# freud Diablo line-terrible!



## mmwood_1 (Oct 24, 2007)

I was recently in immediate need for a new 10" cut-off blade, and a 3/4" straight router bit. No time to wait for online orders, and the only type available locally was the Freud Diablo line. So I bought their 80 tooth cut off blade, and their 3/4" straight router bit. But they're terrible! I couldn't believe these blades would cut so poorly and leave such uneven cuts. Has this always been the case with the Diablo line? If so, why do people buy them? And yes, I have since gotten a new 10" INDUSTRIAL line cut off blade (LU80). And Whiteside straight bit.


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## ryan50hrl (Jun 30, 2012)

I've got a diablo blade and a few bits....no complaints at all. Now I do prefer the industrial blades....but for often half the price the diablos have been fine when I've used them.


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## sawdust703 (Jun 27, 2014)

I have several frued router bits, and have no complaints what so ever! They do an excellent job!! I also have an older 8" Craftsman table saw in my shop, & live in a small community. We have a tough time finding blades for our saw, but frued has several that suit my needs, & I've never had any problems with them making uneven cuts, or rough cuts. Maybe you should spend a little time and tune your saw? just a thought.


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## wericha (Apr 29, 2012)

In my experience, diablo makes low end disposable blades and bits that are of questionable quality. The only diablo I have in my shop are small circular saw blades and I would never use them for any kind of finish cuts. The few times I've had to use their router bits I was not impressed as they did not hold an edge.


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## mmwood_1 (Oct 24, 2007)

Sawdust, first off, I am a professional woodworker. I know the difference between a problem with the saw and a problem with the blade. 

The difference in cut quality between the 80t Diablo and the LU80 is significant. The wobble in the Diablo's cut is visible to the eye. The Diablo router bit required more pressure to push through the wood on a 1/4" deep dado than the Whiteside, and did not leave as clean of a cut either. It was ragged in comparison. No good for professional work. I guess it just goes to show, people's standards of quality and expectations differ widely.


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## Oneal-Woodworking (Apr 14, 2013)

mmwood_1 said:


> Sawdust, *first off, I am a professional woodworker. *I know the difference between a problem with the saw and a problem with the blade.
> 
> The difference in cut quality between the 80t Diablo and the LU80 is significant. The wobble in the Diablo's cut is visible to the eye. The Diablo router bit required more pressure to push through the wood on a 1/4" deep dado than the Whiteside, and did not leave as clean of a cut either. It was ragged in comparison. No good for professional work. I guess it just goes to show, people's standards of quality and expectations differ widely.


There is NO such thing as a 'one size fits all' do it all blade or bit out there. 

It all depends on the material you are working with and the speeds that you operate the blade / bit at / feed rate of material when cutting with them as to what sort of particular blade will suit you best.

A blade that fails in one particular area may excel in another...


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## PhilBa (Jun 30, 2014)

I have a Diablo 10" 60 tooth on a SCMS. After reading this I got curious how far out it was. Just eyeballing it looked ok so I used a micrometer and measured 9.5 mils of wobble (.0095 in). Not great but not that bad considering.


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## Trav (May 30, 2011)

It would seem to me that to accurately measure the wobble, the blade would need to be spinning at full speed. DO NOT DO THIS!!!!!!!!

I mean wouldn't the spinning weighted rim of the blade have significant influence over the "wobble" in the blade?


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## sawdust703 (Jun 27, 2014)

Well, I'm no professional, by NO MEANS, Mr. MM, but I'm not an IDIOT either! & believe it or not, I can count & read the number of teeth on the blade. I FULLY AGREE with Oneal! There Ain't no such thing as ONE SIZE FITS ALL, EVEN FOR PROFESSIONALS! I have some Dewalt finish blades & rip blades, some Irwin blades, Frued blades, & even some Forrester blades that do a FINE JOB, numerous router bits put out by Frued, & others. Not being a PROFESSIONAL, but having a clientele of my own that is happy with my work, & sends other customers my way, I take my time with my junk tools, & get the job done RIGHT, SIR, & keep makin' my customers grin! As for you, mm, you bein' a professional wood worker, you might ought to take a few minutes out of your busy schedule & make yourself a phone call to Frued & help them design blades & bits to suit your needs. My apologies for offending ya.


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## woodnthings (Jan 24, 2009)

*I have some old wobble washers...*



Ttharp said:


> It would seem to me that to accurately measure the wobble, the blade would need to be spinning at full speed. DO NOT DO THIS!!!!!!!!
> 
> I mean wouldn't the spinning weighted rim of the blade have significant influence over the "wobble" in the blade?



Back in the day, they sold wobble washers that you use on a standard blade to make it wobble for dados. If the blade wobbles right out of the package, it's either defective, OR there's a burr on your saws arbor or washers. There is a fix in either case.

By the way I am a Freud Diablo fan. I agree the cuts are not finished no-sand quality, but they're acceptable for a lot of work that I do. A few passes with a card scraper OR a run through the drum sander and they are perfect.
Having said that I have a drawer full of better blades, but since this one keeps on cutting after hundreds of feet, maybe a few thousand, I'll just keep usin' it. A Leitz blade came on my Craftsman 10" Hybrid...now there's a nice blade. Some Deltas I have were made in Israel and they look pretty fine also. The Dewalts don't have that high quality look, but remain untested so far.
Craftsman blades suck...in my experience. Marathon contractor blades are junk also, but good for nails and pressure treated wood.


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## mmwood_1 (Oct 24, 2007)

I've been using the Freud LU80 for crosscutting for years and it makes a clean, even cut in every material I use it on. No measurable variations. The Diablo 80t crosscut blade left cut grooves about 1/64" deep, so the cut was serrated. Measuring the wobble? No, I'm referring to the resulting cut. It's jagged. I could see it leaving grooves on the sidewall of the cut as I made the cut. Either the blade has wobble or the teeth are uneven on it. As for the router bits, the Freud was tearing out the sidewalls of the dado. I've never had a Whiteside do that on any type of wood, and this was just western maple.


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## wericha (Apr 29, 2012)

sawdust703 said:


> Well, I'm no professional, by NO MEANS, Mr. MM, but I'm not an IDIOT either! & believe it or not, I can count & read the number of teeth on the blade. I FULLY AGREE with Oneal! There Ain't no such thing as ONE SIZE FITS ALL, EVEN FOR PROFESSIONALS! I have some Dewalt finish blades & rip blades, some Irwin blades, Frued blades, & even some Forrester blades that do a FINE JOB, numerous router bits put out by Frued, & others. Not being a PROFESSIONAL, but having a clientele of my own that is happy with my work, & sends other customers my way, I take my time with my junk tools, & get the job done RIGHT, SIR, & keep makin' my customers grin! As for you, mm, you bein' a professional wood worker, you might ought to take a few minutes out of your busy schedule & make yourself a phone call to Frued & help them design blades & bits to suit your needs. My apologies for offending ya.


 I never read where he said anything about "one size fits all, even for professionals", but what he DID say was the diablo line of blades and router bits is low end low quality. And I completely agree. Freud makes a line of industrial blades and bits that are acceptable, but not fantastic. There are better choices out there. Let's be honest, you and oneal are making choices based on price and not quality. Sure, quality does not always equate to a high price but low prices at Home Depot are a real clue! 

Tools do not make the craftsman, but quality tools will make a craftsman much better and more efficient. I made a lot of money with a craftsman contractor table saw and cheaper blades over the years, but I learned the value of quality over cheap price.


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## Walraven (Jul 13, 2014)

Iv got a diablo 12 inch 80 tooth found it to be quite good even cutting mitres in melamine


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## Oneal-Woodworking (Apr 14, 2013)

wericha said:


> I never read where he said anything about "one size fits all, even for professionals", but what he DID say was the diablo line of blades and router bits is low end low quality. And I completely agree. Freud makes a line of industrial blades and bits that are acceptable, but not fantastic. There are better choices out there. Let's be honest, you and oneal are making choices based on price and not quality. Sure, quality does not always equate to a high price but low prices at Home Depot are a real clue!
> 
> Tools do not make the craftsman, but quality tools will make a craftsman much better and more efficient. I made a lot of money with a craftsman contractor table saw and cheaper blades over the years, but I learned the value of quality over cheap price.


You got some seriously poor reading comprehension skills there. 

:yes:


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## wericha (Apr 29, 2012)

LOL.......too funny!


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## Chamfer (Sep 6, 2014)

All worked up over nothing. Any true craftsman can adapt to a specific blade. My boss buys us crappy blades to work with, but since hes supplying them Ive learned to adapt. When I do my hobby work at home I switch blades.

But quality work can be produced with just about any blade with a little extra work.


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## GeorgeC (Jul 30, 2008)

I have one or two (I would have to get up and go look to see just how many) Diablo blades and am very pleased with them.

George


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## sawdust703 (Jun 27, 2014)

Well, wericha, I'm proud to hear about all the money you made with so called "crappy" blades, and not to ruffle feathers, but, Oneal, you are CORRECT!! I suppose a fella could read into the original post whatever he likes, but, personally, I'm not financially well off, so I have to pick & choose what blades I can afford to use, & get the MOST out of. I strongly agree with Chamfer, that "any true craftsman can adapt to a specific blade", PROFESSIONAL or hobbyist! I have an 8" Craftsman table saw in my shop, have had it for several years. At times, it's kinda tough to find certain blades for my saw. Frued & Irwin have been the most accessible, but Frued does the best job, hands down! My next point being, if you think, for one minute, that if you're not going to have to put some work into the lumber cut by a saw, regardless of the blade, you either have damn high expectations of that saw blade, or are just lazy, IMO! I don't see what all the fumin' is about! I understand everybody is going have a different of the situation, & that's the best part!


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## woodnthings (Jan 24, 2009)

*There are truly crappy blades*

They are mostly low cost contractor blades,from Sears, Harbor Freight, Home Depot, etc. and sold in packs of 2 
sometimes.

There are truly awesome blades Woodworker 2, Freud Industrial, Infinity etc. that are manufactured by highly precise methods, grinding and heat treating the plates, and have C4 carbide in the teeth and are ground by $100,000 sharpening machines.

Then there are the midrange blades, the Diablos, CMTs Irwins, Deltas etc. that for the most part and marketed and sold to home owners, hobbyists and woodworking enthusiasts for use in non-production shops.

There is no one size/brand fits all in my opinion. It depends on your budget, your application and a lot of the cut quality depends on the saw itself. The arbors on the low end saws can have run out, wobble and must be trued up dynamically or while the saw is running,for best results. Most folks don't measure the run out and wouldn't know how to true it up either. Either the blade runs true or not and it's either the blade or the saw.

I don't know anyone who started out using a $3500 Powermatic or a $10,000 Felder in their home shop. We all started with a Craftsman or Rigid or Delta, etc. and as we got better, made more $$ upgraded the saw, or bought a better one. We are all in various stages of learning, success, and on different rungs of the financial ladder. It makes no sense, and no friends to criticise the tools that someone has chosen to use in their pursuit of the hobby. It does make sense to offer a suggestion about your own success with a particular brand or type of blade based on your experience. 

As far as a sawblade giving a sand free surface, that would be ideal for everyone, but the cost may not be within everyone's budget. We gotta run with what we brung, so to speak. Some folks sharpen their blades while others may just pitch them 'cause they didn't cost that much to start with OR they don't have a friendly saw sharpening service locally. To each their own..... :yes:


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## Al B Thayer (Dec 10, 2011)

I use a stabilizer on my Unisaw. Have been for 25 years. I'm betting I get a better cut with the red blade than some just because I have a great saw and the stabilizer. It's not the quality I used to get from older thicker blades. But I also like the thin cut which allows me to break the saw blade rules and use the same blades for just about anything. 

I also like that I don't have to have them sharpened to get my money's worth. I just pitch them and get another. 

Al


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## wericha (Apr 29, 2012)

Wow.....a couple of you boys need more fiber in your diet, and learn how to read posts LOL!!!!

The OP stated an opinion, based on his experience, about the quality of certain blades and bits. I stated an opinion, based on my experience, that was in agreement with his assessment of those blades and bits. I stand by my statements and will leave it at that.


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## woodnthings (Jan 24, 2009)

*don't know how to take this ....*



wericha said:


> Wow....._a couple of you boys need more fiber in your diet, and learn how to read posts LOL!!!!
> _
> The OP stated an opinion, based on his experience, about the quality of certain blades and bits. I stated an opinion, based on my experience, that was in agreement with his assessment of those blades and bits. I stand by my statements and will leave it at that.


So that's it. Lock the thread all opinions have been stated. We are done here. :no:


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## wericha (Apr 29, 2012)

Nope, just don't want to continue the pointless argument.:thumbsup:

Your assessment is pretty good and I hope some folks take the time to read it carefully.

The next level up for Freud is their red blades and, in my experience, significantly better blades. The thin kerf aren't that much more than the diablo line and have a longer life.

The other comment that seems to have been totally lost is about the diablo router bits. I can't say enough bad about them. For just a couple of dollars more either the regular Freud or Whiteside bits make a world of difference. The diablo bits just don't hold any kind of edge.

It has taken a lot of years to be at the point I am with buying equipment and tools. I learned to do with whatever I could afford, but also learned that often times it was better to wait until I could afford a better quality. Cheaper is not always cheaper, sometimes it costs you more.


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## sawdust703 (Jun 27, 2014)

Al, Where to do you find your stabilizers? I have a friend here that is a cabinet builder, & he suggested a stabilizer for my saw as well. thanks.


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## wericha (Apr 29, 2012)

This is one of the better ones, but others are available: http://www.amazon.com/Forrest-STIF05-5-Inch-Dampener-Stiffener/dp/B0000223VT

I believe you said your saw is 8". The downside to these is it reduces the depth of cut. It might not help you a lot because of that, but these do a good job of making thin kerf blades cut truer.


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## jjrbus (Dec 6, 2009)

Well I had to go look, I am not a professional so am not trying to run a 1000 BF a minute through the saw. I have a Freud Diablo 10" 60T. This is my good blade, the one I put away. I am annal about tuning my saw and can glue joints right off my Rigid TS2424. Junk, terrible me thinks not. Might not be a high quality carbide, might not last as long. Maybe the OP got a bad blade?


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## pweller (Mar 10, 2014)

It might be that the OP got a defective blade. Probably, if one of the teeth is slightly out of alignment, it would cut the grooves that he indicated.

Either way, a sample of one isn't enough to make a judgement on the entire product line.

I'd recommend the OP try to return the blade and get another to see if it has the same problems. If it is defective, the retailer should take it back.


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## Al B Thayer (Dec 10, 2011)

You know come to think of it. I just cut some bamboo for some.......well Id rather not say. Then went straight to glue up. The blades can't be that bad. I can sand with 220 after my cuts. I don't know? Do you think it's my saw? Stabilizers? 

OP maybe you got a really bad one? Did you take it back?

Al


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## Oneal-Woodworking (Apr 14, 2013)

Al B Thayer said:


> I use a stabilizer on my Unisaw. Have been for 25 years. I'm betting I get a better cut with the red blade than some just because I have a great saw and the stabilizer. It's not the quality I used to get from older thicker blades. But I also like the thin cut which allows me to break the saw blade rules and use the same blades for just about anything.
> 
> I also like that I don't have to have them sharpened to get my money's worth. I just pitch them and get another.
> 
> Al


Can you start saving them for me instead of pitching them?

Seriously...

I WILL pay any and all shipping costs. :yes:


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## Oneal-Woodworking (Apr 14, 2013)

woodnthings said:


> So that's it. Lock the thread all opinions have been stated. We are done here. :no:


Did you notice how many 'professionals' that do this stuff for a living every day did NOT agree with this guy? 

:yes:

FWIW - Last time I 'abused' a Diablo blade was by cutting some 2" thick acrylic pieces to make table legs with. Stuff was HEAVY, HARD as a rock, and the poor little Freud Diablo blade sliced through it like butter. Never even heated enough for anything to stick to the blade... I was easily and quickly able to wet sand and polish the 'cut' edges to a glass like finish as well. :yes:


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## mmwood_1 (Oct 24, 2007)

Al B Thayer said:


> OP maybe you got a really bad one? Did you take it back?
> 
> Al


No, I will use it for rough cutting. I have since gotten a Freud LU80 crosscut blade which I find to be a superb blade. I've been using that one for many years. It's just not available locally, I had to order it online.(it used to be, but has been supplanted by the cheaper Diablo line) Basically, what's available locally is the Diablo line, the Marathon products, and some Amana router bits. There is a tool store in the next town over, about 10 miles away that carries PC router bits and Whiteside router bits, but when I went there, the store was gone. I've since found out they they moved, so the bits are still available locally. But they don't carry any top line saw blades. No matter, I ought to get a few years out of this LU80.

Boy, people really got riled up on this thread. Too bad Cabinetman isn't around to stir it up even more.


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