Not likely. Jigsaws tend to wander and the upcutting action leaves a very rough finish. On your budget, a circular saw with straightedge is probably your best bet. However, I was having trouble getting a good job with my fairly cheap well known brand name skilsaw. When I checked I found that the blade was not parallel with the base by quite a bit. I drove out the roll pin that held one end to the base and did a little grinding and shimming and now it cuts very well.

 

Maybe I should change my circular saw blade to get a fine cut? I may need more teeth on the blade.

 

I use a Diablo combination blade on my circular saw. I like it so much I bought three of them on sale. With your jigsaw, if there is a back and front to the job, cut on the back, then the teeth of the saw will leave a smoother cut on the front.

 

Are you using a blade designed for plywood on your table saw? Another type of blade that would work would be a hollow ground planer blade however I would go with the plywood blade first.

 

I have a 60 tooth freud blade for my circular saw - I'd definitely use it with a straight edge for cutting plywood over a jig saw for a smooth cut.

 

plywood blade

Had the same problem for the longest time. switched to the freud plywood blade and no more problems.Good blades are worth the investment.
Tdog

 

I prefer Freud red blades over any others I have tried.

 

In the past I have had good results cutting plywood with most any saw. It all depends on the saw blade and a good straight edge to follow.
Plywood blades are excellent, but you can get a nice smooth edge with most sharp blades with 60+ teeth for 10" diameter. My jig saw gave me excellent cuts using a scroll saw blade from Craftsman. It would cut on both the up and down stroke. The teeth were like beveled triangles. I can't find them any more. My saw takes blades that fasten to the saw with a set screw and I can't find them any more.

 

Sharp blade

I usually find that splintering is a sign my blade is dull and needs replacing/sharpening. Sharp blade and an even feed on a properly aligned saw helps a whole lot.

 

My suggestion for you is to stick with the circular saw with the fine blade as you mentioned and in addition place some tape along the edge to prevent the kick up of the edge.

 

5" Double Cut Saw for plywood and much more,it will put most jig saws to shame.

5" Double Cut Saw

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Plywood by it's nature will look "ugly" at it's edge but if you are referring to tearout of the top veneers when cross cutting, heed the advice of using a good blade and a saw guide.

Masking tapes will help and additionally one can score along the cut line before sawing with a uitility knife.

If you make a simple guide, it's fairly easy to prescore at the cut line.

 

Another thing to remember when cutting plywood is to use as much of the blade's height/depth as possible. This is contrary to what you would do when cutting wood but it helps with tear-out.

 

This is new to me. I remember the rule is that the blade should be slightly more than the depth of wood. Is this rule not working with plywood?

If my plywood has front and back, then which part should be on top when I cut with circular saw? Thanks.

 

You'll never get good results with a poor-quality blade. Get a good carbide-tipped blade designed for cutting plywood. There are a couple of other things you can do that will improve the quality of the cut even more: make a zero-clearance insert for your saws (they work just as well for handheld circular saws as table saws), and if you're willing to put in some extra time and effort, then make the cut in two passes: the first pass is extremely shallow (1/16"--1/32" is ideal). The teeth will be moving close to parallel to the surface of the plywood, so the fragile surface veneer will be better supported and not tear out. After that cut is complete, raise the blade to its final cutting depth and make a second pass, cutting in the groove you just made. Pro cabinet shops often have a dual-blade table saw dedicated for cutting sheet goods. It has a small scoring blade directly in front of the main blade, so it accomplishes in a single pass what this method does in two passes. Either that, or cut slightly oversize and trim the edges with a router and straight-edge guide with a "compression spiral bit" installed.