making a cross cut station?

[keith ouellette]

If you were going to make a dedicated cross cut station (Next on my list) and you had a 12" dewalt sliding compound and an old dewalt radial arm with a black and decker motor

Which one would you use assuming each was set up at its best.

I know.

How good is the radial at its best? I don't know yet.

At first I had always planned on using the miter saw for cross cutting all the time and the ras for dados but now I am questioning how accurate sliders are.

What do any of you think?

[Gerry Werth]

I have the Ridgid 12" SCMS, and IMHO is much more accurate than my old Craftsman RAS. I had to true up the RAS every time I moved if off of 90* cuts. So at one time I had the RAS for only 90* cuts and a miter saw for everything else. Sold both and bought a 12 SCMS. :)

[Wayne Cannon]

FWIW, a RAS can drive a stacked dado set, which a SCMS cannot do.

[Neal Clayton]

why not set up both on a shared fence?

[Rick Potter]

I have a DeWalt 7790 RAS on a shared fence with a DeWalt 12" chop saw. I use the RAS only for crosscuts, and use the chop saw for angles. The RAS has a 16" crosscut capacity and is very accurate.

Rick Potter

[Paul Greathouse]

I also like the idea of a 12" CMS and radial arm saw combo. The higher quaility CMS's are very accurate and like others have said the RAS would be great for wide crosscuts and dado's. I'm presently looking for an older Dewalt or Delta RAS but it seems the recent popularity of these saws has driven the price up. Your lucky to already have yours.

[keith ouellette]

As some of you mentioned I was thinking of having both the ras and the slider on the same wall.

When I first thought this up I thought the 18' wall was really long but now I realize that 18' isn't much.

The original plan called for a flip top station on that same wall right at the center that would have 3 surfaces, one flat with a fence ( and possibly with a router) one with my bench top morticer and one with my bench top spindle sander.

That would take up 3' then the radial would be on the right and the slider would be on the left.

But that would not leave me with much room to the left and right of each machine, if 6' were between them it would leave 6' to the left and right of each side.

[Bruce Wrenn]

Norm on the NYW built a miter saw station several years ago that included his RAS. That is on my "to do list."

[Steve Griffin]

I've preached this before, but the biggest improvement you can make to your miter saw is a indexed fence with a flip stop.

Amazingly, some of the nicest shops can't be bothered to properly set up the chop saw with a stop system. It's as silly as not having a calibrated fence on your table saw.

I have both a Kreg and a Biesmeyer stop system on two different chop saws and both work great.

-Steve

[Rick Potter]

If I could suggest:

Make the bench along that wall various heights. Put your spindle sander lower, and slightly back so that the table is the height of your RAS table and the spindle is behind the RAS fence. Put the mortiser low also and/or make a simple slide arangement to store it slightly behind the fence of the RAS also. Slide it forward when using.

I have my RAS and chop saw up high, on top of the 36" bench. It has a 4' table which is only 6" deep, off to the left of the normal saw table, the chop saw is immediately to the right. I have a home made sliding stop type fence on the 4' long fence.

Doing it this way allows use of the bench for cutoffs and tools, without having to move them to use the saw.

I am big on getting double duty out of as much floor space as possible.

Rick Potter

PS: My new years resolution for 2009 was to learn how to put pics on this site. I will try to post the setup soon. Computer dummy.

[John McCaskill]

I would really like to see a photo :) I am a visual person & can't completely figure out your setup from the description.

John