Customer Reviews

Freud SD206 6-Inch Professional Dado

5 star:		(22)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I purchased this dado set on the recommendations of my brother, who is a professional finish carpenter and cabinet maker. He only uses Freud blades. I had previously had another brand that was fine for ripping dadoes but destroyed any wood during crosscut dadoes. The set arrived last saturday and I dropped what I was doing and had to try it out. I spent two hours "playing " with the set, cut dado's in melamine, birch plywood, oak plywood, solid maple and oak, mdo and mdfb. Man, this is a great little set. Though smaller than the set my brother uses (same set my Dad used for years), it suits my so called "underpowered" saw. Every dado was as clean as anyone could hope to accomplish, even on crosscuts. The tearout was so minimal, it's not worth talking about. The channel is clean and flat, every bit as nice as any dado I ever cut with a router. No burning and the feed rate is consistant with what I would use for crosscutting veneer plywood. After recieving the set, I recieved my latest copy of "American Woodworker", they had just done a review of dado sets and the SD206/208 was rated "Best Buy". For those of us that do this for fun, this is definitly a "Best Buy".

I recently purchased the SD206. It fit my needs well as a part time wood worker. Lots of meat on the carbide, very accuarate when set up correctly. Set up on my BT3K, Ive used it on poplar, white oak and plywood. Great results. Freud could beef up the instructions a bit, and I purchased magnetic shims. Overall. great value for performance, Id recommend to anyone.

After finally giving up on my inexpensive Craftsman dado set, which burned more wood than it cut and had more gum on it than blade, I went looking for something that would make dadoes that (gasp) were actually flat on the bottom, at a price I could afford, and that would work on my smaller saw, a Ryobi BT3000. This Freud set filled the bill nicely. It cuts a nice flat-bottomed dado, is highly adjustable with the included set of shims (though there's little way to tell which shim is which) and has been resistant to gumming up. The triple-angle rake on the outside blades has been great for sharp, flat sides to my cuts. This is not the ultimate dado set; with few teeth and a negative chipper angle, it tends to get pretty hot and slow cutting a 3/4" wide, 1/4" deep slot in hardwood. Multiple passes may be in order. However, the size and price and cut quality were all I was looking for, and I'm completely satisfied. Unless you have a bigger saw or require faster production, this is probably all the dado you'll ever need.

It is reasonably priced for weekend wood workers. It works well for my Delta contractor saw (1.5 hp), which is supposedly "underpower". The Tool-Crib rep said that 8 in. dado blades could be a bit too much for my saw. It came with a sturdy plastic storage case. Ah, not much instruction came with the set.

I was having huge problems crosscutting birch plywood. The wood kept splintering and I could never make a clean cut. I read a review in a woodworking magazine that recommened the SD206 as the best value for the money and decided to give it a try. When I received the blade I tested it out and discovered that if I took small depth cuts, not more than 3/8" at a time, there was no splintering and the dado was perfectly square. I highly recommend this blade.

I'm a hobby woodworker and don't use a dado set too often. So when I went looking for a dado set, I wanted one that was low cost. I first tried a set from Avenger, which is a set made in China. It was a real piece of junk. It didn't make accurate width dados and the chippers were different diameters, which left grooves in the bottom of the dado.

I finally took the Avenger set back and bought this Freud 6 inch set. The difference is night and day. If I set up the Freud set for a 3/8 inch dado, it is dead on at 3/8 inch. The bottom of the dado is absolutely smooth - not even a hint of unevenness.

The only negative about the Freud set is that the spacers are not marked and it's extremely hard to tell the difference between two spacers that are close in size. I realize that Freud may not have wanted to stamp them because a stamp might have changed the thickness in the area of the stamp, but the sizes could have been etched on.

Other than this one problem, I am completely happy and satisfied with this dado set.

I picked up the basic Freud SD206 6" stacked dado set on sale at a local hardware store. Despite what some reviewers have written here, I had no problem mouting this dado stack on my DeWalt 746 table saw. Granted, when all of the chippers are in use the arbor is completely filled - but it does fit. After making many 1/2" deep and 3/4" wide cuts in white oak I found the performance of this dado stack to be excellent. There was no chipping or tearout whatsoever when I was cutting with the grain and only very minor chipping when cutting across the grain. The dado cuts were very smooth on all surfaces and the bottom of the cut was perfectly flat. Also, I was happy to see that the shims included were of very high quality (thin metal rather than paper).

I chose the 6" model because I will probably never have a need for a dado so deep it requires an 8" set. Overall I am very pleased with the quality of this product and recommend that you shop around for a deal like I got (twenty five bucks less than the Amazon price at a local store).

I bought the Freud SD206 6" Professional Dado set so I might be able to make clean, square dados and to produce clean tenons. This product has worked superbly thusfar and I suspect that it will continue to do so in future buildings. I don't think I'll have to make dados so deep that I'd need the 8" set so why not save the [money]? It certainly has made my work easier and more precise. I highly recommend this product to anyone who might be tired of setting up a straight bit in a router and a fence clamped to their work. Use your table saw and leave the fancy cutting to the router.

I've tried several different Craftsman DADOs, and have been using a borrowed Amana DADO ....These all cost as much or more than the Freud, and the SD206 puts them all to shame! It cuts *flawless*, *chip-free* DADOs, even cross-cutting in hardwood veneer plywood! For the money, it is an incredible buy! How it does this with only 10 teeth on the outer blades is beyond me, but I won't question success. Mine came with a plastic "carrier", not the nice padded case shown in the picture (which I would have preferred), but other than that, I could not be more satisfied.

The blade itself is good but it comes with no markings whatsoever, no or limited directions and it is nearly impossible to get off and on your saw spindle. I believe it actually scored the threads on my spindle because now it's hard to get the nut on for thinner blades. For almost $90 I'd expect the blades and chippers to be marked.
Once you do get it set it cut decent but I'd go with another brand if I had to do it over.