GMC DLS2000M Laser Circular Saw: Discontinued — What to Buy Instead
A budget circular saw with a laser guide, from a brand that went into receivership in 2008. The laser was never the useful part.
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The DLS2000M was a corded circular saw with a laser line projector, from GMC — the Australian budget brand placed in receivership in 2008. Parts and warranty support ended with the company.
Laser guides on saws
Worth saying plainly, because it was the selling feature: laser guides on circular saws do not improve cut accuracy in any meaningful way.
The line has width, it drifts out of alignment the first time the saw is knocked, it washes out in daylight, and it is projected from a housing that is not the blade. Meanwhile the thing that actually determines whether a cut is straight — the base plate running against a guide — is unaffected by it.
Anyone cutting accurately with a circular saw is using a track, a clamped straight edge, or a saw guide. The laser is marketing.
What to check if you own one
Base plate flatness. A stamped base that has been dropped will not be flat, and a saw whose base rocks cannot cut straight. Check with a straight edge.
Base square to blade. Set the bevel to zero and check with an engineer’s square against the blade plate, not the teeth. Many budget saws were never square from the factory.
Blade. A tired blade makes any saw feel poor. A current 24-tooth thin kerf blade costs little and transforms a cheap saw.
What to buy
The Makita XSS02Z, linked below, is an 18V LXT 6-1/2 in saw sold as a bare tool, on a battery platform that has been supported since 2005.
If you want corded, the thing to look for is a cast rather than stamped base plate. That single feature separates saws that stay accurate from saws that do not.