Cutting 4x8 sheets

[Gunny]

My little cutting guide does a very good job on the sawhorse table, very little trouble to clamp at exactly the right place and cost me nothing other than three screws and a little bit of wood glue, the lumber came out of the scrap pile.
I can see spending quite a bit of money on a tool if you are in that type business, heck if you're in the business, you can probably depreciate it through income taxes, but for someone like me, who usually only cuts maybe one sheet a month, it's much more than adequate and it'll cut just as accurately as any of the expensive versions. With any of them a tape measure has to be used at some point by a human and that's where most of the mistakes come into play.
The other thing that a lot of people have is keeping the saw on the line, or to one side of the line, which a panel saw would excel at, but my guide suffices.

 

[Deere Dude]

I was veruy closely considering a panel saw like the ones suggested about 25 years ago but decided I have to feed my wife anyway so I might as well holler for her to hold the end up when I need to rip a long piece of plywood...works good so far. It makes her feel good to be able to help once in a while, I think.

 

[Sawyer Rob]

I owned and ran my own custom furniture/cabinet shop for MANY years, and I never owned a panel saw... I wonder how I got along without one??

SR

 

[gsganzer]

I bought our used panel saw to help with building shipping crates. Between the panel saw, compound miter saw and a pneumatic nailer, our shipping guy can build a crate in a matter of minutes by himself. And it's much safer.

 

[MMagis]

I owned and ran my own custom furniture/cabinet shop for MANY years, and I never owned a panel saw... I wonder how I got along without one??

SR

I didn’t see anyone saying that it was absolutely necessary. But anyone claiming it’s not the easiest, fastest, and safest way to cut large pieces of material has never used one.

 

[/pine]

Doing exterior trim carpentry on production tract homes in the late 60's early 70's when cutting the siding for gable ends I would cut 4 sheets of 5/8" T-111 sheet siding at one time...cut for roof pitches...

Cutting for (both) opposite gable ends at the same time required that the sheets be stacked accordingly for pitch, edge lap and texture side facing...