PM-3550 Heavy Duty Omnidirectional Mobile Base

My setup - SawStop PCS 52" 3HP table saw - no the PM-3550 does not fit straight from the box, more later.Saw setup with original 52" extension.SawStop Router Table cast iron plate setup to left of saw blade - fits directly to left of saw blade with matched holes for bolting to saw cast iron wing.PM-3550 with two PM-3245 left and right.saw to blade right with 52" extension, PM-3245 fits straight out of the box with no custom fits required.Saw to blade left with router cast iron plate, PM-3245 requires modification.PM-3550 out of the box is to big for the SawStop. This was solved by cutting down the interconnecting light grey sections as I show in the video for both saw base depth and width - each light grey cross piece requires TWO cuts, one each end with a grinder thus maintaining the bolt holes as required whilst keeping the beam centered to the bolt holes. Note depth and width cuts are different to achieve the best fit.PM-3245 for router table support required one cut to the dark grey beam that connects to the leg support tray, I removed ONE bolt hole. The beam requires only one cut to the correct length, bolt holes are used at one end only to connect the two dark grey beams as shown in the video.A lot of work? No if you have a good grinder with a diamond disk. Took me about 3 minutes per cut including cleanup.The result - I am extremely happy. The SawStop solution would not have supported a left install on the router table as I desired. The saw is extremely stable - make sure you set the foot length correctly AND tightly snug the locking nuts of the adjustable feet (this is crucial to achieve stability). Also, not that I do not have the base fully weighted on the feet, they are sufficiently loaded to stop the saw from moving whilst maintaining some of the weight on the castor wheels, this seems to help with stability (significantly).For those that know the SawStop, the back wood table extension is there to stop interference from the folding run out table against the dust extraction duct when I fold down the table.I am very, very happy with the Bora solution and would recommend to anyone, yes it took some work with modifications to achieve what I needed, but technically it was simple and the solution perfectly fits my needs.NOTE - I have given 5 stars against ease of assembly because the modifications required were to a specific need and product. Straight out of the box, both products are simple to assemble.

UPDATE: I've had my 480 pound jointer/planer on this mobile base for over a year now and have started to notice the flanges where the wheels attach get in the way and do not allow the wheels to fully rotate when under weight. Not sure why because nothing looks like it has bent out of shape. Anyway, I placed four 1/2" washers between each wheel and its mounting plate raising the flanges away from the wheel. Now it works even better than new allowing me to change directions with very little effort when moving it around my shop.I understand Boar has come out with a newer base that has larger wheels that might avoid this issue. You may want to check that one out as well to see if it meets your needs.The Portamate PM-3550 PM-3550 Super Duty Mobile Base-All Swivel Wheels is an excellent mobile base. I received it in excellent condition contrary to some other reviews and found the base easy to assemble, though I recommend having two people available to get a heavy tool into place on the base.I put mine under a 480 pound jointer/planer and since all of the wheels swivel it is very easy to maneuver anywhere in the shop. The four leveling feet make it easy to stabilize the tool on an uneven floor. When the wheels are down just make sure all four pads are lightly touching the floor. Then when you raise the the wheels (which have an easy and light motion) the tool sits firmly in place without moving or tipping to any one corner. Even when under power .I looked at a lot of other mobile bases but this base with its large weight capacity, all swivel wheels and ease of leveling make it a great base for the price.

Okay anyone can have an issue in the manufacturing process. I would buy from Bora again. The mobile base is an excellent overall product. I called Bora told them about the defective part. They asked for some basic information and they saw the issue apologized and sent a replacement part and I received it in days. They turned lemons into lemonade!!! Great Customer Service!!!Happy Day!!!Unusable for a smaller-sized base. The other (3) corners are fine, and the legs slide all the way in. My Laguna shaper is heavy in fact it came with cast iron wheels but only rolled in a straight line. The current base (while it went together easy) is slowly falling apart. This Bora base is very heavy duty, but in trying to get it together a lot paint is gone. Not used to having metal bits and and paint chips on my work bench and floor! It's been ugly!!!Happy Day!!!

This base is very well made, sturdy, easy to put together, I own several and will buy more. A few nit picks though, and they are not insignificant.First the packaging is truly awful, I am sure when shipped by the pallet full to a retail location it's fine, but I've bought 3 of these and all came from different vendors all shipped with different carriers and all arrived busting out of the seams. The last one looked like it had been dragged here and it was the only one boxed in another box, the first two were just coated in a roll and a half of packing tape. Add to that the box is heavy, full of metal that is shifting around and has a nice glossy finish with pictures on it that is difficult to get a grip on. It's a box of heavy metal wrapped up like a coffee maker, doesn't really work, and the necessary tape cocoon doesn't help, it really needs to be packaged in a tougher (brown) multi-wall box which would probably cost about the same as the photo intensive box it comes in.Second, I'm not sure who came up with the standard dimensions, there are various "kits" to make it bigger, even crazy big if you wanted to, but the minimum dimensions are quite large for typical shop tools. The base comes with 2 longer and 2 shorter rails and those 2 longer rails are too long to snugly fit a full size cabinet saw, or a heavy duty shaper, or large floor standing belt/disk sander, or a large drill press, or a typical iron frame band saw on an enclosed base, all things very typical in a home shop, and based on the a fore mentioned photo packaging, this is certainly the market this was intended for. I have had to chop the rails on everything I've put this under, and the holes are drilled such that doing so puts you at the end of the pre-drilled holes, for any of the above applications, and even to get there you need to cut both ends of the rails to have enough pre-drilled holes left and they are formed holes so you'd need to drill and tap, and since the factory holes are distortion punched it's really not something you can reproduce and get the same thread engagement. Personally I think if it was packaged with 2 sets of the shorter rails and the longer ones were available as a reasonable cost option it would be a better product, or there were more pre-drilled holes on the inner rails, like all the way across instead of just a few on either end. I'm just not sure what particular product they had in mind when they came up with the dimensions they even sell an outrigger for this for extension tables for, which can be purchased as a kit with this base, which you'd think would be intended for a Delta Unisaw, or a Powermatic 66 or a Sawstop Professional, or any one of the off shore clones of such, or one of the many hybrid saws, but these all have about the same base dimensions, dimensions smaller than this base can adjust to.Speaking of the outrigger, which I also have, it is also weirdly oversize, it's 32" front to back and none of the saws mentioned above have tables that deep and certainly not a leg support needing those dimensions. Even the Saw stop industrial is only 30" deep with a support leg footprint significantly smaller than that. And this cannot really be cut down in any sort of reasonable way as the castor supports are welded onto the ends, so somewhere you end up with a trip hazard. And the bracketry for the outrigger is also odd, it has some strange clamp dealy on one end that clamps around the inner crossbar of the main base and a flanged end that bolts to that oversize table leg support, which by the way has holes that have no relationship to the hole spacing on the bars of the main base. The whole thing could be simpler if they just drilled the holes all the way across on the main base and used the same spacing on the outrigger and just gave you 2 of the same bracket. it would solve multiple problems. Interestingly though, the outrigger does not share the same picturesque boxing of the base, and is well packaged, not slippery and arrived in perfect shape.But anyway, it is a good, solid product, which I would absolutely recommend and was a huge step up from the Delta mobile base I had on my Unisaw which sagged in the middle at it's only lift point and became not very mobile. Having 4 rotating casters makes it a breeze to move around, it locks down solid, is easy to level, can effortlessly operate it with your feet, it just seems to have a little too much marketing in the packaging, and a little too much counter productive generosity in it's dimension. I really do wish they'd made it less generous and upsold me kits to make it expandable in steps, for both products. All in all it's a well built product, but I can't say it's a particularly well engineered product at least not from a versatility stand point.There are recommendations in the Q&A to solve the size problem by putting in a plywood base and then putting whatever tool you have on that, but this just seems like a bit of a cheesy hack to a problem that shouldn't be there in the first place. Especially considering this product is coming from a company that makes a base based on your supplied piece of plywood, and if you really wanted to stick your machinery on plywood would you have bought a "Super Duty", rated to 3/4 of a ton steel base?So, Bora if you read these, either A) drill more holes in the rails, or B) make it smaller and sell me stuff to make it bigger, or sell me stuff to make it smaller, either way. Oh and just make the hole patterns the same everywhere and you'll need to make fewer unique parts, then even the extra up sell parts are just the same really, you could be selling me all kinds of different size rails that are just cut from the same continuous hole blank, and lastly get better (and cheaper) boxes and put a label on it if you want a picture for the sales floor.

Disppointed in the product, i dont know if its because I had to add the extra coupling and extension piece but it doesnt move easily at all. Its actually arduous to move it. I just assembled it yesterday and it took a long time. I did have to modify the length of the extension pieces because i needed 57 inches and even with everything cinched tight the length was 60 inches so i had no choice but to cut off the extensions length. That wasnt the issue because they give you the size I was just hoping the feet were large enough on the ID of the frame that it would hold the lathe. The disaappintment came with the couplings dragging the ground, I undid all 16 bolts one side at a time and used a crowbar to push up and retighten and the coupings are still dragging on one side and the other side lifted about 1/8 inch. Another disappintment is onewheel doesnt spin freely and got caught on its own frame I had to lift and spin one wheel around to get it to push against the wall where its resting place is in the first picture, the second picture is where I assembled it. Its better than nothing but it really lacks mobility ease in moving it around. I struggled and the video had the guy moving a long table saw with ease.The assembly was really tedious and I had to stop and start again because I was frustrated with getting the wheels assembled there are four washers on eash wheel for the orange flip lock and trying to get them on without the second and third washers falling was just a big issue. I ended up flipping it upright so the third washer install didnt fall down inside the wheel void which the only way to get it out is to take the wheel assembly back apart and flip it upside down to get it out and restart the assembly over. I did everything alone and it probaby took three hours with the wheels being the biggest time consumption.I was really excited because I made my entire work shop mobile and to have spent this much on the extensions, coupling and wheel base and for it to not move easily was a disappointment. It feels sturdy but again the center drags the concrete scratching the floor. Might be easier if there is two people assembling.Its just not the best for mobility but I put all this effort and already cut up one of the extensions so its not like I am going to return it after spending so much time dealing with the assembly and getting a 450 pound lathe inside the mobile rig by myself. Ill just live with it, but you get tired of living with things, you expect it to work as advertised easpecially when you spend a lot for the product.

I threw the Bora Mobile Base Casters in the Garbage just days after I bought them!!!! I am MAD!!! When I opened the boxes; loose bearings fell out of the boxes... The frame is ok Quality , but the casters are CRAAAAAPPPPYYYY!!!!! The casters won't pivit turn like they should... so, the wheels end-up getting scooted sideways when trying to move the equipment ... this results in flat spots getting worn down into the wheels where the wheels had to scoot sideways … because the wheels don't change direction like they should. I called the manufacturer to complain and they wanted me to fill out a bunch of paperwork to resolve there quality control problems... I am an engineer.. but I am not THEIR Engineer!!! I am their customer! not their employee.. I got the “Run-Around” they pissed me off!!! So I called a caster company (CasterCity.com) and just days after I bought the Bora mobile bases... I ordered High Quality casters and I replaced the crappy Bora Casters… I felt I had no other choice , but to replace the Bora casters using my own money... that fixed the problem. So, yeah, I threw the crappy Bora Mobile Base Casters in the Garbage just days after I bought the Bora Mobile base!!, Bora would Not help!I bought three BORA Portamate PM-3550 Super Duty Mobile Bases for my shop, they just arrived...... & I regret buying them due to poor quality issues. - The Casters don't swivel like they should. The Casters are of very low quality.

Even though this is expensive, it is worth it. I have a very heavy Powernatic table saw that I have to push up againt the wall when I am not using it. When I need to move the saw, it just glides easilt across the basement garage floor and raises up off the rollers to a solid and secure saw ready to cut !!

[Update 2/17/2023]Bora Customer service sent a replacement unit but the caster’s were as bad if not worse than the original one. I tried contacting them multiple times and they never responded so I ended up getting a set of casters from another vendor that were as close to the same size but had superior quality and load specifications. I ended up spending about $80 more but the base moves much better. The only downside is the stabilizer feet on the Bora base are maxed out and I may have to find longer ones for better stability. Basically, I’m reengineering their base due to poor quality and performance. Bora contacted me after I left a similar review on Instagram but they didn’t follow up. I DO NOT recommend the 3550 but their lighter weight models are adequate. If there are other brands, I strongly suggest you check them out if for nothing else, better customer support.[Update 12/22/2022]I reached customer service and they said they would “process the warranty” back on 12/12/2022 however, I’ve heard nothing more from them as to a tracking number or shipping details since this time and despite repeated requests for updates from them, I’ve had no response and have no idea what’s going on. Probably the worst customer service experience I’ve seen in a long time. I have a 350 pound machine that has to be moved using dead blow hammers and 2x4s to turn the casters every 6-12 inches of movement.If you’re considering buying one of these, I strongly recommend finding an alternative and prevent the headache![Original Submission]This is the second PM-3550 mobile base I've purchased. The design is excellent and having 4 swivel casters is ideal for moving heavy shop equipment. I particularly like that this base raises each corner with a stationary foot when compressed. This adds to the stability when locked.However - the casters that come with this base are horrible. My first PM-3550 casters were a little better but not great. This new one is actually the worst. I have to kick each caster (multiple times very hard) in the general direction I want the device to go every time I want to change direction. I've had to resort to a dead blow hammer because I've torn up my shoes doing this.The only other change I'd make is the ability to have more threaded holes, in fact, I'd say having them all the way across would be helpful. I need to cut about 2" off the width of this unit but because I don't have more threaded holes to attach to, it wouldn't help - and I'm not interested in trying to replicate the threading.I don't know what other mobile bases are available, the design of this one is excellent, the execution could have been much better and they seem to have cut corners with cheap casters - very disappointing!In this picture, I have my new Hammer sander 950 which weighs about 350 pounds. To the right in the pic, is my Laguna bandsaw with the same base that moves a bit better than the new one but still problematic. The bandsaw weighs in at around 225 pounds. Both tools are well within the 1500 lb rating so there's really no excuse for these casters to be so difficult to work with.

Perfect for heavy equipment, makes it easy to maneuver a heavy thickness planer in a small space.

This is easily the best mobile base I have ever used.

Wheels do not swivel , leaving black marks all over my floor , using it on a 10” Delta contractor table saw with a cast iron top