A few years back, I was watching my carpenter friend fix the trim around a door. A section of it was rotten, and I imagined he would replace the entire piece, but instead he pulled out an amazing tool, made a plunge cut straight into the trim, and removed only the rotten section. The tool was an oscillating multi-tool, and I quickly started thinking of the potential uses for boatbuilding and repair.The multi-tool has a side-to-side rotating blade that swings just 1.6 to 5 degrees at up to 23,000 oscillations per minute. Its speed can be controlled for different materials: slower for metals and faster for wood. The DeWalt multi-tool has aa variable speed trigger switch and a quick-release device for a rapid, tool-free change of blades.
Kent Lewis
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Had a Fein for years, bought when they had the patent and were the only game in town. Used it for everything from sanding to cleaning out about 2 miles of strip-planked deck seams. With lots of folks in the game now, many more blades are available. I like the idea of being able to easily sharpen cutting blades. I’ve done it with a triangular file, which is tedious.
I’ve used Harbor Freight’s version for at least 8 years now. Used it for serious plunging excavations, removing old linoleum (several hours worth, and no overheating!), undercutting door trim, and numerous other uses. There are two tools that I would hate to have to give up: the cordless drill and impact driver, and the oscillating tool. (Okay, I guess that’s 3 tools).
Grizzly Imports has, by far, the best prices on blades. The quality seems equal to any others I have tried, and the bases are universal, and should fit on any brand of tool.
Ben, I wouldn’t call it “sharpen” but more so “make new teeth.” The Rigid Carbide sharpener just cuts new, pretty aggressive. I’d say we could get 2 or 3 more rows of teeth before the blade is done.
Another important function of the multi tool is that it is a flush cutter. You can trim down dowel plugs and by using a flat piece of wood as a guide and resting the flat of the blade against it you can cut a fairly straight line. One novel use I saw was in Fine Woodworking a couple of years ago where sandpaper was glued to both sides of the blade and used to fine sand the inside surfaces of narrow gaps on a custom piece of furniture. And of course the obvious—making quick work of cutting outlet holes in drywall.
Hi Kent Lewis,
Thanks for the sharing this informative article about oscillating multi tools. I need to update my kitchen and I think I am going for this next month. Hope so your ideas is going to help me to do this easily. I had been never used it before. But it looks, sounds good. I will try it for sure.
I’ve used mine extensively in my kitchen remodel. One interesting use was cutting a 2′ x 3′ hole through plaster and metal lath for a skylight. Used a diamond blade, which made sparks as it cut through the metal lath. The whole process (not counting drawing the rectangle on the ceiling) took less than 10 minutes. Messy though.
The switch in my old original Fein just died. So send it back for repair or get another tool. This, of course, in the middle of a job. I’ll need it tomorrow. Went and picked up a DeWalt battery-powered tool. Did I say I needed it tomorrow? Seems to work well but it is ear-protector-required noisy. I’ll not regret having the battery power especially since it matches my 20v drill, but I could do with the quiet. So I’ll send my Fein back to the repair center. It’s an original so may not be fixable as it has been superseded, but they’ll give me a trade-in discount. I guess I can’t complain. It’s been twenty years, and some miles of deck-seam cleaning. For little boat work, these sanders are go-to items; best thing around for trimming cured fiberglass cloth.