Carbide coated tip for clean transitions across large panels. I just used this to smooth out a slab of sycamore about 96" x 16". Run it on a Festool OF1400 and got great results with no tearing. Leaves some marks on the surface that can easily be sanded away with a random orbital sander. The cutter box says it's made in Taiwan (remember the days before the ubiquitous "Made in China" label, it's made in Taiwan). Given the higher wages in Taiwan, I'm surprised this beat was made in Taiwan. Geopolitical/geofinancial aside, this is a great beat at a great price. Happy alignment! Just FYI for those wanting to use this in a router sled: I slowly went into the base of the router sled in 1/8" increments to easily slide through the bottom of the 3/4" router sled to get to the sled.