The Centipede Sawhorse is a foldable worktable that looks like a great traditional sawhorse replacement. It’s an indiegogo project. The Centipede Sawhorse is a heavy duty job site work support system that will have you saying goodbye to traditional sawhorses altogether. This lightweight and compact work support system - the ultimate portable sawhorse or workbench/table… READ THE REST
1 Like
Two sweet tools in one day! This looks really useful. Provided you don’t let the photographer advise you about safety.
1 Like
and here i was about to discard my bag chair cuz the fabric wore out… i can duct tape a three of 'em together and really not have this nifty tool at all.
As a former carpenter, this system looks fine for homeowners, as long as they never use it anywhere except the garage or driveway. It’s dependent on having a flat ground surface to function correctly, so no contractor would touch it, unless perhaps they specialized in factory refits or some such, and always had concrete floors. Jobsites in general don’t have any such flat areas, which is why folding sawhorses work well there.
5 Likes
As a homeowner, that was my exact thought as well. “Maybe I can use this in the carport?” It sure won’t help me build the deck.
As a former art handler and framer this would be ideal for use during gallery installations. Any kind of handyman would also find it useful I would think. Spread it out and throw a sheet of plywood up there and your are ready to go. (Kind of elegant too.)
In a gallery setting you never know what is coming your way and what tool you might need. Somewhere to put down a framed piece for a second to change the hardware or a work-surface to form a mount and do some light brazing. Flexibility is paramount.
1 Like
If you can imagine, where I worked we had a fleet of banquet tables and a pile of one foot lengths of PVC pipe to extend the legs so the surface was at a useful height for working. We still struggled to make a large flat surface. This wold make it simple.
1 Like
The plastic sawhorses have notches that will securely hold 2x4" studs right on top of the sawhorses and you can throw on a sheet of plywood on top of those.
Surely this is just a standard pop-up trade show display frame laid on its side?
This product would be better if it were sustainable. Unfortunately, it’s difficult to repair. When one of those fragile rods bends or breaks, or the plastic corner connectors break, the entire item has to be thrown out. Imagine trying to put this thing in a trash bag. A product’s life cycle should be part of its design. Given that this folding table has a bad ending, it has a bad design. Mark, please consider this when promoting a product.
3 Likes
I have two of these- they are portable bed frames for inflatable beds. I suppose it’s a clever re-use, but it isn’t anything new.
I don’t know, it looks pretty maintainable to me. The posts look like simple iron rods, and the corner bits look like I could get pretty close with wood and a router or drill. And when I watched the video, it looked like the posts mount to the corner connectors with normal bolts. All in all, it looks like something I could pretty easily maintain. And it looks very handy for me around the house. I don’t need a table often, but occasionally I need a larger surface to work on. I like it.
1 Like
Indeed, not all hired hands treat tools and equipment with care or pride. The product does not seem durable too abuse unlike a sawhorse. Ideal perhaps for trade shows, exhibits and for domestic handywork, as mentioned.
Actually, relatively flat surfaces are needed for traditional folding sawhorses as well, unless you are going to custom cut a set for every contour on the job site. This works on rough ground as well as traditional sawhorses and in either case, the table top or board to be cut will only be as level as the ground beneath it.
Yeah, we’ve looked at those as well. They weren’t in violation of our utility patent and their product is dedicated to bed usage only, so we felt confident in our uniqueness. Yes, the concept is tried and true, but we feel our application of the accordion frame style tool is indeed new…
The rods aren’t as fragile as they appear to you and absolutely nothing in this unit is connected by plastic. Yes, the rods could be bent, but I would argue that any tool is going to be damaged when you back a truck over them. Short of this or other gross misuse of the product, it seems unlikely that the nested steel support beams will be bent.
Below is a picture of the Centipede Tool team atop the smaller 2’ x 4’ prototype unit. With well over 500 pounds of man on this tiny little frame, we feel the durable nature of the product is apparent.
The polymer plastic P-Tops are there only to prevent marking the project board and to put enough space between the cutting blade and the steel frame. These P-Tops are replaceable after one too many misguided cuts hit them.
image
“Relatively flat” is, as one might expect, a relative term. I’m not worried that contractors might buy this and be disappointed, they know whether they can expect to have flat work areas or not, and won’t consider this product if they don’t.
To claim that this device handles uneven ground as well as sawhorses is just ludicrous. A pair of sawhorses can bridge swells, tree stumps, etc, and flex to conform to mild variations in their (small) individual footprints. Doing the “Infomercial Fumble”, where you show some actor trying to use sawhorses improperly, as if he’d never seen them before, is unimpressive, to say the very least. The device will work very well as long as the work area is very flat, as in a driveway, garage, etc. There’s nothing wrong with that. Why claim more?
It is a pretty obscure scenario where one would be forced to work over the top of a tree stump instead of anywhere next to it. But you are correct, if that were absolutely the only place on the job site that sheet materials could be cut, then the Centipede would not be the correct tool for the job. I never made any exceptional claims, I only took the time to point out that traditional sawhorses have very similar limitations. Only under very particular circumstances would this not be the case.
As to the infomercial fumble, I had to chuckle when I read your comment. I don’t expect anyone to take my word for it, but we had many takes where we tried to show the inherent inconvenience of traditional sawhorses when cutting 4’ x 8’ thin sheet materials. However, none were as poignant as the one shown, which was indeed an accidental fumble. As I’m sure is often the case, because no one is perfect, the leg was not in the fully locked position as the actor tried to slide it into place. The true audio of that clip includes the inventor shouting, “Keep going! Keep rolling, that was perfect!” In spite of our attempts to stage the scene, the best shot was an actual depiction of the fundamental flaw we were attempting to illustrate.
Reminds me of one of those fold out walls for a convention booth. Stronger supports, but basically the same design. It’s just laid flat and not vertical for holding artwork panels. Wonder if that’s where the idea grew out of. You never had enough room during set-up at a busy convention.
This topic was automatically closed after 5 days. New replies are no longer allowed.
