I would prefer to always buy American made products but
that's increasingly difficult now, obviously. I don't
really have anything against an import saw or other tool
but if I can find one made in America that's as good as
the import and isn't significantly more expensive then
I'll buy it. That being said, I couldn't find any saw
for anywhere near the same money as my General Internationl
50-185 LM1 that had the same features or quality.
Regarding the Jet, I wasn't all that impressed with them.
Nice saw, but for the money I liked the GI better. I looked
at four different models of Jet saw from the cheapest
contractor saw to a fully outfitted cabinet saw and all
four had what I would call an unuseable miter gauge. The
pin that the head rotated on was loose in it's hole. You
could tighten the adjustment down as tight as possible but
there was no way tighten the pin in it's hole. All four
were like that. I asked the store manager at one store
and the salesman at another and both had never noticed it
before. Neither had an explanation but the manager guy
did say he'd call Jet about it and get back to me...He
never did and I suspect it's because Jet just shrugged
their shoulders. I strongly considered buying the Jet
hybrid saw from my local dealer but because of the useless
miter gauge and, more importantly, because the dealer
never addressed the issue I'm now the very satisfied owner
of the GI saw. I paid less and overall got a better saw.
Ok, so I haven't tried to deal with GI customer service
but I haven't had too either.

Bruce
Redding, Ca.