I got our new (to us )Marvel Model 8 Mark II saw running Tuesday evening, but couldn't get purchase approval until today to buy the blades. WOW!!!!! An amazing saw. This thing just slides through 1" plate steel like nothing.
Normally to make up a set of 1" test plates for a welding cert, a student has to use the track burner to cut the 2 pieces and bevel the inside edges to something close to 22.5 deg each. This way you get a 45 deg included angle. This process takes about 20 - 30 minutes if they know what they are doing. On the Marvel saw I cut a set of test plates in 3 minutes.
3 cuts, 1 minute each, including measuring, moving materiel and clamping.
I am just so blown away. It turned out that the manuafacturer , Armstrong-Blum, has a distributor here in Kent WA. They carry the blades in stock.
I got 10 blades, 5-8 vari-pitch for about $50 each. That should last us a year.
I was slicing things all night. Just for fun I cut 6 sets of test plates and handed them out to my students. What a hoot.
The straightness of the cut is unreal. I took a slice off some heavy wall tube that was 1/32" thick all the way.
That's it. Just wanted to share the good news.