has fitting a 26.5" wide miter saw, mine measured in at just over 27" inches with the built in adjustable tab arms, so I just removed those which gave me enough room to fit my saw on the top.
I was a little worried how hard it would be to flip the table with the saw mounted to go between saw mode and table mode, but surprisingly it is rather easy. The table spins pretty easily, and my saw has handles in 3 spots so it's easy to grab and move and hold in place with one hand and lock into place with the other.
The adjustable tool tables on the side table arms raise up to the height of the miter saw to help with cutting longer boards. They do lack a miter saw stop built in, but do have some bench dog holes so I may looking creating something to use as a stop.
Table arms extend on both sides (couldn't open both at same time in my small shop and was raining outside so couldn't bring outside to get a picture of both opened.) 10" plastic wheels on back side and a pull up handle make moving it easy, especially considering the weight of the table alone without a saw is around 90 pounds.
Couple of issues, when assembled and spin the tabletop, it does scrape along some stickers on the inside of the table, the stickers won't last long.
Second issue is the the handle is locked into place with some plastic spring lock you mount on the backside and twist to unlock so you can lower the handle when table in use. The handle gets in the way of my saw when I have that on top, so I prefer to lower it when using the saw. When I twist the lock, it will spin easily so you can easily put it back in lock mode without realizing it, preventing you from lowering the handle. It is also only held in with two small pieces of plastic, and one popped off when I twisted it. Not sure how long these are going to last, I think they are the weakest design point of the table.
Overall I am happy with the purchase, enough that I've considered getting a second one for my planer as PortaMate says it can be used for a planer also.
