Sawstop Injury I didn't think this could happen.

[Robert Engel]

I might be a bit concerned if this happened to me (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1wJQn_UGAKY).

[Nick Decker]

Actually, this vid was discussed in another thread. Note that the guy was using a Freud ripping blade with anti-kickback "shoulders", which SawStop recommends against. I mentioned this to the guy in the comments to his video. He responded that he wasn't aware of that issue, he called SawStop and they confirmed it.

[Rod Sheridan]

Yeah, I'd be concerned about anyone who doesn't use a blade guard...........Regards, Rod.

[Julie Moriarty]

And this is why I love Micro Jig GRR-Rippers. I use them for practically every cut I make on the table saw. I've got a 20+ year-old Delta that I long ago removed the blade guard because it was so poorly designed. For riving, I use the Micro Jig Splitter. It does a decent job of mimicking a riving knife. Together they have made my old American table saw much safer.

[andy bessette]

This guy ignored rule #1--"don't push your body parts into the blade." Instead he relied on a contraption to protect him.

[Rod Sheridan]

And this is why I love Micro Jig GRR-Rippers. I use them for practically every cut I make on the table saw. I've got a 20+ year-old Delta that I long ago removed the blade guard because it was so poorly designed. For riving, I use the Micro Jig Splitter. It does a decent job of mimicking a riving knife. Together they have made my old American table saw much safer.

Hi Julie, the GRR-Rippers would be illegal to use in a workplace for good reason, they require the removal of the blade guard.

Anytime you have no guard you drastically increase your risk of kickback (contact with the top of the blade by a work piece), or accidental contact with the blade by a body part.

regards, Rod.

[Robert Engel]

Julie,

I totally agree the guard on my TS is actually a safety hazard and I took it off a long time ago.

But even a Gripper is no guarantee.

Any device that could catch the spinning blade when lifting and returning can bring the hand in contact with the blade (how do I know this?). If we're lucky, we just loose the tip of a finger like this guy.

Unfortunately for some of us :-), safety starts between the ears & IME (30+ yrs) numerous, repetitive procedures or cuts is when we are most likely to get in trouble.

[Brian Henderson]

Yeah, I'd be concerned about anyone who doesn't use a blade guard...........Regards, Rod.

Exactly the case and why I have no sympathy for a lot of people who get injured. Taking the safety equipment off of your saw except when absolutely necessary and then operating unsafely, that's your fault not the saw's. If you're that stupid, you deserve what you get. But what's the first thing most Saw Stop owners do when they get their "safe" saw? They take off the blade guard!

[Ben Rivel]

Seems like he could have done quite a few things differently to have avoided that avoidable accident. In then end I think this one just comes down to education.

[Harvey Miller]

Exactly the case and why I have no sympathy for a lot of people who get injured. Taking the safety equipment off of your saw except when absolutely necessary and then operating unsafely, that's your fault not the saw's. If you're that stupid, you deserve what you get. But what's the first thing most Saw Stop owners do when they get their "safe" saw? They take off the blade guard!

Any of evidence that more Sawstop owners do this than owners of other brands?
I think not.

[Simon MacGowen]

Any of evidence that more Sawstop owners do this than owners of other brands?
I think not.

We know what happened in the video had nothing to do with brands. It is a common scene seen in MANY youtube videos whatever the brand of the saw is, and it is a very bad habit of many tablesaw users. This guy was lucky that he kept his old habit but was using a SS. The money he spent on his SS...has been well spent in the circumstances.

You can also find many many youtube videos, including some produced by some better known woodworkers who do not use a guard or even a riving knife/splitter on their tablesaws. Simply too many of them.

Simon

[Simon MacGowen]

Exactly the case and why I have no sympathy for a lot of people who get injured. Taking the safety equipment off of your saw except when absolutely necessary and then operating unsafely, that's your fault not the saw's. If you're that stupid, you deserve what you get. But what's the first thing most Saw Stop owners do when they get their "safe" saw? They take off the blade guard!

I am sure this guy didn't buy the SS with the dust collection blade guard. The guard must be left on in order for the overarm dust collection to work. The only time that guard should come off is when one uses a dado blade, or uses a cross cut sled, or when sawing thin strips.

I still don't understand why people keep saying the guard obstructs the viewing. Viewing is done before you switch on the saw.


Simon

[John TenEyck]

This problem of removing guards is reinforced by both woodworking shows and magazines. I see more TS's w/o guards than with them in FWW's articles. Same thing with New Yankee Woodworker and This Old House. FWW can at least hide behind the fact that most articles come from woodworkers not under their employ. Not the case with NYW and TOH though.

I understand that some guards are poorly made and frustrating to use, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't use a guard. There are at least a couple aftermarket ones available that work very well. Do some research and invest in your safety.

John

[Simon MacGowen]

I have the Grripper and use it for certain cuts only. Every time I use it I will lose the SS overarm dust collection feature which is very effective in dust control. Even with the SS, I don't like the feeling that my hand is passing directly over a spinning blade, to tell the truth.

Simon

[Brian Henderson]

Any of evidence that more Sawstop owners do this than owners of other brands?
I think not.

I don't care, I think the same of all of them. Disabling your safety equipment, then complaining you got hurt is irrational.

[Brian Henderson]

I am sure this guy didn't buy the SS with the dust collection blade guard. The guard must be left on in order for the overarm dust collection to work. The only time that guard should come off is when one uses a dado blade, or uses a cross cut sled, or when sawing thin strips.

I still don't understand why people keep saying the guard obstructs the viewing. Viewing is done before you switch on the saw.

Or non-through cuts, or cutting narrow material, there are legitimate reasons to take the blade guard off, but that's not all the time and if you watch virtually all YouTube videos, and probably just regular table saw users, that blade guard is off, probably all of the time. But for people who are buying a Saw Stop specifically for safety, then refuse to use the safety equipment that came with their saws in the first place... that makes no sense at all.

[Tim M Tuttle]

Or non-through cuts, or cutting narrow material, there are legitimate reasons to take the blade guard off, but that's not all the time and if you watch virtually all YouTube videos, and probably just regular table saw users, that blade guard is off, probably all of the time. But for people who are buying a Saw Stop specifically for safety, then refuse to use the safety equipment that came with their saws in the first place... that makes no sense at all.

I leave mine in place till I get down to about 2 inch rips. I then use my microjig gripper thingy.

[J.R. Rutter]

I don't want to sit through 12 minutes of video discussion. What happened to his thumb?

[Simon MacGowen]

Or non-through cuts, or cutting narrow material, there are legitimate reasons to take the blade guard off, but that's not all the time and if you watch virtually all YouTube videos, and probably just regular table saw users, that blade guard is off, probably all of the time. But for people who are buying a Saw Stop specifically for safety, then refuse to use the safety equipment that came with their saws in the first place... that makes no sense at all.
Agreed. It is like driving recklessly just because the airbags are there....

Anyone operates a SS with an unsafe mentality will sooner or later get hurt by another non-SS machine such as a jointer or mitre saw.
Simon

[Nick Decker]

I don't want to sit through 12 minutes of video discussion. What happened to his thumb?

Cut across the top, got some stitches.

[Nick Decker]

For me, the takeaway is that it shows why SawStop doesn't like those kinds of blades. Where there would normally be teeth, which the brake bites into, there are just rounded humps, which the brake can't engage, so the blade travels longer. With a regular blade, I'm guessing his injury would have been much less.

I'm not gonna get into whether not using a blade guard makes you a moron. You pay your money and you take your chances, up to you.

[glenn bradley]

This guy ignored rule #1--"don't push your body parts into the blade." Instead he relied on a contraption to protect him.

This mentality is one of my great fears regarding all the new car safety features. "Its OK if I text. My car will steer and brake for me". :eek:

[glenn bradley]

Any of evidence that more Sawstop owners do this than owners of other brands?
I think not.

I was going to ask for a show of hands but, Saw Stop threads get goofy enough without my help. Brian is making a rather sweeping and generalizing statement but, I think it is primarily for effect. I doubt he really thinks 9 out of 10 Saw Stop owners who used all the safety gear on their previous saw remove it once they buy a Saw Stop. This doesn't mean there aren't some buyers who erroneously think "There, now I don't have to use my guard anymore". :rolleyes: For my part I use my tablesaw safety gear on my Saw Stop just like I have on every other saw. I chose the saw itself. It competes well with other saws in its class and price point; it just happens to come with a safety feature. I don't want my saw or my car to start thinking for me :D.

[J.R. Rutter]

Cut across the top, got some stitches.

Thanks.

So the anti-kickback extensions prevent the brake block from grabbing as quickly? Good to know!

When I got my thumb a couple of years ago, the blade was gone under the table before it could do more than scratch me (no blood). And yes, I normally have a Biesemeyer overarm guard, but was doing a cut with board on edge and it was swung out of the way, lol.

[Nick Decker]

Thanks.

So the anti-kickback extensions prevent the brake block from grabbing as quickly? Good to know!


Yup, and it makes sense. I've been surprised that apparently quite a few SS owners aren't aware of this. My saw came with a separate sheet of paper with a picture of this type of blade and a warning about it not stopping as fast. I know Freud and Amana make them, not sure who else. (Also don't understand what it is about the "humps" that prevents kickbacks.)

[jack duren]

Exactly the case and why I have no sympathy for a lot of people who get injured. Taking the safety equipment off of your saw except when absolutely necessary and then operating unsafely, that's your fault not the saw's. If you're that stupid, you deserve what you get. But what's the first thing most Saw Stop owners do when they get their "safe" saw? They take off the blade guard!

Really?? Sad you feel that way...

Some of you guys are so smart. The reason I got kicked off Woodnet. Don't know comments...

[Wayne Lomman]

Yup, and it makes sense. I've been surprised that apparently quite a few SS owners aren't aware of this. My saw came with a separate sheet of paper with a picture of this type of blade and a warning about it not stopping as fast. I know Freud and Amana make them, not sure who else. (Also don't understand what it is about the "humps" that prevents kickbacks.)

The 'humps' are chip limiters. This limits the amount of material that can be grabbed whick limits the strength of the kickback. Very useful for low tooth count blades especially.

I didn't sit through much of the video. I have seen too much of this and similar injuries. If your machine has a guard, use it. If it is too awkward, replace it as John Tenyck so rightly pointed out. There are no excuses.

How about we do our emergency ward staff a favour and help them avoid PTSD by avoiding accidents through arrogance that says "It won't happen to me."

Cheers

[Mark Carlson]

I watched the video to see what he did wrong and to make sure I wasnt doing it.

He came to the correct conclusion, yes use a guard. His saw is new and has an ok guard but I'd recommend getting a better one that incorporates dust collection. My General came with a crappy guard and I never used it. I bought a Shark Guard and use it religiously even if it means switching splitters. I've never understood the need to watch the blade cutting the wood to the point where I'm not watching what my hands are doing. I concentrate more on what my right hand is doing and that the wood is up against the fence. My left hand is helping to feed the wood and goes to the rail right above the shut off when not needed. I'm really careful removing cutoffs on repetitive cuts. I make the cut pushing the wood through the blade, remove my right hand and then worry about the cutoff. I'll shut the saw off it necessary if the piece is small or stuck under the guard. I've seen really dicey cuts with the regards to removing the cutoff on youtube.

I think the SawStop saved his thumb.

[Simon MacGowen]

I've seen really dicey cuts with the regards to removing the cutoff on youtube.

I think the SawStop saved his thumb.

Seen it all the time...blade coasting down and waste being removed with a bare hand -- with no guards installed. 10 tablesaw caused finger amputations happen EVERYDAY for a good (bad!) reason.

Simon

[Roy Turbett]

I can't figure out why he felt a need to move his left hand with the workpiece. I keep my left hand anchored to the table well behind the blade and only use it to guide the stock against the fence. Tommy MacDonald demonstrated this technique on one of his Rough Cut shows and had a small perspiration stain on the table top where he anchors his hand.

I also use a magnetic featherboard once I have two parallel edges and my left hand never goes in front of the featherboard. The push stick in my right hand is the only thing that moves stock.

[andy bessette]

Yeah, I'd be concerned about anyone who doesn't use a blade guard...

Don't be concerned. In more than 4 decades of professional woodworking I have never used a blade guard on a table saw. None of my table saws has a splitter, riving knife or blade guard. It is not "safety" accessories that make a table saw safe--it is keeping your body parts out of the blade. Know where the blade is and where your hands are.

In that video the injured party proudly showed off his foot-tall push stick. Ridiculous! One cannot work safely with such unstable devices "protecting" oneself.

[Roger Marty]

The reason I bought a SawStop is because I was doing something similar and almost put my hand into a spinning blade to grab the offcut. It was a split-second brain fart. Humans make mistakes.

[Wayne Lomman]

Advocating the removal of blade guards and other safety devices is irresponsible. What any of us do in our own workshops is our own business but it is indefensible to peddle and promote unsafe practices to anyone else, especially the inexperienced. Just because nothing has happened to you or me is irrelevant. Safety devices are fitted because statistics tell us that they reduce injuries. Does anyone really think major corporations would fit safety devices if they were unwarranted? Please move the safety culture out of the early industrial revolution when workers were expendable to the current era where there is no need to risk losing body parts to enjoy your hobby or trade. Cheers

[Anthony Whitesell]

This guy ignored rule #1--"don't push your body parts into the blade." Instead he relied on a contraption to protect him.

He even admits, the blade guard would likely not have stopped the incident, as he fed his thumb into the blade.

[Frank Pratt]

Exactly the case and why I have no sympathy for a lot of people who get injured. Taking the safety equipment off of your saw except when absolutely necessary and then operating unsafely, that's your fault not the saw's. If you're that stupid, you deserve what you get. But what's the first thing most Saw Stop owners do when they get their "safe" saw? They take off the blade guard!

I have not seen any statistics on this, but I can't imagine that most would be removing the guards. The guard & riving knife work so well & are so easy to change that I don't see any reason not to use them for almost all saw operations.

[Frank Pratt]

Advocating the removal of blade guards and other safety devices is irresponsible. What any of us do in our own workshops is our own business but it is indefensible to peddle and promote unsafe practices to anyone else, especially the inexperienced. Just because nothing has happened to you or me is irrelevant. Safety devices are fitted because statistics tell us that they reduce injuries. Does anyone really think major corporations would fit safety devices if they were unwarranted? Please move the safety culture out of the early industrial revolution when workers were expendable to the current era where there is no need to risk losing body parts to enjoy your hobby or trade. Cheers

Very well said.

[Roger Marty]

The reason my guard is removed is because I use my crosscut sled all the time. The SawStop gives me the peace-of-mind of using a saw configured in a more convenient way.

[Robert Engel]

I think we tend to focus on people putting their hand or finger into the blade but there are ways your hand can be actuallyh pulled into a blade and this is where even an experienced ww'er can get in trouble.

This happened to me recently when using a push block to make a series of dado cuts. Let me tell you its a scary thing and fortunately for me I still have all my fingers.

Like any of these incidents, when you debrief yourself, its always "Why did I do it THAT way?"

This is why I told Julie even though we use a push block, that doesn't mean you can't get hurt.

Bottom line: Pay attention to where your hand and pushblocks go AFTER the cut is over.

I will be posting some pics of a re-enactment of what happened to maybe save someone a serious injury.

[Julie Moriarty]

Don't be concerned. In more than 4 decades of professional woodworking I have never used a blade guard on a table saw. None of my table saws has a splitter, riving knife or blade guard. It is not "safety" accessories that make a table saw safe--it is keeping your body parts out of the blade. Know where the blade is and where your hands are.
Agreed. As the owner of a TS that came with a blade guard that was an opponent that had to be eliminated, I keep one eye on that spinning blade at all times and the other eye on my hands. "Never the twain shall meet." :)

[Rod Sheridan]

Advocating the removal of blade guards and other safety devices is irresponsible. What any of us do in our own workshops is our own business but it is indefensible to peddle and promote unsafe practices to anyone else, especially the inexperienced. Just because nothing has happened to you or me is irrelevant. Safety devices are fitted because statistics tell us that they reduce injuries. Does anyone really think major corporations would fit safety devices if they were unwarranted? Please move the safety culture out of the early industrial revolution when workers were expendable to the current era where there is no need to risk losing body parts to enjoy your hobby or trade. Cheers

Exactly..................Too many people with no training...............Regards, Rod.

[Simon MacGowen]

I will be posting some pics of a re-enactment of what happened to maybe save someone a serious injury.

Looking forward to learning from your story.

When it comes to safety, one is never too old to learn. I attribute my TS incident-free record not to my use of the SS, but to never ruling out any safety improvement opportunities (if I had, I wouldn't be owning a SS). Every incremental knowledge and acquisition of safe practice and device will help me keep my record untarnished for the next two decades or so (not planning to continue power woodworking when I am past my mid 70s).

As for the no guard, no riving knife/splitter thing, as long as the risk of injury is confined to the user of such tablesaw, who cares? (What about newbies and inexperienced folks? The onus is on every tool (not just woodworking) user to " read, understand and follow all the safety rules that come with your...tools," and to be able to tell the good from the bad.)

Simon

[andy bessette]

...Safety devices are fitted because statistics tell us that they reduce injuries...

No! Safety devices are fitted because lawyers insisted on the manufacturers protecting themselves from liability suits.

[Brian Henderson]

I have not seen any statistics on this, but I can't imagine that most would be removing the guards. The guard & riving knife work so well & are so easy to change that I don't see any reason not to use them for almost all saw operations.

Yet watch YouTube and I'd say more than 90% of the channels that I've watched do, indeed, remove their guards. As much as I like Norm, I place at least some of the blame on him for removing his guard "for visual reasons" all those years.

[Brett Luna]

...Safety devices are fitted because statistics tell us that they reduce injuries...

No! Safety devices are fitted because lawyers insisted on the manufacturers protecting themselves from liability suits.

You know both can be true, right?

[Steve Demuth]

Don't be concerned. In more than 4 decades of professional woodworking I have never used a blade guard on a table saw. None of my table saws has a splitter, riving knife or blade guard. It is not "safety" accessories that make a table saw safe--it is keeping your body parts out of the blade. Know where the blade is and where your hands are.

In that video the injured party proudly showed off his foot-tall push stick. Ridiculous! One cannot work safely with such unstable devices "protecting" oneself.

Let me offer readers of this thread some of what we call "statistical humility" in my risk analysis teams as a counter to Andy's argument.

Let's take 100,000 professional woodworkers. They are all very good. So good, that their risk in any given year of work of doing something that puts their digits into a saw blade - because of a moment's inattention, or being startled by some bizarre event in the shop - is 1 in a million. Then in a 40 year career, 5 of them will put their hand into a saw blade.

Of course, in reality, 1 in a million are very optimistic odds. There are very few human operations that we do with that degree of reliability / repeatability. In the best, safest hospitals in this country, with dedicated teams enforcing attention and quality assurance, we still perform surgical operations on the wrong body part, or leave a foreign object in a closed surgical incision, in about 1 out of 100,000 surgeries. That's not because surgeons and nurses don't understand that those are dangerous, life-threatening incidents, or because they are not profoundly and professionally focused on not doing the wrong thing. It's because humans are not perfect executors of any action in environments that change moment to moment, task to task. Woodworkers have nothing on surgeons and nurses in this respect.

So, use 1 in 100,000 as a better estimate, and that "5 hands into saw" goes to 40.

Of course, that makes it overwhelmingly likely that any individual professional woodworker, like Andy can say in the later days of their career that they didn't need guards or auto-stopping saws (only 1 in 2500 will be hurt in a lifetime in the shop). It does leave 40 maimed woodworkers out of 100,000, however.

What I emphasize at work (where I deal with very different, but still human mediated, risks), is that any risk mitigation plan that relies on an individual or organization to be sufficiently exceptional to not need benefit of better tools is betting against numerical reality is never a good strategy.

[Martin Wasner]

Don't be concerned. In more than 4 decades of professional woodworking I have never used a blade guard on a table saw. None of my table saws has a splitter, riving knife or blade guard. It is not "safety" accessories that make a table saw safe--it is keeping your body parts out of the blade. Know where the blade is and where your hands are.

In that video the injured party proudly showed off his foot-tall push stick. Ridiculous! One cannot work safely with such unstable devices "protecting" oneself.


My new line in the shop is, don't put your finger anywhere you aren't willing to put your man bits.

Gets a laugh. Drives the point home.

[Peter Christensen]

My father had a professional woodworking career of 51 years, never had a table saw injury of any kind and never used a guard. But at about the mid 40 year mark he jointed the tip, about half an inch, of his thumb off. He was in a hurry to get done and beat the traffic home. Nobody is immune to injuring themselves somehow on something, so an extra layer of protection isn't a bad thing. SawStop technology will eventually find it's way into most kinds of hand feed machinery.

[John TenEyck]

I couldn't care less what anyone does in their shops because it doesn't affect me.

Actually, it does effect you if you pay for health insurance.

John

[Wayne Lomman]

To those who can't use their machines without guarding, update your skills. There is a whole section of learning that you have missed. Do not fall into the trap of thinking that as an adult you can skip straight to being an expert. As one with considerable experience, I can assure you all that there is still plenty to learn.

Guarding, setting up and jig-making are acquired skills that are taught to apprentices very early in their training. Those who cannot or will not take safety seriously don't make the grade. It's not worth the risk to the employer. The whole professional woodworking industry works with guarding in place and productivity does not suffer. To the contrary, productivity improves because our staff work with confidence, concentrating on the job, not on whether they are going to lose a body part.
Cheers

[Brian Holcombe]

I believe strongly in good guarding. There is no downside to it.

[Larry Frank]

Some of the comments and such are almost beyond belief.

I worked for years in an extremely large heavy industry company. Safety was a requirement and the rules and regulations were enforced for everyone. If someone took the guards off of equipment, they were severely dealt with. The company could be fined for not following the safety requirements.

Some of the comments in this thread and actions about removing guards and such could easily get one fired.

If one was running a small company and allowed the removal of guards, the liability would be large.

Personally, I will use the guards and other safety equipment. If you think you are good enough with out it, I wish you good luck.

[John TenEyck]

Then maybe people ought to stop being stupid and costing other people money.

I couldn't agree more, Brian. This is exactly why some companies made smoking illegal on their property, require routine drug testing, etc. Individual rights are one thing, until irresponsible behavior impacts others, financially and/or physically.

In my corporate days, if you removed a guard you were gone. No discussion. No exceptions.

John

[Martin Wasner]

There's only one thing you can do to keep yourself safe doing anything. Doesn't matter if it's woodworking, climbing mountains, racing cars, or doing intravenous drugs with strangers. You gotta keep your head out of your rear. No amount of nerfing, padding or guarding will protect you if you're determined to be a dummy.

I have seen guys get mauled by pieces of equipment that I would've guessed it weren't possible.


Btw, those of you that do this sporadically and for fun, you need every advantage. Those who do it day in and day out don't need the dark warnings of playing the odds.

[Mark Hennebury]

There seems to be a lot of derogatory remarks pointed at people who don't use guards. There is an assumption that they are irresponsible. That they are stupid, and that they cost the health care system a lot of unnecessary expense due to their reckless, inconsiderate and dangerous operation of equipment. The suggestion that they don't know what they are doing and shouldn't be allowed to show others how they operate machinery.
I have not seen any data to back this up.
I have seen people say that guards are put on machines because they protect workers, also seen the argument that they are put there to protect the business owner from law suits, and the argument that they could do both.
I read the "humble" post about human error and how surgeons who are "far above woodworkers" still make mistakes and leave tools in patients and cut the wrong limbs off. . But to keep things in perspective how many surgeons operate on themselves? Would that statistic change if it were their own limbs being cut off, would they maybe be more careful?

If you want a sensible debate you have to have an unbiased and even approach.

To flippantly write off people who have put in 45, 50 years of woodworking without guards and suggesting that they have worked dangerously and ignored safety and what, just been lucky? every second, every day for 50 years, is pretty absurd, don't you think?

Maybe you should consider that maybe they have something that is worth exploring, maybe there is more to the picture.

[Carlos Alvarez]

I stopped depending on guards which are often in the way and a potential risk themselves, and doing two things:

1. A perfectly tuned saw. Nothing is more than 1/256 off anywhere on it. This nearly eliminates some risks like kickback.

2. Visualize EVERY cut before feeding. I "see" the wood and my hands go through the cut. Every.Single.Time

[John Sincerbeaux]

When i was 14, i was tought to use a tablesaw in my HS woodshop by my instructor who’s major was woodworking. It was an industrial Rockwell tablesaw that had no guard, no riving knife and no SS tecnology. I loved woodworking so much, that i bought my first tablesaw, a craftsman contactor saw when i was 15. I remember taking off the guard because it was clumsy, akward, and frankly, not what i was trained on using. Well, 40 years, and several saws later i can say i never had a kickback or even a scare from any tablesaw and i never used a guard. Almost a year ago i bought my first slider, a Martin T 60C. I embraced the guard it came with because of its dust collection. I use Airtight pneumatic clamps to secure nearly every piece of wood i cut. Ironically, when cutting smaller stock, the guard interferes with the clamps. Fortunately, the guard arm has a mid hinge point allowing the guard to be moved out of the way. My guard rarely is over the blade due to my clamps. My hands and body are at least a foot away from the blade.

So was a trained in a “stupid” high school by a “moron”teacher? Were the pros i worked for in the pro shops i worked in while in college all “idiots” because none of them used guards? Am I “irresponsible” to move my guard while using my clamps on my slider?

I work in the most safety dominate profession on the planet PERIOD. SA (situational awareness) is paramount like no other profession. I flew supersonic jets in the USAF. I know a little bit about safety and the preservation of life and limb. Your hand placement near a rotating blade is actually pretty minor compared to a jet 3 feet off your wingtip at 400 kias. If i screw up on my tablesaw or Any other equipment and loose my fingers, i lose my paycheck.

So for those who are so adamant about pontificating about their prowess in the shop, their “skills”, and their careers in the wood industry or medical profession or whatever, just know there are other very competent and safe woodworkers that read your dribble that might just know at least as much as you think you know.

[John Sincerbeaux]

So, is this very smart, responsible, expert safely operating this very professional tablesaw?
There is a guard over the blade so he’s gotta be safe, right?
380078

[andy bessette]

I believe strongly in good guarding. There is no downside to it.

Brian--not picking on you (really!), but your statement begs a response.

Mine is a very crowded 1-man shop. Because there are no guards on my table saws their tops frequently serve as additional clear and uncluttered glue-up/assembly tables for large scale projects. I simply roll out polyethylene sheeting on them to keep them clean.

The lack of guards means that there is no fussing when I want to use a crosscut sled or tenoning jig, for example. When ripping very narrow stock there is no guard in the way. One Unisaw (with a rip blade) is married to a contractors saw (with dado); there is no guard to interfere. Another Unisaw is married to a router table; there is no guard to interfere.

I can see the entire exposed portion of the blade and know where not to place my body parts.

https://s26.postimg.org/4lo6neksp/shop-2.jpg (https://postimages.org/)
https://s26.postimg.org/47munt0p5/shop-1.jpg (https://postimages.org/)
https://s26.postimg.org/c6vswm56x/shop-6.jpg (https://postimages.org/)

[Glen Gunderson]

Keep in mind he said "good guarding". A well designed guard can be out of the way in about as much time as it takes you to lower your blade(s) below the surface, which is also required for you to use your saw as an assembly table, work surface, etc.

Everyone has their own tolerance for risk. For me safety is my #1 priority over everything else. I won't touch a saw without at least a splitter or riving knife and would never go without a guard on my own saw. Frankly I can't imagine not having the dust collection above the blade from a good guard, let alone the safety aspect of it. But everyone's different and that's fine.

[Wayne Lomman]

No! Safety devices are fitted because lawyers insisted on the manufacturers protecting themselves from liability suits.

Has anyone actually studied the history of timber trades or is that another part of history that is swept under the carpet as inconvenient? All trade work used to be basically lethal until regulations were introduced. It was part of the advance of civilisation that included sensible limits on working hours, reasonable wages and safe working conditions. It embodied the freedom of the individual to live without fear of threat to life and limb in their society and their workplace. This is a fundamental human right and it genuinely concerns me that the opposite is put forward as somehow better.

I will say again, do what you want in your own workshop. That is your freedom. But do not publicly advise others to adopt a culture of safety risk and impact on their right to be free of bad advice. Cheers

[Rod Sheridan]

To those who can't use their machines without guarding, Cheers

Hi Wayne, I read your post 3 times because it seemed contradictory.

I believe your first sentence should read " To those who can't use their machines with guarding"

I agree completely, in industry we devise guards and processes to protect the operator from injury, and it doesn't reduce productivity. It also reduces costs for accidents.

Regards, Rod.

[Frank Pratt]

Yet watch YouTube and I'd say more than 90% of the channels that I've watched do, indeed, remove their guards. As much as I like Norm, I place at least some of the blame on him for removing his guard "for visual reasons" all those years.

Oh, I agree with you there. I think it's absolutely irresponsible to advocate use without the guards. My point was that with a really good guard/riving knife system, it's so easy that I think most users do use them. On some saws, older ones especially, the guards are so horrible to use that they just get left off.

[Mark Hennebury]

Has anyone actually studied the history of timber trades or is that another part of history that is swept under the carpet as inconvenient? All trade work used to be basically lethal until regulations were introduced. It was part of the advance of civilisation that included sensible limits on working hours, reasonable wages and safe working conditions. It embodied the freedom of the individual to live without fear of threat to life and limb in their society and their workplace. This is a fundamental human right and it genuinely concerns me that the opposite is put forward as somehow better.

I will say again, do what you want in your own workshop. That is your freedom. But do not publicly advise others to adopt a culture of safety risk and impact on their right to be free of bad advice. Cheers

Thanks for the history lesson.


There is no such thing as "a right to be free of bad advice."
The internet is full of bad and biased information and bad advice.
This is the age of information, not enlightenment.
I have a the same right as you to post my opinions.
My opinions are backed up by 50 years of experience.
You don't have the right tell me or anyone else what to do. I will publicly give whatever advise i want.

There are many people injured that use guards.
There are many contributing factors to safe working in a dangerous environment and it would be wise to try and understand what they are.
Maybe it would be beneficial to examine how people who don't use guards work and compare that to those who do, see what the differences are maybe we could all learn something.
Just ignoring the fact that many people work without guards have developed safe ways of working is a big loss.

Maybe, knowledge of machinery, tooling, process, mindset and situational awareness, the acceptance of complete personal responsibility the acute awareness of the consequences of failure play a more/less important part of safety.
It would be better to examine and find out.

Many choose not to use certain types of guards...Why?
Many have worked for decades without certain guards and without injury.... how?

[Brian Holcombe]

Totally agree Mark, the important factor is awareness and understanding of what your doing with the machine. This was drilled into me at the machine shop as some operations were not able to be guarded with the equipment we had (such as a big fly cutter on a knee mill). It was the utmost importance to plan ahead, well ahead.

I'm want to mention that I made my comment with great respect to the opinions presented. I'm safety conscious, I've been like this my entire life so woodworking is no different in my opinion that racing cars, or working in a machine shop. I feel the primary defense is to be conscious of the work your doing and avoid making a machine do something it is not designed to do and to plan your workflow long before turning the machine on.

I've been a primarily hand-tools woodworker, but I've worked through many aspects of my life with industrial machinery at my disposal, my father's shop for instance has a 36 ton Ironworker and a Bridgeport mill, welders, along with large bending equipment and for a time he also had large shears and a forge. I worked in a machine shop in my late teens and early 20's, we had a lathe the size of my living room. It was an imposing but beautiful machine. My boss watched carefully as I used that machine and gave me some basic do's and don'ts that kept me out of harms way, the shop also had huge grinding wheels (the wheels are 3' in the diameter), shot machines, a hot bath for cleaning parts (200 degrees constantly running) and we worked with heavy materials such as 12 piston diesels for industrial equipment. Good practice is critical, but I sure do not mind the guards being there.

I've had the pleasure of having nicely designed guards on the machines I own and the industrial machinery I've worked with. They're not clumsy and tend to work with me, so I want them there.

[Robert Engel]

WADR, Brian,

Agree to a degree, but some guards/splitters are so poorly designed the machine is actually safer without them. At least this has been the case with 2 ts's that I have owned.

We are engaged in an industry that, like many others, is inherently dangerous. I think its not a matter of "if" but "how bad" we will be hurt. BTW, some of the worst cuts I've ever had have been with a hand chisel.

I think repetitive procedures are the danger zone where we let our "guard" down (or as I alluded, our guards let us down).

Every single time we make a cut, we have to think about the setup, the lumber, and where are hands will be.

[Keith Outten]

Accidents happen in every aspect of our lives. The idea that its not possible to use a table saw or any other type of machinery without guards or other types of safety equipment is a stretch. The fact is we, as a group, have been using table saws for generations safely without guards. Running machines is a risky endeavor and like many others every operator has to make decisions concerning their preferred technique. Many techniques develop over time and adjustments are commonplace.

What qualifies as working in a safe manner, in any shop, varies and there has never been a legal or moral specification that we must follow to the letter. When we disagree on technique its best that we respectfully agree to disagree or live and let live if you prefer.

[Martin Wasner]

BTW, some of the worst cuts I've ever had have been with a hand chisel.


The chisel is the most dangerous tool in a cabinet shop. Or at least is the most likely tool to send someone in to get stitched back together.

[Julie Moriarty]

Too many people with no training...........
Being trained in safety does not necessarily mean one will leave all the safety devices in place no matter what. I have both 10 and 30 hour OSHA certificates. I also have safety certificates in man lifts and power actuated tools. I've been the safety official on numerous job sites and as such it has been my responsibility to determine the safest way to carry out a job. Occasionally that meant re-thinking approved safety protocols and coming up with a reasonable alternative in order to get a specific job done.

When faced with the blade guard that came with my table saw, after much trial and error and modifications and adjustments, I finally determined the blade guard created a safety hazard worse than no guard at all. This was my personal decision and is by no means advocating anyone do the same. I have made other modifications and adopted certain practices that make my table saw about as safe as I can, given the options available.

My TS was made in the U.S.A. in the mid 90s. Back then I think manufacturers considered the blade guard something of an afterthought and saw little need to put any R&D into the design. I believe that is why it was so common to see table saws without blade guards. Though table saws rarely made it onto the construction site, the few I saw had no blade guards. The carpenters said they made the saw less safe and, based on my own personal experience, I had to agree.

Today, with well-designed blade guards and riving knives, I consider it definitely less safe to remove a blade guard for thru-cut operations. You just have to have one of those newer machines in your shop.

[Mark Hennebury]

The chisel is the most dangerous tool in a cabinet shop. Or at least is the most likely tool to send someone in to get stitched back together.

I will have to agree that by far most of the scars that i have are from chisels.

[andy bessette]

There is a saying: "If at first you don't succeed, perhaps sky diving is not for you." There should also be one about a natural born klutz around dangerous machinery: "If you are accident prone and are easily distracted, perhaps you should consider knitting."

[Rod Sheridan]

Accidents happen in every aspect of our lives. The idea that its not possible to use a table saw or any other type of machinery without guards or other types of safety equipment is a stretch. The fact is we, as a group, have been using table saws for generations safely without guards. Running machines is a risky endeavor and like many others every operator has to make decisions concerning their preferred technique. Many techniques develop over time and adjustments are commonplace.

What qualifies as working in a safe manner, in any shop, varies and there has never been a legal or moral specification that we must follow to the letter. When we disagree on technique its best that we respectfully agree to disagree or live and let live if you prefer.

Keith, actually there are legal specifications for working in a safe manner, which must be followed.

I'm not familiar with US regulators in any detail however OSHA comes to mind, doubtless there are many other Authorities Having Jurisdiction that I'm not aware of.

At home, it's only smart to follow the applicable regulations, as hobby users don't have enough training or expertise to develop their own safety standards............Regards, Rod.

[mreza Salav]

Many have worked for decades without certain guards and without injury.... how?

I have seen far too many people who were in that camp for 40+ years and "THEN" it happened to them.
Your earlier argument about emergency doctors: they see probably more than any of us here people who are injured by various machines. I have a close friend who is an occupational dr and his job is to deal with these types of patients only day-in-day out. Almost all are exclusively professionals. Many of them (if not all) have various trainings on how to use the machinery they use properly. Almost always it's a human error. I have yet to see a human who can claim they never make a mistake. Those who claim that if you use your head you will be out of danger are delusional!

[John Gornall]

Started as an apprentice in 1964 - the boss took me out to the shop and said 2 things.

To the shop foreman: "Show him where the broom is".

To me: "Don't touch a table saw until I tell you you're ready".

8 table saws in the shop - I was trained well

[Simon MacGowen]

Accidents happen in every aspect of our lives. The idea that its not possible to use a table saw or any other type of machinery without guards or other types of safety equipment is a stretch. The fact is we, as a group, have been using table saws for generations safely without guards. Running machines is a risky endeavor and like many others every operator has to make decisions concerning their preferred technique. Many techniques develop over time and adjustments are commonplace.

What qualifies as working in a safe manner, in any shop, varies and there has never been a legal or moral specification that we must follow to the letter. When we disagree on technique its best that we respectfully agree to disagree or live and let live if you prefer.

When I read the avalanche of posts from the "guard-free" group, it reminded me of "The Empire Strikes Back!"

I must say I have not used or come across a guard that is in itself considered a safety hazard. Could anyone please explain how their guards are a safety hazard? I could understand that some guards might be poorly designed that they are inconvenient to use or impact on the flow of your work, but how could they pass the safety tests if they were a hazard?

Guards have to be removed for certain cuts for me, but my awareness of risk of injuries increases during those times. The SS has never made me less conscious of the risk of amputations.

Lastly, a good guard has different meanings to us. If a guard does not have the SS /Euro dust collection feature, it is not good enough for me. Dust is a safety hazard to me (my lungs). (The SS dust guard is 10 times better than the newly released SS overarm dust tube unless one is ripping a stock of similar widths all day long.)

Simon

[Brian Holcombe]

WADR, Brian,

Agree to a degree, but some guards/splitters are so poorly designed the machine is actually safer without them. At least this has been the case with 2 ts's that I have owned.

We are engaged in an industry that, like many others, is inherently dangerous. I think its not a matter of "if" but "how bad" we will be hurt. BTW, some of the worst cuts I've ever had have been with a hand chisel.

I think repetitive procedures are the danger zone where we let our "guard" down (or as I alluded, our guards let us down).

Every single time we make a cut, we have to think about the setup, the lumber, and where are hands will be.

Certainly injured myself with a chisel plenty of times, same with handsaws.

You can buy guarding that is updated as far as I'm aware. Since we're talking in general terms, I know SUVAmatic is adaptable to fit a variety of machines, same with some of the setups that Aigner produces. This type of thing is valuable to me, and I'm often willing to spring for it in situations where I need an update.

I've done similar with my router table, putting on guide wheels and feather boards where necessary.

This activity is risky, but some of the risk can be mitigated, so why not.

When I was racing cars I saw a few people's cars burn nearly to the ground, I installed a halon system in mine. I was the butt of a joke for that one, but it felt a lot better knowing that if I remained conscious that I was a rip-cord away from fogging the engine bay and interior dashboard (it was a system designed for occupied cars) and not beholden to the speed of the track's rescue team which is not going to be aware of a fire until they see billowing smoke and flames.

[Mark Hennebury]

Originaly posted by Mreza Salav
"I have seen far too many people who were in that camp for 40+ years and "THEN" it happened to them.
Your earlier argument about emergency doctors: they see probably more than any of us here people who are injured by various machines. I have a close friend who is an occupational dr and his job is to deal with these types of patients only day-in-day out. Almost all are exclusively professionals. Many of them (if not all) have various trainings on how to use the machinery they use properly. Almost always it's a human error. I have yet to see a human who can claim they never make a mistake. Those who claim that if you use your head you will be out of danger are delusional!"



Okay so i for one, I never said that i was "a human who can claim they never make a mistake" and i doubt that anyone else did either. So don't try to attribute that to me or "my camp"

I have had many mistakes and still have my fingers. you would do better to ask me why.

For reference.I have 18" blades in my saw with 7.5hp motor and 5" of exposed blade at its max.

The inference is that we:
Disregard safety. That is wrong;
That i have nonchalant "it can't happen to me" attitude. again Wrong.


i may work differently than you and have a different concept of what safety is, but i work safely in a dangerous situation. I was hoping that you could understand the difference.


I do not want to loose my fingers any more than you do, and i do everything that i believe works to ensure that i keep them.
So the big question: am i incredibly lucky , just plain old dumb stupid luck everyday for 50 years. or is it possible that you are not seeing the whole picture?

I have worked a lot in my own shop, but on occasion have worked in other shops, some with all of the safety equipment in place.
I have seen a lot of people operate machinery with such a lack of understanding of the machine, tooling and process that is truly scary.

Accidents can happen to everyone, me included, i am not invincible and i am quite aware of that.

[Mike Heidrick]

Lastly, a good guard has different meanings to us. If a guard does not have the SS /Euro dust collection feature, it is not good enough for me. Dust is a safety hazard to me (my lungs). (The SS dust guard is 10 times better than the newly released SS overarm dust tube unless one is ripping a stock of similar widths all day long.)

Simon

How so? Not sure I follow this logic? The tubes adjust up and down and the fence is fully usable in width. The latest one is based on the Excalibur design it looks like. Dust collection is through the tube to the hood.

[Keith Hankins]

It amazes me the responses from the "Trained professionals" here about disabling safety devices and it ain't never happened to me. I work in manufacturing and I read the amputation reports and most are good people "well trained" and we spend so much on training and proper ways to do things.

If management can spot those individuals that "don't need no safety equipment, or just don't put your hands into spinning blades, and they have not had an an incident (no such thing as accident)", they are former employees.

You are dangerous to your self, and if permitted to continue we are endorsing your dangerous behavior for others. This guy ldid a great service and is to be commended and I would ask you to watch a few of these.

http://www.sawstop.com/why-sawstop/accident-victims

[mreza Salav]

Mark, having better safety methods certainly helps; no question about that. And I agree with you in that many occasions people do not use the machines properly and do not know how the machines operate and don't think through the process carefully. But all these better methods of operating the machines only reduce the chance of having an injury and it seems you agree too that it does not eliminate it (correct?).
Using guards and active safety methods is another layer to reduce the chance even further beyond what those better/safer methods of operating a machine provide.
They too don't eliminate the chance but I find it amusing that people think that just using ones brain is enough and brag about doing that for 40+ years and nothing happening as evidence that that alone is enough.
Many people tend to disregards stats and think of themselves as outliers but it is proven than using guards and safety devices added to the machines do reduce the chance of injuries.

I sign off this respectfully.

Cheers

[Simon MacGowen]

How so? Not sure I follow this logic? The tubes adjust up and down and the fence is fully usable in width. The latest one is based on the Excalibur design it looks like. Dust collection is through the tube to the hood.

Mike,

The SS dust collection blade guard stays with the riving knife/plate and needs no adjustments as it rises up and down with the saw blade. Its use is adjustment free, unless you have to remove it to make, say, a non-through cut or resawing thin stock.

The Excalibur tube is heavy to adjust in and out to cater for ripping narrower stiock so the hood doesn't get in the way with the push stick while the dust shroud needs to be adjusted up and down when stock of difference thickness is cut.

The tube is twice as expensive (and many times heavier) and is used with a 4" dia. collection. My first experience with the SS ICS (before the overarm dust collection blade guard was released) made me wonder why such a heavy accessory was necessary.

The "fins" on both sides of the dust collection blade guard also keep the escape of the dust to a minimum, a feature that even the Euro style of dust hood can't beat, based on my previous use of both styles of saws. The only deficiency to the SS dust blade guard is it does not reach a 99% or more dust collection rating when edge cuts are made.

By the way, I recently saw a video by a woodworker who runs some classes now and then and he uses his saw without a guard. Even with his powerful dust collector for the under the table dust collection, I saw a good amount of saw dust on the tablesaw after each rip. He wore safety glasses but no mask (so he could talk). People will say Sam Maloof was seen bandsawing all the time in public footage without wearing a mask and he lived longer than most of us, woodworkers or not. I don't consider myself another Sam Maloof when it comes to immunity from dust harm. It would be too late if my family doc tells me my lungs are toasted. When I saw the 99% rating for dust collection from the SS, I knew it had to be the accessory I had to buy with the saw.


Simon

[Brian Henderson]

It amazes me the responses from the "Trained professionals" here about disabling safety devices and it ain't never happened to me. I work in manufacturing and I read the amputation reports and most are good people "well trained" and we spend so much on training and proper ways to do things.

If management can spot those individuals that "don't need no safety equipment, or just don't put your hands into spinning blades, and they have not had an an incident (no such thing as accident)", they are former employees.

You are dangerous to your self, and if permitted to continue we are endorsing your dangerous behavior for others. This guy ldid a great service and is to be commended and I would ask you to watch a few of these.

http://www.sawstop.com/why-sawstop/accident-victims

Honestly, the more I think about it, this is a clear variant of the "sunk cost fallacy" where people have been doing dumb things for years and simply will not admit to themselves that they've been wrong all along. They have an irrational emotional investment in continuing bad practices. I'm sure they're all skilled and experienced woodworkers who simply have gotten bad information and kept using their equipment wrong and are too proud to admit it. But pride doesn't keep your fingers safe, does it?

[Simon MacGowen]

http://www.sawstop.com/why-sawstop/accident-victims

in the link you provided (under Report a Save), I saw this question:


Was the saw operator wearing gloves at the time? * Yes No

The discussion of yes guard and no guard in this thread mirrors the discussions between yes gloves and no gloves with both camps advancing views on why it is a dangerous practice or why it is not.

Simon

[Pat Barry]

Fact is, nobody is going to change, no matter how nasty some of the postings are made here about their safety practices. I hope some of the 'better than thou' and very judgemental commentary would stop. Stick to facts please...

[andy bessette]

...people have been doing dumb things for years and simply will not admit to themselves that they've been wrong all along. They have an irrational emotional investment in continuing bad practices. I'm sure they're all skilled and experienced woodworkers who simply have gotten bad information and kept using their equipment wrong and are too proud to admit it. But pride doesn't keep your fingers safe, does it?

And I honestly feel sorry for all the self proclaimed woodworkers who, without myriad safety gadgets and patented gizmos, cannot prevent themselves from cutting off body parts.

[Steve Demuth]

Lot's of heat and light in this thread, much of which boils down to trying to argue whether it's operator training and technique that makes using a table saw safe, or safety devices that do so. Both are important, and arguing against either as if there were an "or" choice is defying facts and reason.

On any saw, an operator who is trained and who concentrates on safe use is going to suffer far fewer incidents and injuries than one who either doesn't know or doesn't follow sound practice. But they will still have accidents. We know this from many settings, from industries with sound, firm training programs, to the surgical example I gave earlier.

So when a "slip" happens, safety devices like guards, riving knives and saw stop add another layer of safety. It's harder to lose control of a cut and get a kickback if you have a properly tuned riving knife. If you slip or in a moment's inattention (woodworkers are ALL human) reach the wrong way, a well-designed guard may well prevent or reduce the severity of saw contact. Or saw stopping technology will very likely neuter the blade before you are seriously injured by contact.

How this can be debatable eludes me.

I've been driving for 40 years. Never had an accident more serious than a little bent sheet metal in a parking lot. Air bags nevertheless make me safer. I may yet make a serious mistake driving, and I certainly rely on the air bags in my vehicles to work if I do.

[Brian Henderson]

And you know this about Sawstop owners how?

Go watch YouTube. How many of them are using a blade guard? How many of them made videos about getting a Saw Stop for "safety"?

[Jay Michaels]

Why in the world (other than while using a crosscut sled) would someone not use a riving knife, at a minimum, with their table saw?

[Brian Holcombe]

Can we somehow merge this with a Neanderthal haven sharpening thread?

[keith micinski]

Guards being used or not shouldnt be the point of this tread. Isn’t the exact purpose of the sawstop mechanism designed to account for stupid human error? The guy stuck his hand into the blade on accident and the sawstop didn’t perform as advertised due to the blade he was using which wasn’t rated to be used on the sawstop because of its design. If he used all of the safety equipment all the time then he wouldn’t need the sawstop. This guys situation is what sawstop guy always touts as why they own one. Now all I’m reading are guards and proper technique were the problem which is what anti sawstop guy has always said is the actual safety needed when operating a saw.

[Martin Wasner]

Guards have to be removed for certain cuts for me, but my awareness of risk of injuries increases during those times.


You're doing it wrong.




The SS has never made me less conscious of the risk of amputations.


Please tell me you see your contradiction here.

[Martin Wasner]

Guards being used or not shouldnt be the point of this tread. Isn’t the exact purpose of the sawstop mechanism designed to account for stupid human error? The guy stuck his hand into the blade on accident and the sawstop didn’t perform as advertised due to the blade he was using which wasn’t rated to be used on the sawstop because of its design. If he used all of the safety equipment all the time then he wouldn’t need the sawstop. This guys situation is what sawstop guy always touts as why they own one. Now all I’m reading are guards and proper technique were the problem which is what anti sawstop guy has always said is the actual safety needed when operating a saw.

Trusting technology is just plain foolish on anything that matters

[Simon MacGowen]

You're doing it wrong.




Please tell me you see your contradiction here.

Not sure why you would see any contradiction there, assuming you are not trying to split hair.

Whether I use a SS or not (that is pre-SS days), I exercise cautions at all times. But that does not mean I can not increase my level of consciousness or awareness when I work with certain tasks.

When a soldier is on duty and stays alerted, it does not mean he or she cannot be extra alerted when he or she senses certain danger either because of sight or sound.

Tell me where you don't understand about not lowering one's consciousness and increasing one's awareness. The two are not mutually exclusive.

Simon

[Simon MacGowen]

Trusting technology is just plain foolish on anything that matters

Do you fly?

Or do you drive a car with computer chips?

Our modern lives all depend on technology.

All patients who undergo major surgeries depend on technology to keep them alive.

Trusting technology is not foolish but a necessity, as long as it is the right and proven technology.

Simon

[Bill Dufour]

I don't want to sit through 12 minutes of video discussion. What happened to his thumb?

He said he did not know what happened so I stopped at that point in the video. I am not a psychic and his esp did not work on me.
I hate most videos. he just drones on and on and never did say what happened. A title might have said something but since he did not know I do not care.
From other posters I guess he ran his finger into the blade and was surprised it got cut and the magic saw stop did not prevent all injury. Kind of like the folks who are surprised a bullet proof vest still hurts when you get shot.
Bill D

[Mark Hennebury]

This is Alex.

We could learn a lot from Alex.
A lot about living your life how you see fit.
A lot about risk.
A lot about safety.

If i wanted to learn to Climb with or without ropes, i would study Alex.



https://youtu.be/Phl82D57P58

[Martin Wasner]

Do you fly?

Yep, the pilots who fly, ATC who control, and the engineers who designed the aircraft don't trust tech either. That's why there's redundancy, often times in triplicate or better, built into any critical system. Why do you think there's two pilots? They don't trust organic means either.




Or do you drive a car with computer chips?

I do, and when there's danger to me having to walk when it's -40º outside, I carry winter gear when something fails. Which seems to have less and less possibility of something going wrong with every generation, but all it takes is one of a thousand parts failing and you're a popsicle when you live in a tough winter climate.




Our modern lives all depend on technology.

Most yes. But what happens when something catastrophic happens? Say a big solar flare and the resulting EMP that takes us back to the 1800's in a matter of minutes? The mormons have it right, you should have supplies on hand. The reptilian brain takes over pretty quickly when the stomach is empty long enough.



All patients who undergo major surgeries depend on technology to keep them alive.

And while the results aren't too bad, patients that should have lived often times don't. Heck, prescription drugs is one of the largest killers in the USA.



Trusting technology is not foolish but a necessity, as long as it is the right and proven technology.



Necessity doesn't make trusting it any more foolish. YouTube hero is a pretty simple example of that.

[Martin Wasner]

Not sure why you would see any contradiction there, assuming you are not trying to split hair.

Whether I use a SS or not (that is pre-SS days), I exercise cautions at all times. But that does not mean I can not increase my level of consciousness or awareness when I work with certain tasks.

When a soldier is on duty and stays alerted, it does not mean he or she cannot be extra alerted when he or she senses certain danger either because of sight or sound.

Tell me where you don't understand about not lowering one's consciousness and increasing one's awareness. The two are not mutually exclusive.

Simon


You should have the thousand yard stare with the tool before you even power it up. You are saying your mentality changes with and without the guard. That is a poor approach.

[Brian Henderson]

This is Alex.

We could learn a lot from Alex.
A lot about living your life how you see fit.
A lot about risk.
A lot about safety.

If i wanted to learn to Climb with or without ropes, i would study Alex.

And if Alex falls, I wouldn't feel at all sorry for Alex. He did it to himself.

[Steve Demuth]

Yep, the pilots who fly, ATC who control, and the engineers who designed the aircraft don't trust tech either. That's why there's redundancy, often times in triplicate or better, built into any critical system. Why do you think there's two pilots? They don't trust organic means either.

Martin's way of saying this is a bit more provocative than how I would, but he's essentially right. People who design complex, potentially dangerous systems understand and assume in their engineering that components will fail from time to time, and operators will make mistakes or fail to perform to requirements from time to time. So in addition to the effort we put into making sure the technology is as reliable as we can get it, and people are well trained, to the degree possible, we design every process and it's associated toolset so that the failure of a component or actor won't result in catastrophic harm. That's how you minimize adverse outcomes - injuries, production failures, etc.

Which makes much of the discussion in this thread rather foolish itself. There are no silver bullets. If your goal is to minimize imjuries, you don't choose safe technique or safe tools, you focus on safe technique using safe tools.

But if Martin is fair in some sense in saying even in highly safety conscious and successful industries, like commercial aviation, people "don't trust" technology, it's a rather misleading oversimplification. We certainly rely on technology, albeit with a healthy understanding that we have to accommodate situations where it might fail. When our surgeons perform a robotic, laparoscopic surgery, they most definitely are trusting that the technology will work, and simultaneously trusting that we've got adequate fail-safe tools and procedures in the event it fails. That is, they do not perform every move in the surgery with a calculation of what they are going to do if the device doesn't behave as expected. They trust - assume - that it will. But they know that they and their team also know what to do if it today is the 1 in 100,000 or whatever when it doesn't.

[Mark Hennebury]

And if Alex falls, I wouldn't feel at all sorry for Alex. He did it to himself.

Alex does not need your sympathy, your understanding or approval.

You too will die.

"He did it himself" Your right on the money on that point. That is what makes him the safest climber on the planet.
He is relying on nothing but himself, no equipment, no help. Zero margin of error. If that doesn't help you focus your attention nothing will.

Read the OP thread heading; Sawstop Injury "I didn't think this could happen."
If you think about that for a minute You might just find a clue into why this did happen.
I would guess that Alex has a slightly different frame of mind.

[Simon MacGowen]

You should have the thousand yard stare with the tool before you even power it up. You are saying your mentality changes with and without the guard. That is a poor approach.

Judging from your response (as well as that regarding technology), you are indeed splitting hair.

Go ahead and live a life...without technology which eliminates any question about trusting or not trusting technology. In the meantime, I will continue to rely on my SS technology for an added layer of protection.

Simon

[Simon MacGowen]

Alex does not need your sympathy, your understanding or approval.



https://www.cnn.com/2017/12/13/asia/china-rooftopping-death-beijing-intl/index.html

Everyone will die, some just live longer. The choice is personal.

The only objection I have against people taking unnecessary risk is when their actions affect others negatively -- directly or indirectly. If they don't, be my guest. Lives are always full of risks and we can only try to manage the risks that we want to manage.

Simon

[Simon MacGowen]

You should have the thousand yard stare with the tool before you even power it up. You are saying your mentality changes with and without the guard. That is a poor approach.

How?

We respond to different levels of stress differently and why changing my level of awareness when a guard is used vs when it is not used is a poor approach? Please enlighten me with science to support your conclusion. If it is just your personal opinion based on your x no. of shop experience without one single incident, then I can tell you the same that I have adjusted my level of awareness without one single incident based on my x no. of shop experience.

Simon

[Martin Wasner]

Judging from your response (as well as that regarding technology), you are indeed splitting hair.

Go ahead and live a life...without technology which eliminates any question about trusting or not trusting technology. In the meantime, I will continue to rely on my SS technology for an added layer of protection.

Simon


I give up. You're far too smart for me. Good luck and I wish you the best.

[Glen Gunderson]

Yep, the pilots who fly, ATC who control, and the engineers who designed the aircraft don't trust tech either. That's why there's redundancy, often times in triplicate or better, built into any critical system. Why do you think there's two pilots? They don't trust organic means either.

I do, and when there's danger to me having to walk when it's -40º outside, I carry winter gear when something fails. Which seems to have less and less possibility of something going wrong with every generation, but all it takes is one of a thousand parts failing and you're a popsicle when you live in a tough winter climate.


Precisely. Redundancy is very important in safety. Which is why the notion of not using available and convenient safety equipment and relying on human error never happening as a means of protecting yourself from being maimed is foolish.

[Carlos Alvarez]

Why in the world (other than while using a crosscut sled) would someone not use a riving knife, at a minimum, with their table saw?

Dunno, why would you? It seems to help nothing. I guess the moment I stopped is when I got zero-clearance inserts that didn't have the cutout. (Obviously yes I can add them, I didn't, and have gone years without any reason to.) I have an overheard arm with a crappy blade guard on it, so I can use the guard without the knife, when desired.

But I just ordered a Shark Guard primarily for the DC function, and it will come with a knife which must be used since it's also the support.

[Simon MacGowen]

Martin's way of saying this is a bit more provocative than how I would, but he's essentially right. People who design complex, potentially dangerous systems understand and assume in their engineering that components will fail from time to time, and operators will make mistakes or fail to perform to requirements from time to time. So in addition to the effort we put into making sure the technology is as reliable as we can get it, and people are well trained, to the degree possible, we design every process and it's associated toolset so that the failure of a component or actor won't result in catastrophic harm. That's how you minimize adverse outcomes - injuries, production failures, etc.

Which makes much of the discussion in this thread rather foolish itself. There are no silver bullets. If your goal is to minimize imjuries, you don't choose safe technique or safe tools, you focus on safe technique using safe tools.

But if Martin is fair in some sense in saying even in highly safety conscious and successful industries, like commercial aviation, people "don't trust" technology, it's a rather misleading oversimplification. We certainly rely on technology, albeit with a healthy understanding that we have to accommodate situations where it might fail. When our surgeons perform a robotic, laparoscopic surgery, they most definitely are trusting that the technology will work, and simultaneously trusting that we've got adequate fail-safe tools and procedures in the event it fails. That is, they do not perform every move in the surgery with a calculation of what they are going to do if the device doesn't behave as expected. They trust - assume - that it will. But they know that they and their team also know what to do if it today is the 1 in 100,000 or whatever when it doesn't.

I am surprised that you would rely on things or people that you don't trust.

If I don't trust an employee, I won't hire him or her. That doesn't not mean I have no checks and balances in place.

If I don't trust my surgeon and the technology he or she uses, I won't go under his or her knife. Period. The fact that every system or procedure has a back-up does not mean it is not trustful. I have candles and torches at home but I trust my power supply.

Looks like you are not much different in terms of trying to split hair, trying to defend the notion that even mature technology can not be trusted while continuing to rely on technology for a comfortable life. If you are not splitting hair, then you don't understand the basic concept of trust and the concept of backup.

Simon

[Mark Hennebury]

https://www.cnn.com/2017/12/13/asia/china-rooftopping-death-beijing-intl/index.html

Everyone will die, some just live longer. The choice is personal.

The only objection I have against people taking unnecessary risk is when their actions affect others negatively -- directly or indirectly. If they don't, be my guest. Lives are always full of risks and we can only try to manage the risks that we want to manage.

Simon

Hey Simon, you would have a hard time finding anything to do that does not carry some risk that could affect other negatively; Smoke, drink, exercise, don't exercise, watch too much TV, spend too much time on the computer. How about sports, totally unnecessary, simply for personal enjoyment, lots of sports related injuries i hear. Do you ski? totally unnecessary risky indulgence, you could wear a helmet, wouldn't stop you from breaking your neck and costing the health care system a fortune though would it. What about eating too much, are you over weight? because that could put a big burden on the health care system, and it would not be right to make others pay for your personal indulgence.

You would have to live a pretty exemplary life to not risk negatively affecting others.

Everyone picks their poison, but if any woodworker says that they prefer to remove the guards, they get bombarded with insults, called a blight on society and dumb morons that get what they deserve if they get injured.
If your liked to ski, how would you like to be called a dumb moron that deserves to break your neck for taking unnecessary risks that put a burden on society.

The fact is lots of people have worked for years without guards. They have right to work how they see fit. they are neither a blight on society, or morons.

[Simon MacGowen]

Hey Simon, you would have a hard time finding anything to do that does not carry some risk that could affect other negatively; Smoke, drink, exercise, don't exercise, watch too much TV, spend too much time on the computer. How about sports, totally unnecessary, simply for personal enjoyment, lots of sports related injuries i hear. Do you ski? totally unnecessary risky indulgence, you could wear a helmet, wouldn't stop you from breaking your neck and costing the health care system a fortune though would it. What about eating too much, are you over weight? because that could put a big burden on the health care system, and it would not be right to make others pay for your personal indulgence.

You would have to live a pretty exemplary life to not risk negatively affecting others.

Everyone picks their poison, but if any woodworker says that they prefer to remove the guards, they get bombarded with insults, called a blight on society and dumb morons that get what they deserve if they get injured.
If your liked to ski, how would you like to be called a dumb moron that deserves to break your neck for taking unnecessary risks that put a burden on society.

The fact is lots of people have worked for years without guards. They have right to work how they see fit. they are neither a blight on society, or morons.

I thought I was pretty clear about managing risks; I do not live with any illusion that there are no risks in life. Unnecessary risks are those that you can take measures to mitigate against them, but you simply ignore them. My choice is a SS as I know it reduces my chances of getting seriously hurt in a tablesaw incident.

If someone smokes in a designated smoking area and I do not become a second smoker as a result of their actions, it is their business not mine. I manage my risks by avoiding these people when they are smoking.

When I choose to engage in sports, I am confronted with calculated risks, not unnecessary risks and for calculated risks I take up measures to reduce them such as wearing my helmet. Unnecessary risks in sports are those when you bike or ski without using the proper safety gear. Taking part in sports is not unnecessary risk.

Burden on the healthcare system of course is a concern. That is why I support financial measures that reward those who live a healthy lifestyle such as lower insurance premiums for non-smokers etc.

Last, my position on the use of guards or no guards has always been clear: as long as one who doesn't use a guard on the tablesaw is confining the risk of injury to oneself, who cares? You can find a similar statement of mine in one of my posts. Abusive words like stupid, idiots, morons, dumb, etc. are used by those who can't debate with reasons or facts; I look down on those posts.

Simon

[Bill Dufour]

One thing about Alex is anyone can tell that what he is doing is not completely safe and he needs to be careful.. Someone cutting wood on a tablesaw may not realize the dangers and not know they need to take precautions.
My wife comments every time we go to Yosemite that those climbers could fall down. They have passed laws and they have to haul there own poop and pee up with them.
Bill

I wonder if you have to sign a safety wavier to stay at this hotel. Better not be a sleep walker.

https://www.cnn.com/travel/article/skylodge-adventure-suites-peru-hotel/index.html

[jack duren]

https://sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?69308-Papa-Griz-and-Gass-Duke-it-out!

[Ron Citerone]

In my mind it comes down to the quality of the guard. The new SS guard that I've seen picture of look usable. I was forced to use a "mickey mouse" guard that came with the saw at work. The insurance company pushed the issue that it was required for all "through cuts." The problem was the splitter was so poorly designed wood was always getting jammed or rubbing against it so that I had to push hard to get the wood through. Crosscutting was difficult because the plastic part that covered the blade did not always go up smoothly and again feeding stock was difficult.....................The anti kickback pawls were another issue.

I used the guard because I did not want to lose my job, but I felt I was more likely to have an accident using the guard than not.

The issue wasn't that I wanted to work unsafely, but I felt no guard was better than that guard.

[Charles P. Wright]

Guards being used or not shouldnt be the point of this tread. Isn’t the exact purpose of the sawstop mechanism designed to account for stupid human error? The guy stuck his hand into the blade on accident and the sawstop didn’t perform as advertised due to the blade he was using which wasn’t rated to be used on the sawstop because of its design. If he used all of the safety equipment all the time then he wouldn’t need the sawstop. This guys situation is what sawstop guy always touts as why they own one. Now all I’m reading are guards and proper technique were the problem which is what anti sawstop guy has always said is the actual safety needed when operating a saw.
He got cut, and needed an ER visit; but he still has all his fingers. It's really impossible to know if that would be the case otherwise. This doesn't strike me as either pro-or-anti Sawstop, people will spin it either way they want.

[Michael Rector]

The argument seems to be between “gut” and “actuaries”. Which is really the problem with statistics and anecdotes, you can’t apply statistics to the individual only to a group.

If you have two groups, one that uses guards and one that doesn’t, the actuaries will tell you that the group as a whole who use guards has fewer injuries than the group who doesn’t. That’s why injury insurance costs are reduced by safety equipment.

However, none of this can be applied to an individual. You can’t say that statistics show that YOU are more likely to hurt yourself without a guard, only that the group you’re in is more likely to have injuries.

Now, going back to recommendations for collective you can say that woodworkers who use safety equipment are less likely to have injuries than those who don’t. Feel free to choose which group you’d like to be a part of.

[Steve Demuth]

I am surprised that you would rely on things or people that you don't trust. Simon

Simon,

I think you misunderstood what I intended. As I said, when Martin says we "don't trust technology" that is misleading. We do trust - rely on - technology, but we do it with the explicit understanding that it will in some rare cases fail. Same with people. So where life is at stake, we layer technology protection on top of people expertise on top of other technology guardrails. So we reduce the likelihood of an end-to-end failure to the smallest probability we can afford to achieve. In other words, we trust both technology and people to work, but we don't trust them to work perfectly. Nothing that is more than trivially complex ever works perfectly. Anyone who trusts a technology or a person to execute perfectly all the time is going to get hurt. If you layer them together, though, you can reduce the likelihood and severity of hurt.

The story in the video is a great example of multiple failure modes of even a fairly simple system: The guy 1) disabled one technology protection deliberately (no guard); 2) did something he knew better than (reached across and into the blade); 3) partially disabled a second technical guard either through ignorance or deliberate oversight (used a shouldered blade that makes saw stop technology much less effective). As a result he suffered an injury he shouldn't have had at all, and it was more severe than it should have been. On the other hand, it appears that his injury wasn't very severe in the big picture, because the saw stop technology mostly worked.

[Simon MacGowen]

[QUOTE=Steve Demuth;2784351]Simon,

I think you misunderstood what I intended. As I said, when Martin says we "don't trust technology" that is misleading. We do trust - rely on - technology, but we do it with the explicit understanding that it will in some rare cases fail.

My apologies for misreading your post.

Simon

[Marc Rochkind]

Actually, there's no proof that the SawStop technology reduces injuries to experienced, trained, and careful woodworkers. True, there are many reported cases where a body part touched the blade, the saw stopped, and the injury was minor or nonexistent. But that doesn't mean that there would have been an injury had a conventional saw been used.

[Added] SawStop technology might even increase other injuries, such as those from kickback, because of misunderstandings about what the technology can actually do and not do.

Until comprehensive data is collected about table saw injuries, complete enough so that variables can be controlled for (age, health, experience, time spent in shop, etc.), we won't know what the overall benefit of SawStop technology is.

If the woodworker is inexperienced, untrained, and careless (and has no business being in the shop at all), then I could see, even without data, that SawStop would reduce injuries. But how many Sawmill Creek members are inexperienced, untrained, and careless?

I think of it this way: Right now, I am extremely careful when making cuts, knowing how dangerous my saw is. Would I be that careful if I thought the saw was safer? Also, my shop is full of power equipment that doesn't have a SawStop equivalent, even if I wanted to buy such a thing. It's better to treat all power equipment the same: DANGEROUS.

This is sort of similar to a story I heard of a country intersection with no stop sign. Everyone in the county knew it was dangerous. After a stop sign was put up, accidents increased. The theory is that the stop sign encouraged drivers with the right-of-way to drive as if they had the right-of-way.

[Nick Decker]

You know the shortest debates I've seen here? Whether or not SawStops are high quality tools. I'm awaiting delivery on my second SawStop, both of which were purchased primarily because of their quality and the quality of the company's customer service.

[mreza Salav]

Would I be that careful if I thought the saw was safer?

Are you driving more recklessly now that the cars have a lot more safety features compared to 30 years ago? Anybody who does that is making a big mistake.
There are plenty of data out there regarding the number of amputations on table saws per year and it should be possible to find how many are just weekend worriers or hobbyist and how many are professionals. I suspect that a sawstop will not detect what type of user you are and the reduction will be equal for hobbyist and professionals :-)

[Martin Wasner]

You know the shortest debates I've seen here? Whether or not SawStops are high quality tools. I'm awaiting delivery on my second SawStop, both of which were purchased primarily because of their quality and the quality of the company's customer service.

Start another thread and I'll discuss that one with you.

[andy bessette]

...I'm awaiting delivery on my second SawStop...

You should be twice as safe now.

[Simon MacGowen]

Actually, there's no proof that the SawStop technology reduces injuries to experienced, trained, and careful woodworkers. True, there are many reported cases where a body part touched the blade, the saw stopped, and the injury was minor or nonexistent. But that doesn't mean that there would have been an injury had a conventional saw been used.

[Added] SawStop technology might even increase other injuries, such as those from kickback, because of misunderstandings about what the technology can actually do and not do.

Until comprehensive data is collected about table saw injuries, complete enough so that variables can be controlled for (age, health, experience, time spent in shop, etc.), we won't know what the overall benefit of SawStop technology is.


So true! As far as we know, all those who have reported a cut to SS are newbie (with about 1 week of woodworking exp. or less before they owned a SS), inexperienced, untrained, inattentive and reckless woodworkers.

Listen, SawStop's new owner.

We demand you DROP your prices for every model by 50% (at least) UNTIL you can prove your worth! Dr Gass has ripped you off with his sale of his business and technology that has unknown overall benefit! Go after him before it is too late.

Simon

[Mark Hennebury]

Are you driving more recklessly now that the cars have a lot more safety features compared to 30 years ago? Anybody who does that is making a big mistake.
There are plenty of data out there regarding the number of amputations on table saws per year and it should be possible to find how many are just weekend worriers or hobbyist and how many are professionals. I suspect that a sawstop will not detect what type of user you are and the reduction will be equal for hobbyist and professionals :-)

Taken from; The guardian 2016

Behind this demarking lies the concept of “shared space” and “naked streets”, developed in the 1990s by the late Dutch engineer, Hans Monderman (http://www.pps.org/reference/hans-monderman/). He held that traffic was safest when road users were “self-policing” and streets were cleared of controlling clutter. His innovations, now adopted in some 400 towns across Europe, have led to dramatic falls in accidents. Yet for some reason Monderman’s ideas remain starkly uninfluential in the world of “big” health and safety, especially in Britain.
Monderman’s principle is that freedom to assess risk for ourselves is what makes us safer. Rules, controls, signs, traffic lights all reduce our awareness of our surroundings and thus our sense of danger. On roads, he said (https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=Hs4Ao8ABFIkC&pg=PT88&lpg=PT88&dq=when+you+don%E2%80%99t+exactly+know+who+has+rig ht+of+way,+you+tend+to+seek+eye+contact+with+other +road+users&source=bl&ots=O_uRY9ocbp&sig=gLwxRhWV7cD4lVHVfnZI45gp2e8&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwj_4o7Ald7KAhXLhhoKHWZWC5oQ6AEIIDAA#v=on epage&q=when%20you%20don%E2%80%99t%20exactly%20know%20wh o%20has%20right%20of%20way%2C%20you%20tend%20to%20 seek%20eye%20contact%20with%20other%20road%20users&f=false): “When you don’t exactly know who has right of way, you tend to seek eye contact with other road users. You automatically reduce your speed … and take greater care.”

[Simon MacGowen]

Taken from; The guardian 2016
“When you don’t exactly know who has right of way, you tend to seek eye contact with other road users. You automatically reduce your speed … and take greater care.”


Tell this to a guy behind the steering wheel of a Hummer!

Simon

[J.R. Rutter]

Actually, there's no proof that the SawStop technology reduces injuries to experienced, trained, and careful woodworkers. True, there are many reported cases where a body part touched the blade, the saw stopped, and the injury was minor or nonexistent. But that doesn't mean that there would have been an injury had a conventional saw been used.

???? I got Sawstops because I had employees using the table saws. When the process / flow changed, I sold one and kept one. It saved my thumb from having a nice split one Friday afternoon 20 minutes before quitting time. No one is going to argue that people should be personally responsible for their actions and act accordingly, but I also have all the proof I need that a blade brake stops cuts from becoming disasterous in the case of an accident.

[Mark Hennebury]

Tell this to a guy behind the steering wheel of a Hummer!

Simon

I believe someone already stated that statistics apply to the overall group not an individual within a group.

[Simon MacGowen]

I believe someone already stated that statistics apply to the overall group not an individual within a group.

But when my own safety is at stake, including amputations, I study statistics to avoid becoming a statistic!

Simon

[Mark Hennebury]

???? I got Sawstops because I had employees using the table saws. When the process / flow changed, I sold one and kept one. It saved my thumb from having a nice split one Friday afternoon 20 minutes before quitting time. No one is going to argue that people should be personally responsible for their actions and act accordingly, but I also have all the proof I need that a blade brake stops cuts from becoming disasterous in the case of an accident.

Friday afternoon, quiitting time... Bad time to be doing dangerous work when your'e attention is divided. Best to leave that until Monday Morning when your'e not in a hurry to leave, and you can fully concentrate on what you are doing. But hey you got a sawstop so whats the worst thing that could happen.



I don't have employees otherwise i would have all of the safety apparatus in place.

[Nick Decker]

Start another thread and I'll discuss that one with you.

I'd rather not. My point was that my own experience and the general feeling both here and elsewhere is that SawStop makes a very good saw. My guess is that you and some others might disagree, otherwise this wouldn't be the internet. ;)

[Mark Hennebury]

But when my own safety is at stake, including amputations, I study statistics to avoid becoming a statistic!

Simon

Simon, like i said statistics don't apply to you individually, they apply to a percentage of 100,000 Simons or 1,000,000 Simons.
They are a generalization of you risk factor, and it doesn't take into account how you as an individual will operate or how you will fare.

[Mark Hennebury]

I have read the thread entitled " Had an ooops in the shop Monday"

Of the half a dozen posters that said they have had an accident on the jointer all of them had guards on at the time of the accident. Not really a large enough group to use as say anything definite, but an interesting observation that might be worth investigating.

It would be interesting to see a thorough set of statistics that was broken down into all of the subgroups, so that we had a better understanding of how, when and why accidents happen. And with what type of shop and equipment and safety or lack of safety equipment.

Does anyone know if this type of data exists?

[Simon MacGowen]

Simon, like i said statistics don't apply to you individually, they apply to a percentage of 100,000 Simons or 1,000,000 Simons.
They are a generalization of you risk factor, and it doesn't take into account how you as an individual will operate or how you will fare.

While statistics is a study of the whole population or a representative sample and its results apply to a group and not an individual, as a member of the group being studied, I can take measures as an individual in light of the group findings.

For example, one study found that 10 years after quitting, a member of the public's risk of dying from lung cancer is about half that of a person who is still smoking. As an individual, I consider myself a member of the public and I would stop smoking, hoping that my chances of dying from lung cancer would be cut. The statistics is a generation of my risk factor but it also provides vital information for me to assess, decide and take action.

If the finding were after 10 years of quitting, my risk of dying would be cut by 0.0001%, I might not care.

So, I study statistics, including how many amputations are happening each day or how many tablesaw injury happens every x minutes, to guide my actions and decisions.

Simon

[Mark Hennebury]

While statistics is a study of the whole population or a representative sample and its results apply to a group and not an individual, as a member of the group being studied, I can take measures as an individual in light of the group findings.

For example, one study found that 10 years after quitting, a member of the public's risk of dying from lung cancer is about half that of a person who is still smoking. As an individual, I consider myself a member of the public and I would stop smoking, hoping that my chances of dying from lung cancer would be cut. The statistics is a generation of my risk factor but it also provides vital information for me to assess, decide and take action.

If the finding were after 10 years of quitting, my risk of dying would be cut by 0.0001%, I might not care.

So, I study statistics, including how many amputations are happening each day or how many tablesaw injury happens every x minutes, to guide my actions and decisions.

Simon

Hi Simon, Good luck, i hope that it all works out for you. I am always a little leary of statistics as there are many variables and many can be omitted or misrepresented.

I had a good friend, Non-smoker, Extremely fit and healthy, ate celery sticks, and exercised, died of lung cancer at the age of 41. He had been going to the doctor for two years about a persistent cough, of course they never checked him for lung cancer, he didn't fit the statistical profile.

[andy bessette]

...one study found that 10 years after quitting, a member of the public's risk of dying from lung cancer is about half that of a person who is still smoking. As an individual, I consider myself a member of the public and I would stop smoking, hoping that my chances of dying from lung cancer would be cut. The statistics is a generation of my risk factor but it also provides vital information for me to assess, decide and take action...So, I study statistics, including how many amputations are happening each day or how many tablesaw injury happens every x minutes, to guide my actions and decisions.

Simon

Really, if I had to live that kind of life, I would just shoot myself now.

[Simon MacGowen]

He had been going to the doctor for two years about a persistent cough, of course they never checked him for lung cancer, he didn't fit the statistical profile.

Of course, and it is easy to explain: any lung cancer statistics does not apply to him as an individual.

Same thing, a SS does not prevent tablesaw injuries to anyone who owns one...it just reduces the extent or severity of a sawcut injury if and when it happens-- provided the operator does not disengage the SS feature!

Simon

[Simon MacGowen]

Really, if I had to live that kind of life, I would just shoot myself now.
And the result would be better?

Definitely not for me. I still have decades of safe woodworking years to enjoy.

Simon

[Simon MacGowen]

You should be twice as safe now.


Now, I understand why the local school I visited has spent so much money, acquiring four SawStop's (All ICS's!).

Simon

[J.R. Rutter]

Friday afternoon, quiitting time... Bad time to be doing dangerous work when your'e attention is divided. Best to leave that until Monday Morning when your'e not in a hurry to leave, and you can fully concentrate on what you are doing. But hey you got a sawstop so whats the worst thing that could happen.



I don't have employees otherwise i would have all of the safety apparatus in place.

Ignoring the sarcasm, yeah I had a Sawstop, so a wake up call *was* the worst that happened. Thanks for the advice - you're right of course. But sometimes getting stuff glued up before the weekend is what lets it get delivered on Monday though, and that is the reality of my situation.

The Sawstop is an OK saw aside from the brake tech. I've owned a PM66, General 350, and Unisaw. They are all pretty similar in actual use. The riving knife is really nice on the SS.

[Mark Hennebury]

Ignoring the sarcasm, yeah I had a Sawstop, so a wake up call *was* the worst that happened. Thanks for the advice - you're right of course. But sometimes getting stuff glued up before the weekend is what lets it get delivered on Monday though, and that is the reality of my situation.

The Sawstop is an OK saw aside from the brake tech. I've owned a PM66, General 350, and Unisaw. They are all pretty similar in actual use. The riving knife is really nice on the SS.

Hi J.R. Sorry about the sarcasm, its a bad habit.

My point has been to try to show that maybe the fact that you have safety gear increases your chance of having an accident. Albeit a less damaging one with a sawstop. The human brain is quite complicated and not necessarily looking out for the best interests of its owner. Knowing that you have all of the safety equipment, causes an automatic reduction in your focus. I believe that you will simple not take as much caution and are more likely to have a mishap.

Without guards there is no such misconception. I know that when i turn on my saw or jointer, that i risk loosing my fingers, i have no guards on them, so i have the wind in my face and an 18" blade or 24" cutterblock spinning within a fraction of an inch of my fingers, i feel the danger intensely, i am neither afraid or complacent, when my machines are on, I am on, my movements are smooth and controlled, i know where my hands are and i know where they will be if i slip up. I have nothing in my way, nothing to hide the blade, or the danger, I have no sticks or rubber grips, nothing in the way to slip of bump into, no guards to have to push against, I hold the wood, i roll up my sleeves up, i check my grip, i roll up my fingers, i have a mental process to follow, i know my machine and i know my material. It may not be for everyone, but it is the only way that i feel safe.

I understand that many think that not using all of the safety equipment is taking "unnecessary risk" Yet i have seen many using guards and blocks and sticks that scare the crap out of me, i wouldn't go anywhere near them. I am okay with my calculated risk and my approach, its good for me, until i screw up, then maybe i will wish i had a SawStop.


I have worked around the clock on many occasions so i understand that you have to do what you have to do.

But Late Friday afternoon is feeding time for the machines, stay alert, stay safe.

[Steve H Graham]

The thing that always amazes me about threads like this is the belligerence and persistence of crusty old coots arguing AGAINST safety methods and guards.

[Brian Henderson]

The thing that always amazes me about threads like this is the belligerence and persistence of crusty old coots arguing AGAINST safety methods and guards.

I can't wait for the new software where we get the ability to thank for posts.

[Don Bullock]

Any of evidence that more Sawstop owners do this than owners of other brands?
I think not.

I fully agree. The blade guard on a SawStop is much better than most and it’s easy to use.

[Jim Dwight]

Apparently the injury that started this discussion is kind of old now. A thread started on a regional forum I also participate in recently and I found it interesting. It went a different direction, however. This one seems to have degenerated into a discussion of blade guards.

A couple of points I think are worth considering. First, if you check SawStops frequently asked questions, they state you can get seriously injured with their saw if the velocity of your body part's movement into the blade is high enough. They do not comment on the blade design in that FAQ. The blade stops in 5 milli seconds or less. 0.005 seconds or less. It travels about 1/3 of a revolution in .005 seconds. How much of you it touches is dependent on how fast your body part if moving. Moving faster, like if a board breaks or knocks your hand into the blade, will result in a more serious injury.

This is speculation but I do not believe the blade design impacts the speed of stopping more than 1 milli second. I doubt putting the blade on backward would increase the stoppage time more than a couple milli seconds. The force the spring applies to the aluminum block is something like 1000 lbs. It's like swinging a soft aluminum hammer into the blade. That blade is stopping quickly regardless of the blade design. The fact that blade design is not even mentioned in their comment about extent of injury indicates to me that it is a secondary factor.

I have not purchased a SawStop saw yet but I probably will within the next year. I've never been cut by my table saw in 40+ years of hobby usage. I have been cut by other tools when I did something stupid or got tired. I am a little concerned that I get tired more quickly at 62 than I did previously. I like the fact that the SawStop blade guard seems well designed including being able to be easily removed and replaced. It will need to be for me to use it.

To me the key message of the injury is that a SawStop does not always stop us from getting stitches. We still need to be careful. But if we screw up, the injury will be less.

[Matt Mattingley]

I thought about this long and hard for many years. (I’ve even considered a saw stop) I came to conclusion

Who benefits from A saw stop? 100 hours equals 100% anything less than 100% buy saw stop!

What is their level of professional training?
What is their level of comfort?
What is their level of respect for the machine?
What is there a level of training with guards and procedures?
What is their level of reaction materials?
What is their level of fear respect ?
What is their comfort level of pinch and throw body placement? 6 inches is not enough!
How often are they practising the above per year?

[Carl Beckett]

I had a tablesaw injury. I was making a dado groove on the edge of a door stile (to fit a panel). Was using a short scrap of very hard maple and the front edge 'dove' into the front of the blade and was pulled down into the insert gap, which didnt fit the dado edge close enough - climbed the blade and kicked back. The blade didnt get me, the kickback of the piece caught in the crook between my thumb and palm and pushed my forearm back into my gut (and the thumb webbing was torn open, and a bone fractured in the thumb). It was so fast I didnt really know what happened until the bruise on my gut showed up the next day (from my elbow).

Could I have been more safety conscientious? You betcha. There were several things that could have prevented the accident. But yet, it happened (again it could have been prevented). And I remind myself of that every single time I am making a cut (even the routine cuts can become relaxed about if not focusing).

There is a phrase that we used to use in a risk prevention product I launched once, it is called:

"Statistical inevitability"

It just means that even if the risk of incident is very low, if you do it long enough the statistics catch up to you and it becomes statistically likely to happen. So what are the precautions you are taking 'now' to mitigate the damage 'when' those statistics catch up to you.

Have considered a saw stop several times. Recently upgraded to a Euro slider... I am still learning how to operate it but not sure it is all that much safer than my previous cabinet saws. My personal philosophy is, yes, I will take every piece of safety advice I can learn. I ignore budget if there is a safety item I want to try out (hold downs, feather boards, guards, etc) - these items go #1 on my budget priority list.

Some general statistics are here (lots more data out there easily obtained by searching): https://www.wwgoa.com/article/shop-accident-statistics-woodworking-safety/

For the record, I DO have sympathy for anyone that gets injured. Even if they were not following safe practices. That is just me though, I am compassionate and do not wish harm and injury on anyone no matter how reckless (if they are putting others at risk then that is a different discussion). In fact, if the bulk mass of users behave poorly it can ruin it for those that do behave (just how our legal system works, manufacturers can not produce and sell products that are deemed 'unsafe', and yes this includes protecting people from possible 'mis use').

[Ole Anderson]

I am an advocate of using your blade guard whenever you can. My old grizzly guard from 1997 worked, but was a pain to remove and replace. Still I didn't just take if off and toss it. I eventually got a SharkGuard when I installed my dust collection system so I could do over-blade dust collection. It is easy to remove and replace so it now gets used 95% of the time I am able to use it. Thin rips, dadoes, sled? No. Add me to the camp of those that rail against all of the TV shows and YouTubers that simply don't use a guard. They are telling everyone else you aren't a man (or a woman) if you need a blade guard.

I have been following closely Jesse and Alyssia on the Pure Living for Life YouTube channel as they build their house. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CyFqabSj7Cw They are inexperienced, and admit it. They have a job site table saw that gets a lot of use. Mostly ripping 2x stock and sheet goods. And lots of fairly narrow (2-5") rips on long stock. Stuff that a blade guard would do nothing but speed up operations. Yet I have never seen a blade guard, and usually with the 10" blade lifted as high as it will go. I cringe every time they start ripping.

And you guys that have have never used a guard in 40 years (likely the same ones that wedge the skill saw guard up) I hope you don't start telling others it is ok and I hope you continue your injury free career.

Oh, and as far as calling a push block (not a push stick which is bad) or a Gripper which must be used without a guard a contraption and implying they have no use. Stop right now. How else do you push your stock through the last few inches without using your fingers next to the blade, especially shorter pieces? Plus it holds the stock down so the blade won't cause it to rise up.

[Rick Potter]

Good safety video, but I can't get over wondering if he ever cleans the pitch off his blades?

[andy bessette]

...They are telling everyone else you aren't a man (or a woman) if you need a blade guard...

No, they're not. They're showing that you can safely use a saw without a guard, which is true.

[Mark Hennebury]

[QUOTE=Ole Anderson;2830687] No. Add me to the camp of those that rail against all of the TV shows and YouTubers that simply don't use a guard. They are telling everyone else you aren't a man (or a woman) if you need a blade guard....


Again, No they are not; If you have to make up false statements to support your argument, maybe you don't have much of an argument at all. How about just stick to the facts.

When you watch a video of people showing how they work, that's what they are doing, showing you how they work. I you don't like it, don't do. If you disagree, you are free to disagree, You can tell everyone that you disagree, you don't have to make stuff up.

[Matt Mattingley]

No, they're not. They're showing that you can safely use a saw without a guard, which is true.
You can also win the Super Ball if you play every week. Those who advocate not using safety guards, I guarantee show up in the hospital more often then those who win the Super Ball.

Ratio % for winning the Super Ball?
Ratio % for using woodworking equipment, not safety equipment properly... injuries?
Ratio % for not using a seatbelt/airbags in a vehicle injuries?

This is why lawyers make so much money. Both parties are trying to prove due diligence/negligence.

No one won the lottery when you cut off all your fingers because you were not due diligent. (Except the lawyers).
Cut safe, play safe and think of every time you make a cut,...this is the time you’re gonna lose every finger and the board is going to shoot at you. Then get some real training. I’d like every lawyer to ask their client, can you prove how much former professional, professional training you have prior to this incident and the professionals signed offed signature for training to rule out negligence. Machines don’t cut/hurt people. People do it to themselves. Just ask your best friend if you can borrow their chainsaw and how much they are insured for. Let me know the outcome.

I don’t lend my chainsaws to anyone! And I’m in the midst of putting together a shop entry waiver.

[Matt Mattingley]

I look at every table saw accident as a 1800s sword fight. You were given a Brain, knife and a shield to work with. Those who dropped their shields and said I’ll be a superstar with just with a knife, usually didn’t come home to brag about it... most people who leave their tools at home, don’t get the job done! Sooner or later, Turn off your brain, turn off your shields… Just turn off your blades!

[Mark Hennebury]

I look at every table saw accident as a 1800s sword fight. You were given a Brain, knife and a shield to work with. Those who dropped their shields and said I’ll be a superstar with just with a knife, usually didn’t come home to brag about it... most people who leave their tools at home, don’t get the job done! Sooner or later, Turn off your brain, turn off your shields… Just turn off your blades!

Matt, the problem with this argument is always the same;
Nobody examines the actual facts.
Nobody actually looks at what is being done and what is being said and everybody makes up nonsense to prove their point,
Everyone makes up totally irrelevant analogies.

And all any of it does is muddies the water.
If you want an intelligent conversation stick to the facts.

This has absolutely nothing to do with seat-belt or no seat-belt.

It has a lot more in common with sword fighting;

if you did your research you would find that the most famous swordfighter of all time Miyamoto Musashi did not use a shield...... and died of old age! In fact he often only fought with sticks
He also wrote a book on strategy called the book of five rings, which is still in print after 500 years and used as a model for martial arts, business, and philosophy.

So maybe the shield like pushsticks and guards in woodworking give you a false sense of security and in fact obscure your vision and limit your movement and control.


389787389788

[jeff oldham]

I had intentions of buying a sawstop for the safety aspect of it,,,and I believe that is the main reason most do buy them,,,but there is a lot of good saws that do the same as a saw stop,,,and for the price that you pay for it to start with,,reguardless of what blade you have on it,it should stop the blade,,,,i think for the price of the saw,, it is over rated,,,as prove in this thread

[Carlos Alvarez]

I'm more aware and careful when I run without the guard. My only TS injury happened while using all the guards. Your guarantee is void.

[Simon MacGowen]

I had intentions of buying a sawstop for the safety aspect of it,,,and I believe that is the main reason most do buy them,,,

The safety feature is one of the reasons, not necessarily the main reason. Imagine who would spend $3000 on a SawStop that had the best finger saving technology but

did not offer excellent cutting performance
included mediocre tolerances
was supported by poor customer service
did not have the option of excellent dust collection, and
did not offer the option of one of the best mobile bases money could buy.

I would not have.

Simon

[Martin Wasner]

Imagine who would spend $3000 on a SawStop that had the best finger saving technology but

did not offer excellent cutting performance
included mediocre tolerances
was supported by poor customer service
did not have the option of excellent dust collection, and
did not offer the option of one of the best mobile bases money could buy.


Please, whoever brainwashed you, I need their number.

[Matt Mattingley]

Matt, the problem with this argument is always the same;
Nobody examines the actual facts.
Nobody actually looks at what is being done and what is being said and everybody makes up nonsense to prove their point,
Everyone makes up totally irrelevant analogies.

And all any of it does is muddies the water.
If you want an intelligent conversation stick to the facts.

This has absolutely nothing to do with seat-belt or no seat-belt.

Mark, you and I agree on so much.

Do you have a saw stop in your shop? Why or why not?
Just play with me here...
If you took a position in a cabinet/pattern shop and the shop owner said to you pick any table saw/s and gave you a total budget of $30,000. What would you choose(and you’re allowed to use the used market)? You’re not allowed to upgrade for about 10 years. You only have a 700 square-foot room in the building. You are required to maintain your own machines.

[Simon MacGowen]

Please, whoever brainwashed you, I need their number.
I think it is a 1800 number....For the record, I have not needed to call them for service to my saw; I go to their website now and then.

Simon

[Mark Hennebury]

Mark, you and I agree on so much.

Do you have a saw stop in your shop? Why or why not?
Just play with me here...
If you took a position in a cabinet/pattern shop and the shop owner said to you pick any table saw/s and gave you a total budget of $30,000. What would you choose(and you’re allowed to use the used market)? You’re not allowed to upgrade for about 10 years. You only have a 700 square-foot room in the building. You are required to maintain your own machines.


Hi Matt,

I do not own a sawstop. I own and use Robinson models ZT/E and ET/E

I would look for a used Reinhard PKN 350, you might get one for that price if your lucky

389847

[Matt Mattingley]

Hi Matt,

I do not own a sawstop. I own and use Robinson models ZT/E and ET/E

I would look for a used Reinhard PKN 350, you might get one for that price if your lucky

389847

Both excellent and top-of-the-line machines!

Thank you for your response. I was trying to put you on the spot. Sorry! I fully respect your opinion on quality woodworking and metal machines. Sometimes I wish you and I live closer, so we could play in each others sandbox.

I think you made it clear (without saying it) what you would prefer.

Your shop is on my shortlist of tours.

[Mark Hennebury]

Both excellent and top-of-the-line machines!

Thank you for your response. I was trying to put you on the spot. Sorry! I fully respect your opinion on quality woodworking and metal machines. Sometimes I wish you and I live closer, so we could play in each others sandbox.

I think you made it clear (without saying it) what you would prefer.


Matt, you can put me on the spot anytime.

I can't see me ever owning a Sawstop.

To be honest it would be fun to design and build a table saw.


It would be great to spend some time chewing the fat together, you are an interesting and knowledgeable guy.

[Matt Mattingley]

Matt, you can put me on the spot anytime.

I can't see me ever owning a Sawstop.

To be honest it would be fun to design and build a table saw.


It would be great to spend some time chewing the fat together, you are an interesting and knowledgeable guy.

I do have an industrial SS at work. But 95% of the workers are/or have less than 100 hours experience. Then there is the good old general 350. We don’t have any siders. I’ve done about a dozen tours through high school shops that are introducing woodworking to novice. The high school shops are auctioning off their machines to subsidize saw stop for insurance reasons. The technology is there to help my stupid idiotic son from cutting off his finger. Just ask your next employee if they’ve ever had a saw stop stop. Then think three times if you should hire them... i’ve had the same kid blow up a belt sander 3x. Ask me for a recommendation.

Anyone can brag about buying a tool. Not Anyone brags about 8000 hours training. YouTube is a good example of this.

[Simon MacGowen]

The high school shops are auctioning off their machines to subsidize saw stop for insurance reasons. [/QUOTE]

This is news to me and a sad one. No schools I have been to that have acquired one to three ICSs had to sell their shop machines in order to get their new saws. In fact, SawStop seemed (still?) to have a school deal for them. Of course, every school in question had reported their finger saves. They used Freud blades and CMTs or economical blades like those.

Simon

[jack forsberg]

just get the right saw! and keep your hands in your pocket .


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-NGFQCDlhw

[Mark Hennebury]

You have what would be a called a SAW-GO

[jack forsberg]

You have what would be a called a SAW-GO
For new people coming in to my shop as workers I actually ask them if they’ve been trained on The Saw Stop . If they say yes they’re not allowed in my shop. I got too many saws that do have gaurds . Sorry but stay in school or get some real traning. That is unless the only machine you wish to use in your career is a tablesaw.

Jack does not own any flash sensing safety devices in his shop and does not wish to put his wiener Anywhere near a swirling blade now or in the for seeable future .

[Simon MacGowen]

For new people coming in to my shop as workers I actually ask them if they’ve been trained on The Saw Stop . If they say yes they’re not allowed in my shop. .

Since most future cabinet saws will all have the finger saving technology as a standard feature just like the riving knife (sawstop patents expiring), future shop owners will be hard pressed to find new people who have gone through carpentry or woodworking programs with no "sawstop" experience. Of course, if they are interested in just anyone, there will be no shortage of unskilled labor. I know when I contract out a job, I only look for contractors who are skilled.

This is the same reason why Google gives its education programs free to schools to ensure all future kids are capable of using its products but not necessarily others. No free lunch.

I have been clearly told that a couple semi-community entities had closed down their woodworking programs because they could not afford a SawStop but could not afford the insurance costs either.

Simon

[Robert Engel]

For new people coming in to my shop as workers I actually ask them if they’ve been trained on The Saw Stop . If they say yes they’re not allowed in my shop. I got too many saws that do have gaurds . Sorry but stay in school or get some real traning. That is unless the only machine you wish to use in your career is a tablesaw.

Jack does not own any flash sensing safety devices in his shop and does not wish to put his wiener Anywhere near a swirling blade now or in the for seeable future .

I think Jack brings up a valid point, that being, the SS is only one machine.

Safety is more of an attitude, an overall state of mind approaching power machinery.

Having just one machine that will save you from a mistake isn't really good enough, is it?

[Simon MacGowen]

Having just one machine that will save you from a mistake isn't really good enough, is it?

Yes, it is not good enough. In fact, the current no. of woodworkers who can enjoy the sawstop technology is not good enough even though it is more than 10 years old. I think the sooner the patents expire the better, so more brands of saws can be made and bought with such safety improvement.

My view on shop safety is that it should be progressive. That is what worked in the past should be improved if it can be technically and economically done. SawStop is an example. When the patent protection expires, competition, insurance consideration, etc. will lead to the standardization of the finger saving technology as part of a saw. Economies of scale will reduce the cost of ownership too. Like it or not, consumer and market expectations will be the driver. Bosch saw that future market.

Finger saving technology has now been applied to the meat cutting machines (they are bandsaws to a woodworker). The tablesaw should not be the only machine that we need to improve its safety record, of course, but it is the woodworking machine that causes the most (more serious) injuries and so naturally it was the first machine that got the first fix. I am hoping the parent company of Festool will do R&D to expand the technology into other tools like the mitre saws, etc. One at a time is better than doing nothing. The "finger saves" speak for themselves. I also know radar sensing auto brake systems have saved lives on the highways, even though they did not exist before.

Simon

[jack forsberg]

Since most future cabinet saws will all have the finger saving technology as a standard feature just like the riving knife (sawstop patents expiring), future shop owners will be hard pressed to find new people who have gone through carpentry or woodworking programs with no "sawstop" experience. Of course, if they are interested in just anyone, there will be no shortage of unskilled labor. I know when I contract out a job, I only look for contractors who are skilled.

This is the same reason why Google gives its education programs free to schools to ensure all future kids are capable of using its products but not necessarily others. No free lunch.

I have been clearly told that a couple semi-community entities had closed down their woodworking programs because they could not afford a SawStop but could not afford the insurance costs either.

SimonMost future cabinet saw will not have saws . Most future cabinet shops will be lights out 24/7 seven robotic. Cabinet saws of themselves are relics of the classic machines in a modern shop . Besides not all woodworking is cabinets . If saw stop has set itself up as an educator It just further Devalues A proper training and apprenticeship. Training that I might add that was developed through the industry with all due consideration. Just in my lifetime I’ve seen the education system completely dismantle trades in schools . When I grew up I was advised by counselors in schools that I should not enter into the traides , that I should enter computer science . Trades were four people that were stupid. That’s why Jimmy who was as dumb as a sack a hammer got sent to woodworking to make a lamp. The reason people need saw stop today is because we’ve sent all the idiots to woodworking. Fact of the matter is you need brains .


389868

Proper training is severely lacking in North America. This is why saw stop is not sweeping Europe. Health and safety executives in the EU is far better than our education system.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t-a0MMMruZI&app=desktop
Basic safe work practices are highly lacking in North America. Their reliance on the safety technology has been seriously considered adequate buy some.
The fact is it’s pretty basic stuff that just seriously has not been passed on . In North America we are being led by the blind on YouTube
http://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/wis16.pdf

[Roger Marty]

Most future cabinet saw will not have saws . Most future cabinet shops will be lights out 24/7 seven robotic. Cabinet saws of themselves are relics of the classic machines in a modern shop . Besides not all woodworking is cabinets . If saw stop has set itself up as an educator It just further Devalues A proper training and apprenticeship. Training that I might add that was developed through the industry with all due consideration. Just in my lifetime I’ve seen the education system completely dismantle trades in schools . When I grew up I was advised by counselors in schools that I should not enter into the traides , that I should enter computer science . Trades were four people that were stupid. That’s why Jimmy who was as dumb as a sack a hammer got sent to woodworking to make a lamp. The reason people need saw stop today is because we’ve sent all the idiots to woodworking. Fact of the matter is you need brains .


Hilarious. I'm a computer scientist and hobbyist woodworker, and probability theory (and actuarial science) strongly factored into my personal decision to buy a SawStop.

[Simon MacGowen]

Most future cabinet saw will not have saws . Most future cabinet shops will be lights out 24/7 seven robotic.



Robotic takeovers have been predicted many times by many people before you for many industries. That day may come for cabinet shops, but that won't happen until many future generations of shop owners have experienced real problems of finding new workers who have never had any "sawstop" experience...if they insist on welcoming only people who never touch a "sawstop."

My guess: Complete robotic takeovers in 200 - 300 years; mass production of "sawstop" like cabinet saws in 20 - 30 years.

Simon

[Carlos Alvarez]

Sawstops will become common in under ten years, and nearly full robotics in under 20.

[Simon MacGowen]

Sawstops will become common in under ten years, and nearly full robotics in under 20.

SawStop has become common already; it is NA's #1 selling cabinet saw.

What is full robotics in under 20?


Simon

[Simon MacGowen]

In North America we are being led by the blind on YouTube


I do not have any in-depth knowledge of the EU education system and its safety practice (just having used an EU slider a few times doesn't count, does it?) to form any opinion about the sale of SawStop in Europe. But I agree with you that, judging from the unbelievable comments people made in some of the woodworking videos, many people (outside NA as well) are being led by unqualified and unsafe youtube woodworkers.

Simon

[jack forsberg]

Sawstops will become common in under ten years, and nearly full robotics in under 20.
If not sooner :::;::::::::::::


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kHpNjenTqz8

[David Kumm]

The technology will need to progress to impact other machines and larger commercial saws to become a given in commercial shops. Cabinet saws are pretty limited as to volume and 10" blades are designed more for hobby or specialty use than the more traditionally sized 14-20" blade machines. When true industrial machines have the SS technology or competing versions of the same, the game will change. Dave

[Roger Marty]

Sawstops will become common in under ten years, and nearly full robotics in under 20.

Do not underestimate the cost effectiveness of human labor for some industries. I'm not claiming that humans will remain more cost effective for cabinet shops in 20 years, but I am familiar with a large-scale industrial operation that looked strongly at robotic automation and found that paying humans $15/hour remained far more cost effective. And go read Elon Musk's recent interview about Tesla's attempts to fully automate the Model3 production.

[Carlos Alvarez]

Do not under-estimate the power of Luddites and people who spread fear and doubt about computers and automation. Without them, we'd be much farther along already in many automations.

[Roger Marty]

Do not under-estimate the power of Luddites and people who spread fear and doubt about computers and automation. Without them, we'd be much farther along already in many automations.

Hey dude, PhD in Computer Science here with a healthy dose of what's happening in state-of-the-art Machine Learning. I'm no luddite.

[Carlos Alvarez]

Hey dude, PhD in Computer Science here with a healthy dose of what's happening in state-of-the-art Machine Learning. I'm no luddite.

I didn't think I was suggesting you were. Just a general statement, look at how many people are holding us back from so many technologies.

[Simon MacGowen]

The technology will need to progress to impact other machines and larger commercial saws to become a given in commercial shops. . Dave

There has been a video showing a sliding saw (Italian?) with the sawstop (or sawstop like?) technology. I wonder what the new owner of SawStop in Germany is cooking; for a fact, I know SawStop is still being run separately from Festool, as the recently approved expansion of the US Festool compound is all about Festool and not SawStop.

Simon

[Simon MacGowen]

Just a general statement, look at how many people are holding us back from so many technologies.

Those people could include us ourselves! The refusal in some quarter to admit the SawStop as a valid safety technology is one, even though undisputed records of finger saves are out there for people to see. I have seen people say they would rather lose a finger than have a sawstop in their tablesaw (for whatever reason, which none of us would care anyway. It is their fingers...they can do or not do whatever they want).

Simon

[Carlos Alvarez]

Those people could include us ourselves! The refusal in some quarter to admit the SawStop as a valid safety technology is one, even though undisputed records of finger saves are out there for people to see. I have seen people say they would rather lose a finger than have a sawstop in their tablesaw (for whatever reason, which none of us would care anyway. It is their fingers...they can do or not do whatever they want).

Simon
Certainly, every tech should be evaluated, so I did. I realized it was mostly a gimmick and gave relatively little value compared to other potential saw features and abilities. But I didn't just dismiss it without research.

[jack forsberg]

Those people could include us ourselves! The refusal in some quarter to admit the SawStop as a valid safety technology is one, even though undisputed records of finger saves are out there for people to see. I have seen people say they would rather lose a finger than have a sawstop in their tablesaw (for whatever reason, which none of us would care anyway. It is their fingers...they can do or not do whatever they want).

Simon

Just a bit of a note and opinion from my end of things on the finger saves . It comes across to me A circular reasoning. This just shows untrained people with their hands too close to the blade with Basic safety gear removed.Who are we saving ? It just proves every time they say they saved a finger they don’t use safe practice. I mean it’s pretty hard to touch the blade with at least to push sticks 300cm long , a crown guard , riving knife and run off table . a properly calibrated sliding rip plate fence with high and low Four and after adjustment. Training is the most relevant thing all safety equipment is just a secondary. It would be a bad mistake to make it primary. I’m not suggesting that’s what you’re saying I would just like to share my opinion on the save as rudimentary back up to the Saw stop

[Roger Marty]

Certainly, every tech should be evaluated, so I did. I realized it was mostly a gimmick and gave relatively little value compared to other potential saw features and abilities. But I didn't just dismiss it without research.

Indeed, I personally determined that General Aviation (GA) has too high of a risk for me right now. Not entirely subjective-- about 1 death per 100,000 hours in General Aviation. I figure an avid flyer easily accumulates 200+ hours/year. So after doing that for 20 years, I have a 4% chance of dying. Now all the GA pilots tell me that majority of risk can be controlled. Sure it can. But humans are humans and I'm not arrogant enough to think that I'm safer than the average Joe out there.

Now awhile back, I did a back-of-the-envelope calculation on the likelihood of a table saw injury. I wish I had the figures I used at my fingertips...but I don't. But I calculated a sizable risk of a (non-kickback-related) table saw injury over 30 years and opted to spend the extra $1000 on the SawStop.

That said, my current risk of having a fatal cardiac event in the next 10 years is about 1.5% given my age, weight, and cholesterol levels.

[Carlos Alvarez]

Now awhile back, I did a back-of-the-envelope calculation on the likelihood of a table saw injury.

Since your calculations were based on numbers regarding everyone else, not to someone who is already thinking about safety, they really don't mean anything relative to you. Just doing this puts you in the group less likely to have an accident.

For example, I kept a boat in a marina at a very busy lake with a lot of idiots doing idiot things. The statistical "likelihood" of an injury seemed high. But then you realize it's all happening to people with no training, no care about safety, etc etc. So yeah, the numbers didn't apply to me--and likely to you. By even just considering all of this, you put yourself in a small percentage of the people who participate in the hobby, and the stats don't apply to you.

I raced and rode motorcycles pretty hard for most of my life. My stats were rather impossible to correlate to the masses of bike riders. On the one hand, they were higher because I was pushing it. On the other hand, that experience made me safer during average, normal riding.

[J.R. Rutter]

Training is the most relevant thing all safety equipment is just a secondary. It would be a bad mistake to make it primary.

Exactly. I've done some high performance driving education/coaching and this is a common theme regarding electronic stability control. Lots of students having ESP save them constantly without them even being aware. But a Sawstop is either working or triggered, not halfway in between. So I don't see any downside to having the secondary system in place as long as the machine performs well. And on the highway, I would much rather have all of the other drivers keep their ESP switched on :)

[jack forsberg]

Exactly. I've done some high performance driving education/coaching and this is a common theme regarding electronic stability control. Lots of students having ESP save them constantly without them even being aware. But a Sawstop is either working or triggered, not halfway in between. So I don't see any downside to having the secondary system in place as long as the machine performs well. And on the highway, I would much rather have all of the other drivers keep their ESP switched on :)

I couldn’t argue with you there. I guess the point of the video was the guy rely primarily on the technology. But push sticks , riving knives ,crown guards ,run off tables are secondary safety features as well. They all are the same amount of Importance At keeping your hand from the cutting blade. Saw stop was developed because secondary safety features are routinely removed in NA .

[Martin Wasner]

I think Jack brings up a valid point, that being, the SS is only one machine.

Safety is more of an attitude, an overall state of mind approaching power machinery.

Having just one machine that will save you from a mistake isn't really good enough, is it?

Only one machine will protect you from tools, material, and people in the shop.

I wonder if a company could afford the costs from misfires on something like a shaper? A big block of aluminum slamming into a $600 head isn't cheap like a $100 blade. Never mind the build quality it would take to bring that much mass to a halt without damaging the machine itself.

What about equipment that you're already maimed before you even reach the cutter?

[John C Cox]

There is some big industrial equipment which will brake hard and fast from a high speed.... But you generally have to replace a lot of parts when you activate that sort of emergency brake mechanism.... It's an expensive proposition... But it's a whole lot less costly than somebody loosing limbs (or worse)....

in general - only an idiot would stick their hand into it to see if it works. There are procedures for challenging the system which won't grenade the system....

[Carlos Alvarez]

Panic-stopping an MRI machine can cost a quarter million. I was sent to deliver metal-cased PCs to the MRI lab. Nobody did 2+2, and I walked in from the summer sun wearing shades, lost and unable to really see. When I felt something weird I decided to back up, and the only cost to the whole thing was destroying the hard drives.

[Simon MacGowen]

Just a bit of a note and opinion from my end of things on the finger saves . It comes across to me A circular reasoning. This just shows untrained people with their hands too close to the blade with Basic safety gear removed.Who are we saving ? It just proves every time they say they saved a finger they don’t use safe practice.

Regardless of what -- ignorance, not using safe practice, poor training or lack of training, distraction (intended or unintended) or even outright foolishness -- causes an injury and a finger save, the point you made does not negate or lessen the value of the sawstop feature as a safety technology.

Every medical professional, family member of the injured, the injured's employer or teacher and those who will be affected by a finger loss, let alone the sawstop user (not necessarily owner), would value the contribution of the sawstop technology as a safety feature.

Every finger save is a finger (or something worse) saved. We should not belittle or criticize the technology for doing its job, or not doing enough (only one machine but what about other machines), although we can trace and blame the incidents on other things.

Simon

[jack forsberg]

Sorry not buying it. First of all fingers saves are just triggered devices. No accounting for severity of the injury nor is it compare to anything . Dare I say a push stick has save more fingers then saw stop ever will. So will the Crown gaurd and riving knife with safe work practice. The majority of the counts are with one of these devices removed. And of all the unsafe things that can kill like kickback saw stop provides the worst type of fence . Clearly the long straight through bessy style fence Provides no high low or sliding Rip plate The most important thing in unison with a riving knife to prevent kick back. Lots of fingers were being saved before saw stop ? I mean my old Wadkin Saw come from England developed in 1920 came with a crown Gaurd and all of the features I just described . That’s why I agree it’s a gimmick as it doesn’t even provide proven safety yard technology that is almost 100 years old. Is it a useful device for those who remove basic safety kit yes . Is it a device for untrained people like in the schools yes . Does it encourage the use of crown guards I’m afraid not. none of these traditional guards will let your finger ever get close enough to be cut so what they don,t count as a Save . I say there is an element to the finger count and for blame to saw stop technology for gives the operator a false sense of security . the initial video so clearly illustrates this point . You cannot touch the blade if basic kit in place And safe work practice.


Accident historyCircular saw benches are the machines that cause the most woodworking accidents. Many of these result
in the amputation of fingers. Analysis of accidents investigated by HSE has found that most were
caused by inadequate or missing guards. Many of these accidents could have been avoided by having a correctly adjusted saw guard and using a push-stick. Inadequate or lack of training for the operator was also found to be a major cause. It is therefore very important that only properly trained and authorised operators are allowed to use circular saws. Kickback of the workpiece has caused serious and even fatal accidents.

[Simon MacGowen]

Sorry not buying it. First of all fingers saves are just triggered devices. No accounting for severity of the injury nor is it compare to anything . Dare I say a push stick has save more fingers then saw stop ever will. So will the Crown gaurd and riving knife with safe work practice. The majority of the counts are with one of these devices removed. And of all the unsafe things that can kill like kickback saw stop provides the worst type of fence . Clearly the long straight through bessy style fence Provides no high low or sliding Rip plate The most important thing in unison with a riving knife to prevent get back. Lots of fingers were being saved before saw stop ? Is it a useful device for those who remove basic safety kit yes . Is it a device for untrained people like in the schools yes . Does it encourage the use of crown guards I’m afraid not. none of these traditional guards will let your finger ever get close enough to be cut so what they don,t count as a Save . I say there is an element to the finger count and blame to saw stop technology gives the operator a false sense of security That the initial video so clearly illustrates. You cannot touch the blade if basic kit is in place .

There is a lot of misinformation in your latest post which I believe partly is because you have had little experience using a sawstop (I have been on record to say I started using an ICS in 2004ish; not a heavy but a regular user since including using the PCS and contractor (much less), but not the jobsite model).

First, I am not sure what you want to say about injury severity. Are you suggesting the severity of injury recorded in a finger save could have been much less anyway had it not been saved by the sawstop?

SawStop fence is as good as or as bad as any other fences seen in the common cabinet saws we see in NA, and if you think it is the worst type, it is the same worst type countless amateurs (which outnumber people who use cabinet saws for a living, and they are also the people SawStop is now heavily targeting at with its PCS and Contractor saws) are using. If a better fence can be designed and built for SawStop or any other cabinet saws, no one should object to it, but that in itself does not lessen the value of the sawstop technology.

It is true that many finger injuries were caused in which the blade guard and/or riving knife were not used (some others who are reading this thread have already said they don't need to use their guards). SawStop finger saving tech. was never invented to encourage or discourage people to use the guard; the saw stop is a just a feature to minimize injuries. Why are you grouping all other cabinet deficiencies in the discussion of the finger-saving technology? That is the point I don't understand.

The SawStop dust collection guard in fact encourages people to use it because it improves dust collection.

The false sense of security has been floated by so many people who have never used or have no interest in using the finger saving technology. I have heard people saying the new car safety features (which previously were available to only high end cars) would kill more than save people, people will rely oh those than their skills. Several years ago, someone even suggested the sawstop actually failed to work in a tablesaw accident.

Simon

[Carlos Alvarez]

First of all fingers saves are just triggered devices. No accounting for severity of the injury nor is it compare to anything .

Jack makes good points. I've also said this before--many times, a safety device breeds complacency and/or over-confidence. It will take a lot of time and data to figure out what changes in serious injuries happen for what reasons.

The absolutists who say "it's better than nothing" clearly have not studied psychology and statistics.

[jack forsberg]

Why are you grouping all other cabinet deficiencies in the discussion of the finger-saving technology? That is the point I don't understand.



Simon
I rest my case I have nothing else to say.

[jack forsberg]

Jack makes good points. I've also said this before--many times, a safety device breeds complacency and/or over-confidence. It will take a lot of time and data to figure out what changes in serious injuries happen for what reasons.

The absolutists who say "it's better than nothing" clearly have not studied psychology and statistics. Seen a lot of electronic fail in my years And of course saw stop people are bypassing the device. How dangerous ;)

[Martin Wasner]

It does amaze me how one tool, that doesn't get much use in a cabinet shop, creates so much content.

As far as it not developing complacency, you are full of it and haven't paid attention to humans. Anything you do that pads you from the reality of consequences will make people more complacent. One of the fanatics years ago asked would I ride a motorcycle differently with a helmet on? Of course I do. Riding three blocks in shorts, sunglasses, and flip flops turns me into the world's most careful motorcyclist. Put me in full leathers with an ambulance on the side of a track, ready to vacuum up my parts, and my survival instincts drop to nothing.

[Matt Mattingley]

The reason why humans have become the most powerful species on the planet...Is they have the ability to reason! No other animal possesses these traits to this extent. Ultimate power, ultimately corrupts.

So let’s just put the two reds together.

I know this machine will cut my fingers off in milli seconds. I have the power and money to buy a Machine that will not hurt me. I have the power and money to not have to take any trainings courses. I have the power and money to disregard/remove any safety guards provided by the manufacturer.

Tonight I took all the guards off my saw. I raised the blade to 5 inches above the table(18”blade) then cut a solid piece of cherry, using only a short fence, 5/4 thick. 7.2” wide rip, 29” long, with no push sticks, no riving knife, no safety glasses, no dust collection, No SS. I did Percision dress the fence & table sides of the board to take out any rocking.

It was a pretty cool adrenaline rush. I didn’t know the ends of my fingers had sweat glands until I looked at the board after the 20 Second cut.

For crap sake don’t remove your guards. And use your ability to reason.

[Martin Wasner]

Oh Matty, apples and horseshoes.

[Larry Frank]

These threads never change and we hear the same things every time.

The electronics will fail....

One becomes complacent...

It is safer without guards....

One can pay attention 100% of the time...

One has so much experience that they never will get hurt....

Time to move on as people will not change their minds.. as I have said before, if you want a Sawstop then get one and if you hate them don't get one.

[Mark Hennebury]

These threads never change and we hear the same things every time.

The electronics will fail....

One becomes complacent...

It is safer without guards....

One can pay attention 100% of the time...

One has so much experience that they never will get hurt....

Time to move on as people will not change their minds.. as I have said before, if you want a Sawstop then get one and if you hate them don't get one.


Not enjoying the debate Larry?.... maybe it's time for you to move on.

[Larry Frank]

The debate is a comedy of replies......

[Carlos Alvarez]

These threads never change and we hear the same things every time.

The electronics will fail....

One becomes complacent...

It is safer without guards....

One can pay attention 100% of the time...

One has so much experience that they never will get hurt....

Time to move on as people will not change their minds.. as I have said before, if you want a Sawstop then get one and if you hate them don't get one.

The only thing funnier than endless debates on safety items on various forums is the people who feel the need to tell everyone else to stop talking. You know you don't have to open this thread, right?

The motorcycle analogy is PERFECT! We have a saying in motorcycling; ATGATT. All the gear, all the time. Non-thinking people who look down on anyone who isn't fully leathered up for every single ride. It basically results in these same debates, where a certain vocal minority calls everyone else dumb for not doing that, and people who make decisions and compromises try to reason with them. It just hit me that the Sawstop and guards are ATGATT for the shop.

And yes, in spring and fall, when the weather changes from cold or hot to awesome, I do some short rides without any gear, even a helmet. I'm an adult, I can make choices. And I'm the most careful rider ever during those rides. Just like when I have to work without guards, I'm double conscious of my fingers, feed, etc.

[glenn bradley]

The only thing funnier than endless debates on safety items on various forums is the people who feel the need to tell everyone else to stop talking. You know you don't have to open this thread, right?

Darn! I just opened this thread with the intention of expressing surprise that it was still perpetuating . . .

You are, of course, absolutely right. Ya got me! :D:D:D

[Warren Lake]

problem with the bike anology is its no always up to you. Had a friend spend alot of time on the back wheel of his Ninja. Sold it cause he knew he was riding an edge and it could be life changing. Year later he bought a more powerful Ninja. In europe I saw four people pass me two on each bike full leathers, I thought geez most ive ever done is a leather jacket. Later in the day we came up on a traffic jamb, all four were killed. Car pulled out that didnt see them no front ends on the bikes.

Problem id have with a bike example is with the saw its you and the saw and the material, its if you screw up, its what you know or dont know. At least its not some moron coming out of no where attacking you.

[jack forsberg]

The debate is a comedy of replies......
We are the generation of grumpy old man. I’ll pass along this series of videos will tell the position. But if you happen to be a grumpy old man you may not find Your self amused :)

video=youtube;NyByBORmtH0]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NyByBORmtH0&list=PL6C0E574A11906EE9

[Lee Schierer]

Folks, this thread has run its course. Let's let it die......

[Mark Hennebury]

Folks, this thread has run its course. Let's let it die......

Hi Lee,


The forum is a social meeting place where we come to meet, discuss, debate, joke around, keep in-touch, learn and exchange ideas, participate or just sit back and watch the show.

A couple of days ago this thread had 10,560 views it is now up to 12,355 with active participation daily, hardly seems to me that it has run its course.

I don't understand Why anyone would want to see a thread end that has continued interest and participation; maybe you could explain that to me.

It is not mandatory for anyone to participate, so the ones that do are doing so willingly.

No need to kill it, or try hurry up its demise by telling us to move on, it will die of natural causes when interest ceases.

[Carlos Alvarez]

Hi Lee,


The forum is a social meeting place where we come to meet, discuss, debate, joke around, keep in-touch, learn and exchange ideas, participate or just sit back and watch the show.

A couple of days ago this thread had 10,560 views it is now up to 12,355 with active participation daily, hardly seems to me that it has run its course.

I don't understand Why anyone would want to see a thread end that has continued interest and participation; maybe you could explain that to me.

It is not mandatory for anyone to participate, so the ones that do are doing so willingly.

No need to kill it, or try hurry up its demise by telling us to move on, it will die of natural causes when interest ceases.

There's a common perception that forums need to be "managed" and that you will lose viewers if you let things "get out of control." I've found the exact opposite with every place I've modded or been an admin. Maybe it's different demographics, I don't know. But that's the answer to your question on why forums are quick to shut down dissent or even just minor crap-talk among members.

[Simon MacGowen]

Hi Lee,


The forum is a social meeting place where we come to meet, discuss, debate, joke around, keep in-touch, learn and exchange ideas, participate or just sit back and watch the show.

A couple of days ago this thread had 10,560 views it is now up to 12,355 with active participation daily, hardly seems to me that it has run its course.

I don't understand Why anyone would want to see a thread end that has continued interest and participation; maybe you could explain that to me.

It is not mandatory for anyone to participate, so the ones that do are doing so willingly.

No need to kill it, or try hurry up its demise by telling us to move on, it will die of natural causes when interest ceases.

I wholeheartedly support your position.

When a thread is enough, no one will read it, let alone participate in it.

I don't know the job description of a moderator, but telling people not to go on with a discussion that doesn't break the forum's rules has the unintentional effect of telling people not to come to the forum at all.

Simon

[Simon MacGowen]

But that's the answer to your question on why forums are quick to shut down dissent or even just minor crap-talk among members.

Another forum I frequent is thriving...the only times I know of a thread is locked -- it is done automatically without the intervention of a moderator -- are when people put something up for sale in the Classified Section. You cannot respond to or comment on the things put up for sale through the forum. PM is the way to contact the person selling things.

I also don't recall any thread getting removed in that forum.

Simon

[Carlos Alvarez]

Another forum I frequent is thriving...the only times I know of a thread is locked -- it is done automatically without the intervention of a moderator -- are when people put something up for sale in the Classified Section. You cannot respond to or comment on the things put up for sale through the forum. PM is the way to contact the person selling things.

I also don't recall any thread getting removed in that forum.

Simon

I love forums like that. I mod one where users do often thank us for doing the admin work without stepping on anyone, and letting the users manage each other and the content. They tell us they post more *because* they don't fear moderation or deletion.

[Martin Wasner]

Hit Sailing Anarchy. Two rules: no exposing real names, no accusation of pedophilia. (Somewhere in there someone got sued, so rule #2 was born)

It's probably the most successful forums I've participated in.

[Carlos Alvarez]

Hit Sailing Anarchy. Two rules: no exposing real names, no accusation of pedophilia. (Somewhere in there someone got sued, so rule #2 was born)

It's probably the most successful forums I've participated in.

LOL, that's a heck of a rule. Is there a short story you can tell?

The largest forum I mod has only a couple rules. Real names are encouraged, but nobody is allowed to expose anything personal otherwise, such as addresses, workplace, and the like. No NWS posts in areas other than "general chat," and they must be tagged in the subject (then anyone can choose to view or not).

[Simon MacGowen]

Hit Sailing Anarchy. Two rules: no exposing real names, no accusation of pedophilia. (Somewhere in there someone got sued, so rule #2 was born)

It's probably the most successful forums I've participated in.

Wow! One thread had almost half a million views and still counting.

Simon

[Matt Mattingley]

Folks, this thread has run its course. Let's let it die...... Lee, Do you have any opinions on the relevant decisions, regarding or disregarding safety, that has been provided by the manufacturer? You do contribute to this forum as a member as well,not just a moderator? What are your feelings and practises in your own shop with table saw safety? How do you feel your experience could help others? Isn’t this what a forum is all about???

I do believe this discussion has been very gentleman like and informative to(and from)Professionals, educators, people being educated to become professionals, novice and those who are considering entering the field as a hobbyist and anything in between. Can you explain your position and letting this thread die?

Why would you want anything to die that is so educational? Is this a collective decision of the whole mod team?
Edit: 217 posts, 12,700 views of gentlemen being gentleman, and a Full five star rating by contributing members.

Can you answer the 8 questions as a contributing member?

I’ve been printing this off for original post for class discussion, as posts have been contributed. I have directed about 48 students to this thread.

[jack forsberg]

Yet another high-tech gizmo to dazzle those who have gadgetitis! The point is it STILL cannot protect you from a kickback (one of the major injury risks on a table saw) - which is the result of rising teeth at the rear of the blade digging into the timber. If you have a properly designed saw with sufficient power, a sharp blade, a riving knife, a decent crown guard (the last two both mandatory on new saws in the UK) and a European short rip fence, and you have bothered to learn how to use your saw properly - i.e. with push blocks, push sticks, etc so that your fingers are always at least 10 to 12 inches away from the blade - then this device is just about superfluous. I think that the reason it was introduced in the USA is because American saws are to say the least safety deficient, the design of the guards being the same as 40 years ago - in Europe we have, thankfully, moved on. I'd rather see other safety measures, such as the standards for rip fences.


why talk about the other table saw features:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: :::?


My point was partly because these guys are fitting a piece of electronics onto a machine which seems to lack some of what are regarded in Europe as basic safety devices, namely a short rip fence (their own machines have a splitter for the crown and a long parallel fence). The fence they use is really a cheap solution more suited to sawing plywood than solid wood and can never be as good (read consistently parallel) as a properly triangulated short rip fence (like thoses on EU saws , for example, not the flimsy confections on certain other machines which shall be nameless) for solid stock ripping - ask anyone who worked on a Wadkin slider BGP in the 60s or 70s.

My experience of electronic devices on (industrial) woodworking machinery are that the dust and resin inevitably cause problems (premature failure of electronic sensors, etc) in the longer term, leading to disconnection, which to me is another reason to distrust devices such as this. I feel that electronics are never going to be a substitute for proper training and understanding of the processes of wood machining and I feel that this device is really marketed with (fear, uncertainty and doubt).

Finally, you are never going to get a blade which will totally eliminate the possibility kickback - it just isn't possible unless you also specify that all wood must not warp when being rip sawn. What you can get is a riving knife, crown guard and rip fence which when used in concert with push sticks and some basic common sense (or better still, training) will protect you from the vast majority of potential hazardous situations. After all, if it doesn't look safe, it probably isn't...

The SawStop was introduced for a market where people routinely remove guards and splitters and some use dado heads without the use of guards . Anyone formally trained in the use of the tablesaw should be able to tell you exactly why a SawStop will do little or nothing to protect you over and above the proper use of riving knife/crown guard/short rip fence/push sticks combination. You can not count finger saves if these are not in place. It seems to be a piece of equipment designed to protect people who are willing to take wholly unnecessary risks in the operation of a potentially dangerous machine (and let's face it any woodworking machine used incorrectly is just that). In training you are taught the use of the short rip fence, crown guard, riving knife and push sticks and it is drilled into to you time and again that "fingers should never be nearer the blade than 12 inches". During training were you to break this rule you would find yourself barred from using any machine unsupervised until the shop foreman were satisfied that you had learned the safe use of equipment. And surely that's the point - SawStop is designed to protect your fingers when you've already placed yourself in easily avoidable danger - use a TS correctly and SawStop becomes superfluous. My contention is that safety training is more relevant than any number of add-on gadgets of potentially limited application (and incidentally costs less). But then, what do I know?


For those who are interested and the links i posted earlier in the safe use of the table saw I'd recommend the HSE website saw page to you http://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/wis16.pdf it really is worth printing out the pages and reading them through, you never know it might make you a safer woodworker. This site is frequently referred to on both amateur and professional forums in other parts of the world, so it can't be all bad - best of all it is free training! The full index of Woodworking topics is here http://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/woodindx.htm.


http://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/wis16.pdf

http://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/woodindx.htm

[Simon MacGowen]

Better say this before it is too late (as the thread can be locked or simply disappear with no trace -- and without explanations):

The reality in NA is that the cabinet saws will stay and the EU style slider saws will remain to have a minority share in the hobbyist market. Given that reality, the sawstop is the next best thing.

It is true that if ALL safety measures are followed (guard on, don't cut wet wood, don't get distracted, don't work when you are tired, don't blah blah blah), the sawstop is useless. In fact, as long as I use a sawstop, I do hope the finger-saving tech is useless to me -- I don't want it to get activated! Neither do I want to file an insurance claim for a burn-down house.

Until the day comes when every woodworker does EVERYTHING right when using a tablesaw, the value of the sawstop technology will remain.

Simon

[andy bessette]

...learn how to use your saw properly - i.e. with push blocks, push sticks, etc so that your fingers are always at least 10 to 12 inches away from the blade...

This is completely unnecessary and potentially responsible for many kickbacks, due to lack of control of the workpiece.

[jack forsberg]

This is completely unnecessary and potentially responsible for many kickbacks, due to lack of control of the workpiece.
I take it you’re one of those that has the long through fence . And then push sticks are used to guide the work after the cut is finished but the pieces is trapped between the saw blade and long through fence . I mean isn’t it lovely that such inventions like the gripper Require the removal of the crown guard for the there very purpose of control of the work in the trapped location above the blade. Had you done any research on the short position fence you would realize that your hand never enters that area and that the piece can no longer be trapped between the fence after the cut therefore illuminating kicked back. You come across as a person who hasn’t read the documentation on how to Eliminate kick back with the Hi low rip plate fence . Here is a pulled back rip plate fence in use Who techniques have reduced kickbacks since mandated in 1978 Machinery regulations.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=luS0q1GmjxM&app=desktop

[Lee Schierer]

Lee, Do you have any opinions on the relevant decisions, regarding or disregarding safety, that has been provided by the manufacturer?

With over 10,500 posts, I believe I contribute a bit more than just being a moderator....

The original topic of this thread was an unusual saw stop accident. I do not own a saw stop and have never used one. I respect the technology and have seen it restore woodworking equipment to some high schools where the previous safety devices failed to adequate prevent injuries and the eventual elimination of the training from our schools. If I were buying a new saw today it probably would be a Saw Stop.

In answer to some of your questions. I have been a woodworker for 58 years. I started woodworking with my father making bird houses and craft projects for cub scouts. He owned a radial arm saw which to me a the time was marvelous machine for cutting wood. He stressed to me the safety aspects of woodworking as did my instructors through various shop classes I took in school. I also learned that some of the things my teachers stressed were not necessarily the safest way to do things. Over the years I have learned more and more techniques and have been a pretty safe woodworker. I was bit once by my table saw doing a cut that at the time I was nervous about and in the end, my instincts were correct as I made a trip to the ER and received 21 stitches to repair my little finger on my left hand. I was extremely fortunate that no tendons or nerves were damaged. That has been my only shop accident where professional medical attention was required. All the rest have been splinters or minor cuts from sharp wood edges.

In my professional career in the Navy and as and engineer and project manager in industry, I have been held accountable for the safety of those working for me as either a contractor or a fellow employee. I have stressed safety for over 40 years.

I cringe when I watch so called professionals make free hand cuts, both ripping and cross cuts without guides, safety shields or even safety glasses. The response I often hear is “ I've done this a thousand times with out an injury” or something along those lines. What they don't understand is that the basic act is inherently dangerous and eventually they will get bit or worse cause someone else to get hurt by copying them. You Tube and other online sources are full of people who show techniques which are questionable, touting that these methods are safe.

My saw is a 30 year old Craftsman saw that is well tuned and outfitted with an after market fence, miter gauge and a zero clearance insert. The original blade guard was a piece of junk that was more dangerous than none at all, so it rarely gets used. With that being said I don't advocate that practice for others as it does leave the blade exposed. I compensate for the lack of guarding by using a selection of push sticks, feather boards, crosscut sleds and jigs to make most cuts. I also carefully evaluate each operation I make around any piece of machinery in my shop to insure that what I am about to do is safe and that I will be clear of the work piece and cutting edges should something go wrong. I haven't had a kick back on my saw in many many years, but yet I insure that I don't stand in the line of fire. My personal website shows a fraction of the pieces I have made accident free.

I was originally taught in school that the bottom of the gullets on a saw blade should just clear the wood when making a cut. What I've learned by experience and studying the geometry and vectors of the cutting action that you actually get a safer cut with the blade raised an inch or more above the top of the work piece. This insures that the blade is driving the work piece down against the table and is preventing the piece from wanting to climb up the blade and raise up off the table where a kick back can occur.

This particular thread has wandered back and forth from the topic and has pretty much stated everything that can be said several times. It has also wander to discussions of moderation on other forums which has no bearing on the topic. No one is likely to change an opinion at this point. There are those who love technology and those that don't, we can all agree to disagree over the value of new innovations and/or gadgets.

I advocate safety above all and if it is safe then do it. If it is unsafe, don't.

[Carlos Alvarez]

I was originally taught in school that the bottom of the gullets on a saw blade should just clear the wood when making a cut. What I've learned by experience and studying the geometry and vectors of the cutting action that you actually get a safer cut with the blade raised an inch or more above the top of the work piece. This insures that the blade is driving the work piece down against the table and is preventing the piece from wanting to climb up the blade and raise up off the table where a kick back can occur.

Huh, and I've always heard that the blade tips should just barely clear the wood, and the cleanest cuts come from doing that. My experience is that my saw sounds better also, and often, noise equates to wasted energy/force, which often also leads to undesirable loads. I don't think I've ever heard someone advocate something different.

[andy bessette]

Running the blade too low can cause the workpiece to rise.

[Carlos Alvarez]

Running the blade too low can cause the workpiece to rise.

Of course. The question is "what is too low?"

[jack forsberg]

Huh, and I've always heard that the blade tips should just barely clear the wood, and the cleanest cuts come from doing that. My experience is that my saw sounds better also, and often, noise equates to wasted energy/force, which often also leads to undesirable loads. I don't think I've ever heard someone advocate something different.
it is very common to have the blade high in the UK. I do believe that the idea of it low blade is to reduce the exposed blade should the hand come in contact the injury is less severe . A crown guard take care of a high blade and finger contact and the riving knife keeps the rising teeth at the back from lifting the work in the high possession . in the low possession the blade want to lift the work at the blade and then slap the wood around on the table,at least if your at the end of a long stick and are not putting down pressure at the blade. also high count teeth blades with small gullet do not have a chance to clear at the top and so can pack before they go out the bottom, this can bind the blade up on the sides with packed saw dust and pull on the work or burn . the only time i rip(cross cut is different ) with the blade low is if i have a cross cut blade in the saw with little set and i do not want black eyes on the plate . mind you i am to lazy to change out for the right rip blade for just one cut LOL. i like the blade high for ripping in general

[David Kumm]

Like most of life, I think there are different schools of thought about blade height, just as there are about short vs long rip fences. The high blade cutting downward, the nose guard, and the short fence are the English way - and maybe the Euro way- Jack will know better than I. I do prefer the higher blade and short fence on my 16-18" saws but I also pull the fence forward to add more support in front of the blade for longer stock. I don't know if the methods for a 10" blade would necessarily be the same as what works with a 16" blade which also cuts a much wider kerf. I have about 10 saws and each has slightly different sweet spots. When I rehab a saw, in addition to the splitter or riving knife, I spend a fair amount of time aligning the rip fence and eliminating the runout on the arbor. I feel both are essential. A good riving knife on a saw where the fence or arbor move under load is still a poor design. Dave

[jack forsberg]

Like most of life, I think there are different schools of thought about blade height, just as there are about short vs long rip fences. The high blade cutting downward, the nose guard, and the short fence are the English way - and maybe the Euro way- Jack will know better than I. I do prefer the higher blade and short fence on my 16-18" saws but I also pull the fence forward to add more support in front of the blade for longer stock. I don't know if the methods for a 10" blade would necessarily be the same as what works with a 16" blade which also cuts a much wider kerf. I have about 10 saws and each has slightly different sweet spots. When I rehab a saw, in addition to the splitter or riving knife, I spend a fair amount of time aligning the rip fence and eliminating the runout on the arbor. I feel both are essential. A good riving knife on a saw where the fence or arbor move under load is still a poor design. Dave


Not a matter of theory the short fence and high blade at all Dave :). A matter of fact which is relatively easy to demonstrate with badly stressed timber on an under powered saw if you want to be brave. To my knowledge the short rip fence technique has been taught in colleges in the UK (and for that matter most of Europe) as general practice since at least the 1960s and appeared as the "norm" on purpose-built saws from the earliest days ( 1840s). The fact is the long through fence was introduced on lower cost general purpose saws in the 1930s possibly as a means of handling sheet materials and NOT solid timber. The fact that it was a cheaper alternative to a properly triangulated rip fence mounted on a substantial fence bar probably encouraged it's propagation, but look at any medium to heavy weight industrial saw ( Wadkin AGS or Startrite powermatic Delta Saw Stop are by definition both low cost and lightweight designs). I find it interesting that in the 1970s Wadkin finally gave the AGS a decently triangulated rip fence and that the last of the Startrites were similarly equipped with a modern sliding face rip fence.

Incidentally I use neither and both - my saw has a sliding fence plate which allows it to be used as a short rip fence (also useful as a lengthening stop when crosscutting) as well as a long fence (useful, for example, when ripping thin solid timber edgings which can require extra support). This has been the norm on professional quality European saws for many years as opposed to DIY or amateur equipment. Most of the time the fence is used in short mode as it is possible to experience kickback even when one is ripping MDF against a long fence, especially if the board is warped or "case hardened" , also that for professional workshops the use of the short rip fence has been mandated on safety grounds since at least the 1974 WW Machinery Regs


for those that do not know what type of fence we are taking about here is one (after market) . Delta used to make one .

389975

for those wishing to learn more on the TS fence for the DIY look here


http://fence.morecheap.us/how-to-build-a-better-table-saw-fence/

[Carlos Alvarez]

Perhaps this deserves its own thread.

My one major kickback happened with a high blade and extended fence. Anecdotal, of course, but just sharing. I've never had a kick or any issue of any sort once I got my saw tuned to perfection, then re-did it for even more perfection. Since then, everything is smooth and safe. And I always run with the blade *barely* peeking over the wood.

[Pat Barry]

I'm not sure I see the benefit of a short rip fence because, assuming the fence is properly adjusted parallel or slightly open to the blade I dont see it contributing to kickback. None the less, it would be simple to add a short fence adapter board to a standard fence if anyone sees the need.

[Lee Schierer]

Huh, and I've always heard that the blade tips should just barely clear the wood, and the cleanest cuts come from doing that. My experience is that my saw sounds better also, and often, noise equates to wasted energy/force, which often also leads to undesirable loads. I don't think I've ever heard someone advocate something different.

Set your saw so the teeth just come thought the top surface of the cut piece. Then with the saw off push a piece of wood into the blade, most likely it will climb right up over the blade. Now raise the blade an inch or more above the top surface and repeat the push test. You will have great difficulty getting the piece to climb up the blade.

[Pat Barry]

I also agree with the higher is better blade height. I think it presents a better cutting angle to drive the piece down during cutting, particularly rip cutting. A low blade height will present much more force pushing back on the piece toward the user. I think this contributes greatly to the kickback hazard.

[Ben Rivel]

I was taught to set the blade height so the bottom of the gullet was at the top of the material being cut. Is that now considered too high?

[Carlos Alvarez]

Set your saw so the teeth just come thought the top surface of the cut piece. Then with the saw off push a piece of wood into the blade, most likely it will climb right up over the blade. Now raise the blade an inch or more above the top surface and repeat the push test. You will have great difficulty getting the piece to climb up the blade.

Well you got me, I went out and tried it. It's not difficult at all; rolled right up onto the blade in both cases. And there is zero correlation between a blade being moved slowly in the wrong direction compared to a blade moving at 5k RPM in the correct direction. You'd have to be moving wood at 100 MPH to make it really climb versus cut.

Here are some thoughts on it that seem useful: https://www.protoolreviews.com/trades/carpentry/setting-the-optimal-table-saw-blade-height/24594/

Freud's position is that you want a full tooth to clear the wood and no more.

[Simon MacGowen]

I was taught to set the blade height so the bottom of the gullet was at the top of the material being cut. ?

Been doing this since Day 1 as I was told a low blade would be less conducive to under the table dust collection.

Simon

[jack forsberg]

I'm not sure I see the benefit of a short rip fence because, assuming the fence is properly adjusted parallel or slightly open to the blade I dont see it contributing to kickback. None the less, it would be simple to add a short fence adapter board to a standard fence if anyone sees the need.
the real problem is with reaction timber in grades less than select or better. unless you can predict case Harding and which way a board will behave and will push off the fence into the blade and rising teeth at the back . the worst would be with a right tilt saw and the blade tipped into the fence . the short fence really does a great job here . you can just make out the inverted U-slots in the riving knife on the Hammer below (note crown guard removed for illustration purposes and fence plate not necessarily in the best place . the crown will not foul if the sliding plate is in the low position and pulled back to front of center on the blade
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as to the riving knife most have no idea of the proper spec on these.

389980

389981

[Lee Schierer]

Well you got me, I went out and tried it. It's not difficult at all; rolled right up onto the blade in both cases. And there is zero correlation between a blade being moved slowly in the wrong direction compared to a blade moving at 5k RPM in the correct direction. You'd have to be moving wood at 100 MPH to make it really climb versus cut.

Here are some thoughts on it that seem useful: https://www.protoolreviews.com/trades/carpentry/setting-the-optimal-table-saw-blade-height/24594/

Freud's position is that you want a full tooth to clear the wood and no more.

Not all saw blades move at 5K rpm, many are considerably slower.

[Matt Mattingley]

Set your saw so the teeth just come thought the top surface of the cut piece. Then with the saw off push a piece of wood into the blade, most likely it will climb right up over the blade. Now raise the blade an inch or more above the top surface and repeat the push test. You will have great difficulty getting the piece to climb up the blade.
Lee I respect you a lot! This ithread can be learned from. Thank you for your more in depth contributions... as you are absolutely correct. Raising your blade while using riving knife and overhead guard help extremely,... feather boards and short fence help extremely when cutting reaction lumber. Sometimes using Long fence that extends beyond the blade after the cut, arc‘s into the blade causing a jam that the riving knife wasn’t designed for.

This becomes an other danger. This is the danger that most woodworkers have not been trained for but is relevant if only ever using long fence. Most European sliders encompass short fence designs. Implementing a long fence is still there for ply material.

What is The new company’s owner going to do with this technology?
How is the service going to be for the next 20 years?
Will PARTs be replaceable?

Lee, what table saw you presently running? What would you really replace it with, considering the use to market?

Do you have a dream table saw weather vintage or present day?

My personal vintage would be complete pk. I am working on it.
If I have the space, money, I would order a brand new Altendorf F 45.

[Lee Schierer]

Lee, what table saw you presently running? What would you really replace it with, considering the use to market?


I currently own a 1-1/2 Hp Craftsman 113 model saw with the open web cast iron wings. I have added a 4 foot extension table out the back side of the saw, which allows me to handle long pieces of work without assistance. I have a Beismeyer fence and a Kreg cross cut guide. I use Grip-Tite feather boards and Freud full kerf blades. The saw suits my needs very well and I have no desire to replace it. Best of all it has paid for itself many times over.

[Joe Calhoon]

it is very common to have the blade high in the UK. I do believe that the idea of it low blade is to reduce the exposed blade should the hand come in contact the injury is less severe . A crown guard take care of a high blade and finger contact and the riving knife keeps the rising teeth at the back from lifting the work in the high possession . in the low possession the blade want to lift the work at the blade and then slap the wood around on the table,at least if your at the end of a long stick and are not putting down pressure at the blade. also high count teeth blades with small gullet do not have a chance to clear at the top and so can pack before they go out the bottom, this can bind the blade up on the sides with packed saw dust and pull on the work or burn . the only time i rip(cross cut is different ) with the blade low is if i have a cross cut blade in the saw with little set and i do not want black eyes on the plate . mind you i am to lazy to change out for the right rip blade for just one cut LOL. i like the blade high for ripping in general

This is not common in the UK anymore Jack. All the shop owners there said the old UK saws with the fence pulled back in front of the blade and blade at full height was very dangerous. Sure, you probably see it in some old school or one man shops. The pro shops that have employees have pretty much adopted the mainland Euro safety standards that dictate fence between 30 to 45 degrees in front of the blade and the blade high but not full height.

It’s pretty rare to see a conventional table saw in a Euro shop but table saws are mainstream here both for hobby woodworkers and pros and that will probably never change. Most euro shops use sliders which removes a lot of the danger inherent to table saws especially for kickback. I realize most here are hobby woodworkers and don’t have the space of funds for a sliding saw.
Here are a few pictures from a BGHM safety book. They have about 30 plus pages on saw safety. A sliding saw is used in the examples but a lot of this would be valid for tables saws. This might be available online but their site is only in German and difficult to navigate.

390021
390022
390023

[Ole Anderson]

Just an observation: This thread recently seems to be dominated by a few guys that are in a commercial shop setting that can justify a much larger budget for equipment than the average hobbyist Joe here on the creek, many who are trying to follow this thread. Most of us can't afford or have the room for the fancy and expensive Euro sliders. I feel fortunate that I have an older 3 hp cabinet saw (a Grizz 1023) when I see many here are successfully (and hopefully safely) using a $300-$800 job site saw in their shop. I am in the camp that says you can use an older (non-SS) saw safely if you follow a few basic rules and use a blade guard, hopefully with a riving knife, or at least a decent splitter. I learned my lesson with a kickback to the gut only a few years after I got my saw.

[Ken Fitzgerald]

Just an observation: This thread recently seems to be dominated by a few guys that are in a commercial shop setting that can justify a much larger budget for equipment than the average hobbyist Joe here on the creek, many who are trying to follow this thread. Most of us can't afford or have the room for the fancy and expensive Euro sliders. I feel fortunate that I have an older 3 hp cabinet saw (a Grizz 1023) when I see many here are successfully (and hopefully safely) using a $300-$800 job site saw in their shop. I am in the camp that says you can use an older (non-SS) saw safely if you follow a few basic rules and use a blade guard, hopefully with a riving knife, or at least a decent splitter. I learned my lesson with a kickback to the gut only a few years after I got my saw.

Ole, I couldn't agree more with you! The only time the blade guard comes off my saw is when I am doing dados or a non-through cut. My blade guard has a splitter that works well and it's not removeable.

[Joe Calhoon]

Just an observation: This thread recently seems to be dominated by a few guys that are in a commercial shop setting that can justify a much larger budget for equipment than the average hobbyist Joe here on the creek, many who are trying to follow this thread. Most of us can't afford or have the room for the fancy and expensive Euro sliders. I feel fortunate that I have an older 3 hp cabinet saw (a Grizz 1023) when I see many here are successfully (and hopefully safely) using a $300-$800 job site saw in their shop. I am in the camp that says you can use an older (non-SS) saw safely if you follow a few basic rules and use a blade guard, hopefully with a riving knife, or at least a decent splitter. I learned my lesson with a kickback to the gut only a few years after I got my saw.

Ole,
I did mention in my post that I know most here are hobby and use table saws. The safety pages I posted can be useful for table saws.
Yes, Table saws can be used safely. I used one for 40 years with no loss of limb.
joe

[Martin Wasner]

Joe, how much of the slider work has gone to routers? I'm convinced nowadays that with out one you can't be competitive, and I think that holds especially true when doing frameless cabinetry where the machining is quite a bit different than face frame cabinetry.


If I were getting into this today, I'd probably get a router and a, edge bander. Then just work.

I also purely think of this industry from a residential cabinetmakers view too. I would think that is the most prolific of woodworkers though.

[Mark Hennebury]

Joe, how much of the slider work has gone to routers? I'm convinced nowadays that with out one you can't be competitive, and I think that holds especially true when doing frameless cabinetry where the machining is quite a bit different than face frame cabinetry.


If I were getting into this today, I'd probably get a router and a, edge bander. Then just work.

I also purely think of this industry from a residential cabinetmakers view too. I would think that is the most prolific of woodworkers though.

Martin,

I worked in a commercial cabinet shop for a year or two a couple of years back; They seemed to be making lots of money as the three owners had huge houses and late model BMW's and they punched out a lot of cabinets for Universities, food courts and such; They had a big slider, a cnc router and a cnc edgebander Most of the cabinet parts were cut on the CNC router. In talking with the shop foreman, he told me that since they got the cnc router they had increased productivity ten-fold!
He said that everything used to be cut on the slider, and since getting the CNC router the slider was hardly used. They got through forlifts of panel stock each day, with probably ten shop employees. All parts were cut on the router and had part numbers stuck on them and stacked in racks, to be taken and assembled. Mostly the job consisted of gluing and pinning boxes together, Not exactly interesting work.

[brent stanley]

This is not common in the UK anymore Jack. All the shop owners there said the old UK saws with the fence pulled back in front of the blade and blade at full height was very dangerous. Sure, you probably see it in some old school or one man shops. The pro shops that have employees have pretty much adopted the mainland Euro safety standards that dictate fence between 30 to 45 degrees in front of the blade and the blade high but not full height.

It’s pretty rare to see a conventional table saw in a Euro shop but table saws are mainstream here both for hobby woodworkers and pros and that will probably never change. Most euro shops use sliders which removes a lot of the danger inherent to table saws especially for kickback. I realize most here are hobby woodworkers and don’t have the space of funds for a sliding saw.
Here are a few pictures from a BGHM safety book. They have about 30 plus pages on saw safety. A sliding saw is used in the examples but a lot of this would be valid for tables saws. This might be available online but their site is only in German and difficult to navigate.

390021
390022
390023

Were people promoting the rip fence be positioned in front of the blade? I've never heard of that. What I've heard is what is depicted in the diagram in the top left of your first image.

B

[Joe Calhoon]

Joe, how much of the slider work has gone to routers? I'm convinced nowadays that with out one you can't be competitive, and I think that holds especially true when doing frameless cabinetry where the machining is quite a bit different than face frame cabinetry.


If I were getting into this today, I'd probably get a router and a, edge bander. Then just work.

I also purely think of this industry from a residential cabinetmakers view too. I would think that is the most prolific of woodworkers though.

Martin,
Depends on the shop. If all you are doing is making furniture for IKEA you better have a lights out fully robotic CNC shop.
For high end custom though classical machines are not going away anytime soon. In Euro shops sliders are not used much for sheets other than special and miter cuts. They see most use in solid wood shops for the odd cuts. Way quicker for a lot of jobs than a CNC.

Here is a good example of a vintage slider in a small German shop we were in this year. Shop was a little smaller than my 4000 sq ft.
4 highly skilled employees plus the 2 owner brothers. Been in the family for several generations.

They just installed a Weinig Conturex which is about the ultimate in a CNC processing center along with a new CNC moulder. They also had a lot of 70s and 80s classic machines that they said are used daily for jobs not compatible with the CNC. These guys were producing a lot of quality work from the small space they were in.
390024

[jack forsberg]

This is not common in the UK anymore Jack. All the shop owners there said the old UK saws with the fence pulled back in front of the blade and blade at full height was very dangerous. Sure, you probably see it in some old school or one man shops. The pro shops that have employees have pretty much adopted the mainland Euro safety standards that dictate fence between 30 to 45 degrees in front of the blade and the blade high but not full height.







Joe if what you mean are old fixed arbors and fixed short fence saws they can only be run that way . when i say high i do not mean full. They do not have rise and fall the older kit , but they do demonstrate there effect at handling kick back on reaction timber . they do no have a sliding plate. as to there value there are a Numbers on E bay currently now asking $4000 each . these do have rise and fall and a fixed short plate fence . Not every one in the UK makes windows some make pallets .


Mr Dovey showing a rope feed rip saw of the type .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9HMLx6Iiv8

most of these type were resaws and came with power feed like this Wadkin Pickels . This one in operation in the UK

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IWeFhpJ1rJI

390025

390026

most on ebay are the more modern type from the 60s and 70s

390027

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Wadkin-20-BSW-rip-saw/173413887856?hash=item286045ef70:g:tvsAAOSw8Ntal83 A


so they still teach it in the UK in school. here is a posters from the HSE for the modern shops there ,look at the top

390028

[jack forsberg]

Martin,

I worked in a commercial cabinet shop for a year or two a couple of years back; They seemed to be making lots of money as the three owners had huge houses and late model BMW's and they punched out a lot of cabinets for Universities, food courts and such; They had a big slider, a cnc router and a cnc edgebander Most of the cabinet parts were cut on the CNC router. In talking with the shop foreman, he told me that since they got the cnc router they had increased productivity ten-fold!
He said that everything used to be cut on the slider, and since getting the CNC router the slider was hardly used. They got through forlifts of panel stock each day, with probably ten shop employees. All parts were cut on the router and had part numbers stuck on them and stacked in racks, to be taken and assembled. Mostly the job consisted of gluing and pinning boxes together, Not exactly interesting work.
was that Gamberdino or Alaska Mark you worked for ? I am sure that there must have been a room in the back that had the saw bench for the one offs