How would you do this...

[joe lear]

Recently while trying to build a copy of the Workshop Hutch by NYW's Norm, I had to make dados in 2x4 lumber. I don't own a radial arm saw so the cuts where made on the table saw. Thank God nothing happened but it seemed to me that the way I did these cuts was sort of dangerous. The 2x4 where about 75 in long so using the miter gage was out of the question. I did the inside cuts freehand on the table saw and the corners with the fence and holding the wood for dear life while using the miter gage. Any suggestions as to how I could have done this safer or was this the correct way of doing it. Thanks.http://www.woodworkingtalk.com/images/smilies/blink.gif

ASlo, how would you crosscut large panels on the table saw. I made a panel cutting jig but if the panel is to wide to begin with it just won't work. I already had a MAJOR Kickback http://www.woodworkingtalk.com/images/smilies/oops.gif today while doing this operation. Any suggestions?

[Pat Zabrocki]

If you have a circular saw you could use that. The depth of cut would be easy to set. I've built that hutch (its in the background of my avatar) and those joints don't have to pretty. Also, on the table saw, don't use the fence for cross cuts. Use a stop block clamped to the fence that does not extend to the blade to set your measurement and then make the cut. You do not want the piece to bind against the fence for a the cross cut.
cheers
Pat

[John D. Thompson]

Hey Joe,

I haven't seen the plans you are building to but, if there aren't too many of those dadoes, you can make them with a hand held circular saw and a speedsquare. Just define the sides of the joint with care and waste the rest freehand. Then clean up with a chisel. This is probably exactly what you were trying to avoid! Alternatively, a shop-built jig to be used with a router and guide bushing is usually very fast after the initial dialing-in.

Cross-cutting large panels can be accomplished with the use of a Clamp-'n'-Tool Guide. This is a brand name and it is the only one of its' type I have come to trust. Alternatively, you might use a jointed length of hardwood and a couple of clamps.

Your sawblade MUST be registered dead-parallel with the edge of the table(which should,by rights, be dead-parallel with the miter-gauge slots).

Just clamp the toolguide parallel with your intended cut at the appropriate distance from the cut-line, lay the panel on the saw in such a way that the guide is on the underside of the panel so it will run against the table edge, and, carefully, feed the work through the saw.

If the panel is so long that it overbalances or WILL overbalance when it is cut through, you would be wise to provide out-board support. A length of jointed lumber carefully screwed (edge up) to sawhorses co-planar with and angled SLIGHTLY toward the tablesaw edge works very well for this. It must be said here that I have a personal distaste for portable roller stands as I have found them to be near impossible to keep in alignment and, thus, they tend to push the work all over the place. This can be, shall we say, disconcerting.

While I have built several kitchens using this method, it is a pretty tedious sort of operation and it does require that you stay "tuned in" to the task at hand.

Stay Safe! JT

[Ken Fitzgerald]

You could also make the dados using a router and straight edge.

[Andy Fox]

Make a large crosscut sled. This will cut large panels and allow you to do the dados in the long pieces of lumber if you stabilize the long pieces by clamping them down with blocks held against the fence with clamps. Mine is about 4' x 27", and covers nearly the entire top of my table saw. It has a front and rear fence, but the rear fence is to support the rear of the sled only. It has a 3" wide strip cut from the blade area to allow for using replaceable inserts which I cut from the same piece of 1/2" Baltic birch plywood I used for the base. The sled rides with runners in both miter slots. The design is mostly from Tolpin's book Table Saw Magic, but I'll bet that if you search on "sled" in this forum you'll see some excellent designs to copy.

Be sure to use a stop block screwed to the sled and a matching one on your saw table edge so that the sled can't go too far past the blade and surprise you by going through the guard block on the back of the fence.

Another option would be to use a homemade square guide and router to do both the dados and the panel crosscutting, but for workshop furniture I think I'd rather just use a circular saw and chisel for this.

[Al Killian]

You could also make the dado's useing a dado plane.:p

[Brian Clevenger]

At least in my neck of the woods, radial arm saws come by pretty cheap. I grabbed on old Rockwell for $150. There's an old DeWalt on Craig's list for $200.

I wouldn't mess with the Craftsman, newer Delta, Black&Decker DeWalt years, or the Emerson made Ridgids, but if you can find a well cared for Ol' Arn RAS in your area, it takes up little room, and earns its keep right quick.

It is the perfect companion to set even with the end of that hutch for stock support.

[Doug Shepard]

Using both the miter gauge and the fence together is a big no-no. It's no wonder you came close to getting kickback. I'd have probably gone with the circular saw method others have mentioned, or maybe routed them.

[Dave Morris]

Cutting guides are your friends, for both the router and circular saw. Take a piece of thin material, either 1/4" ply or hardboard, and rip a piece off one factory edge about three to six inches wide. Glue this on top of another piece of the same material so the factory edge is set back slightly more than the distance of the router bit (or skill saw blade) to the edge of the tools base. Run the tool along the upper factory edge, trimming off the excess material from the lower piece. You now have a exact (and straight) line where the tool will cut. The nice thing about this type of jig is the original cut you make to separate the factory edge doesn't have to be perfect, since you only use the factory edge as a reference, and a skill saw, jig saw, or even a hand saw will work for the initial "separation" cut.

If you make the original "separation" cut on a table saw, or have a good straightedge as a guide, you can use both sides of the original upper piece-- one edge for the router and the other edge for the circular saw. Just make the lower piece wide enough so one tool cuts off the excess from each side. I've got a couple of these jigs, one for cuts up to 48" in length, the other for full-size sheets of plywood. Both jigs are two-sided, so they work with my hand held router and my circular saw. Just be sure to mark which side is for which tool.

Lay the 2x4's on a flat surface, clamp them together so they don't move, mark where you want the dado, lay the guide along that line (paying close attention to which side of the line you actually you want to remove material), and clamp the guide in place over the 2x4's. You'll get matching dado's in all the pieces, and in all the right places.

For dado's wider than the cutting tool's bit or blade, make multiple passes. This is where an adjustable router base really shines, since you won't have to reposition the guide.

Cross-cutting long pieces such as you described using the miter gauge on the table saw is something I wouldn't want to try. A sliding miter saw would work if you don't have room for a full-size radial arm saw, but you are limited to how far (wide) the miter saw will slide. A cutting guide works not only for tasks like ganged-up 2x4's, but for cutting/dado/rabbeting large panels as well. Plus, you can bring the tool to the task outside the shop, instead of manhandling large pieces in sometimes cluttered shop space.

Then again, there's always a sliding table saw, but I have neither the long green nor the space for one of those beauties.;)

[John Schreiber]

Unless I'm misunderstanding, a handsaw and a chisel will do the job quickly and neatly.

[Greg Funk]

Using both the miter gauge and the fence together is a big no-no. It's no wonder you came close to getting kickback. I'd have probably gone with the circular saw method others have mentioned, or maybe routed them.

Using the miter gauge and a fence is not a problem as long as you are using a dado blade and not cutting through the wood.

If you support the long 2x4's and clamp them to the miter gauge you shouldn't have any problem cutting the dados safely on a tablesaw.

Greg

[Todd Jensen]

and DON'T run stock that long, particularly and especially 2x4s sideways through your tablesaw - super recipe for disaster in my opinion.

[Andrew Williams]

Another vote for hand tools. Unless you are making a whole bunch of these dadoes...and I really mean a lot!

I made a clamp rack from 2x4 pine stock a while back and needed to make a lot of dadoes. Pine is so soft that I just marked them and cut them with a crosscut backsaw. The waste chops out with about 3 mallet blows on a large chisel. Since you are making a cross-grain dado on a narrow piece a router is both unweildly and slow. A groove would be a whole different story. So would a very hard wood.

I actually already had a dado jig made for the sliding miter saw, but since I would have had to cut a zillion kerfs it turned out to be not much faster than handwork.

[Byron Trantham]

and DON'T run stock that long, particularly and especially 2x4s sideways through your tablesaw - super recipe for disaster in my opinion.

Amen!:mad:

[Jim Becker]

For 2x lumber a speed square and a circular saw followed by a chisel would probably be my choice for safety reasons. With the radial arm saw, the material stays stationary; not so with a table saw. The concern is that construction lumber isn't, well...straight/stable/whatever...as compared to the more refined material we tend to use for our furniture and cabinetry projects and that's where the catches and foibles come into play when you're trying to do this work on the TS. (Keep in mind that for this kind of project we're talking deeper cuts than you would normally be using a dado cutter for)

[Jeff Raymond]

An incredibly experienced boat builder friend of mine was doing a free hand job on TS and the skeg got twisted, pulling the work and Bobby's hand into the blade.

I rushed him to the hospital, but we couldn't save the 1 1/2 fingers he lost.

Freehanding into a TS?

NO!

[Bert Johansen]

Having also had a nasty kickback several years ago on the tablesaw, I purchased the EZ Guide system and I got a good circular saw to go with it (Bosch). Wonderful tools for dead-on accurate cuts of sheet goods--and most importantly, it is very safe. I made a sacrificial table to cut on, and it rests on a 3/4 inch MDF sheet on a cheapo large folding table to keep everything flat. Some folks just put the sacrificial table on the floor and make their cuts.

[glenn bradley]

When the work is too big to bring to the blade, take the blade to it. Router would be my first choice, circ. saw second choice.