mreza Salav
05-17-2012, 11:03 AM
well, I should say it can be dangerous.
I have a home-built over-the-blade guard that has a 3" dust collection. The good thing is that it can be used with a cross-cut sled I have built as I don't have to remove it to place the sled; just lift the guard up a bit and down after the sled is on the saw. The cross-cut sled has two T-tracks to use toggle clamps to hold the pieces; I always use it for cutting small pieces, as shown in the first photo below.
Recently I upgraded my DC to a clearvue cyclone. The 6" pipe comes to the TS where it branches to the cabinet and a 3" hose to the guard. The suction is so strong that a few times the off-cut pieces (like 1"x1") where sucked into the hose right after I finished the cut all the way to the bin.
Tonight I was cutting some acrylic 1/4" sheets (for a non-wood working project).
I had clamped the piece and the off-cut piece was about 2"x3". Once the cut was finished there was a loud bang and the piece was sucked up but couldn't go through and in the path was hit by the blade:
232311232310232312
The blade guard did its job in preventing the piece from shooting back but it certainly isn't a good set-up here. I could have clamped both sides but I didn't expect the suction to be strong enough to lift that 2x3 piece.
So this is a situation where too much suction could be bad. I have been thinking about how to address this; perhaps make the blade guard narrower so that there is not enough lift power to pick the pieces off the sled but I guess that is essentially limiting the CFM at the guard too.
Just wanted to share the story...
I have a home-built over-the-blade guard that has a 3" dust collection. The good thing is that it can be used with a cross-cut sled I have built as I don't have to remove it to place the sled; just lift the guard up a bit and down after the sled is on the saw. The cross-cut sled has two T-tracks to use toggle clamps to hold the pieces; I always use it for cutting small pieces, as shown in the first photo below.
Recently I upgraded my DC to a clearvue cyclone. The 6" pipe comes to the TS where it branches to the cabinet and a 3" hose to the guard. The suction is so strong that a few times the off-cut pieces (like 1"x1") where sucked into the hose right after I finished the cut all the way to the bin.
Tonight I was cutting some acrylic 1/4" sheets (for a non-wood working project).
I had clamped the piece and the off-cut piece was about 2"x3". Once the cut was finished there was a loud bang and the piece was sucked up but couldn't go through and in the path was hit by the blade:
232311232310232312
The blade guard did its job in preventing the piece from shooting back but it certainly isn't a good set-up here. I could have clamped both sides but I didn't expect the suction to be strong enough to lift that 2x3 piece.
So this is a situation where too much suction could be bad. I have been thinking about how to address this; perhaps make the blade guard narrower so that there is not enough lift power to pick the pieces off the sled but I guess that is essentially limiting the CFM at the guard too.
Just wanted to share the story...