Bosch GCM 12 GDL Professional

Disappointing all round – I bought this saw for accurate mitres and longevity - the mechanism promised to be longer lasting in tough conditions because it should not corrode like competitors slide mechanisms. The saw would not cut an accurate mitre and I spent a weekend trying to tune it. I gave up and returned it to Bosch for tuning (the head was not aligned and the… Read more

fence was not straight). They turned it around in about a week, but it came back within their "acceptable spec", which was a joke as it left significant gaps on any spans longer than 1 meter. On my table saw I have it tuned to 0.1mm per meter, which is acceptable.

I spent a further day making changes and got it down to 0.25mm per meter. But on hardwood the blade drifts in the cut and you get further randomness, especially on long cuts.

My other complaint is that the laser light is only visible in very dark environments and if you are onsite then you have to erect a shad structure to be able to use the laser light function. Hopeless. The laser light is also difficult to adjust.

This saw now only gets used for framing duties and sleepers, but you could spend $500 less and get something that does this job. This saw was the reason that I gave up on Bosch Professional equipment and have systematically changed all my tooling to other brands. Very disappointing.

The saw is very heavy, and it is difficult to lug around, so if you want something for site work, look elsewhere. The mechanism that attaches it to the stand (GTA 3800) is great, and the stand is adequate, but doe not have wheels so you need to lift the heavy saw off the stand to move it any distance. The overall build quality is good and it has now lasted a few years, but its lack of accuracy, repeatability, and tunability means it is not fit for purpose as a mitre saw for anything other than framing work.

Not aligned with axis - machined incorrectly – Beautiful design, but poorly manufactured. The blade is on an angle to the axis it moves on, so it can never cut straight. So the teeth at rear cut a mm to the left of the front teeth, so no matter now it’s squared, the rear teeth make a lot of noise as they grind through a different path to the front teeth. This is apparently unfixable, as there… Read more

is no adjustment to the orientation of the blade in reference to the axis of the arm. I am so disappointed with this product, especially as I’m a big fan of other Bosch power tools. This may just be a defect in my saw, but there are many reviews claiming the same or similar issues with curved cuts.

A nice saw with a major problem – Having unpacked my shiny new mitre saw, I was anxious to try it. I made a few cuts on a machined length of timber, checked the cuts with a try square, and to my disgust, learned that the saw was not cutting square on either Mitres or Bevel cuts. I spent a full day attempting to set the saw to cut accurately, but unless you have a bevel gauge, it… Read more

is a long slow process of making incremental adjustments, locking everything, and making a test cut and then checking. I have consumed a 100mm X 100mm piece of Jarrah 2 metres long, one thin slice at a time! This is obviously fixable, but I feel the saw should have been accurately set up from the factory.

A much worse problem is its sawdust collection, or should I say LACK of it. Forget about just using the supplied bag - less than 10% of the sawdust ends up in the bag; most of it all over the saw, and on the floor. I was using a good quality German Stihl vacuum cleaner connected in place of the bag, and yet with one cut, the saw is filthy with (red) dust. I can see I am just going to have to live with this; each time the saw is used to make a cut, in the end, it needs to be blown down with compressed air to be made clean once more, ready for the next time. In my opinion, the whole dust collection system needs to be re-engineered. This is a very poor setup.

While I'm having a grizzle- there are two Allen keys supplied with the saw. The larger one (6/4 mm) is provided with a dedicated parking place on the body of the saw. Nice. The other one, which at 2mm is tiny, has no place to put it! I can imagine not being able to find it when it comes time to use it, with it floating around loose. This is an observation - The saw is VERY heavy - the book gives the weight at 32.1KG. I almost gave myself a hernia lifting it onto its work stand - definitely a 2-man job!

On the plus side, the saw has many fine attributes. It has a unique saw suspension system which gives a very smooth operation. It has twin lasers, just a saw cut wide, so you can see exactly where the cut will be. Having a 315mm blade, it has a magnificent depth of cut. It has a powerful 2 KW motor.

In summary, it is an innovative, large saw with many nice features, but spoiled by an inefficient dust collection system.

Not ideal – I recently hit the mitre fence with the saw blade which I thought would be impossible to do as the bottom mitre fence doesn't move unless you use an Allen key. In doing this the mitre fence fractured off. I found my receipt a few days later to see if I still had a warranty only to find out that it had expired the day before. I rang Bosch to see if… Read more

there was anything they could do and the answer I got was NO, it's out of warranty. I explained that it had happened a few days earlier and that I haven't used it that often and still she said NO, BOSCH are very strict on warranties. The part is around $65 on their website so I asked if I could buy it, she replied you need to have an account. The only way that I could purchase the part was through a third party so I went to Bunnings only to find that now the part now cost $95...so very dissatisfied with their after service care. It's not like it cost $200 it's their flagship saw which I spent $1000 on. BOSCH gotta do better!!!!

bosch gcm12gdl – a heavy bulky machine , very smooth to use almost too smooth , on start up the kick back can be a bit of a shock as the blade drops down and back towards you if you are not ready for it, I think you can adjust the arm so you need to apply more pressure to move it. The laser is good though could probably be adjusted to be more accurate in regards… Read more

to blade width ie the laser shoots a line down each side of blade about 5mm apart where as blade is 3.5 mm max.The one thing which annoys me is when doing slide cuts to a set depth, there is flex in the machine so depending on how hard you press you can get a variation in the depth of cut.The saw bench that comes with it is not up to the task , extended will not support anything bar moldings or jambs.Also due to the base being so wide it doesn't sit well on a plank.This is more set up and leave in place saw. can cut up past center of blade due to design of guard.150 mm plus. can readjust if not cutting square.good cutting capacity.accurate heavy , flex when slide cutting to a set depth,