Implications Of Rip Fence Set Too Far Past Blade

[Mike Shields]

I'm wondering if I'm making some of my rip cuts more difficult than they need to be:

how far do you allow your rip fence to extend past your blade?

I'm raising this question because of a Rojek video I saw where the rip fence was used as a measuring stop to crosscut on the right of the blade.
Hmm, I always thought that was not a safe practice.

It just got me thinking about safety.

[Greg Sznajdruk]

Using your table saw for cross cutting you do not want to use your fence and miter gauge together. There is a real potential to to jam the work between the fence and the miter gauge causing kick back.

I have a Unifence and when using the fence for a reference I slide the fence back behind the blade.

You can accomplish the samething by using a block clamped to your fence so that the block is behind the blade.

Greg

[glenn bradley]

For rip cuts my fence extends a foot or so past the blade. Are you asking about corsscuts? A link to the video would help too ;-)

[Frank Drew]

Using your table saw for cross cutting you do not want to use your fence and miter gauge together. There is a real potential to to jam the work between the fence and the miter gauge causing kick back.
You can accomplish the samething by using a block clamped to your fence so that the block is behind the blade.

Greg

Exactly; very dangerous unless you use the method Greg outlines but I'd phrase it, "a block clamped to the fence so that the block ends before the blade begins" or words to that effect.

For ripping, though, I've used fences that extend the full depth of the table and those that I could adjust to pull out beyond the front of the table so that they didn't extend much past the back of the blade, but, honestly, I didn't find much advantage to the second method except when ripping awkwardly long or wide and long stock where you want a little more fence to bear against at the beginning. I understand the point of having the rip fence end shortly after the back of the blade -- so that reaction wood has free air to react into and won't cause a miscut -- but I just didn't find that issue much of a factor in real life when using full length fences.

[John Thompson]

What the guys said about cross-cutting. The stop or reference block or fence has to stop before the blade using the miter gauge. But.. when rippijng I use a Euro short fence that does not go past the center blade tooth which is the highest point the blade extrudes from the table.

Once the stock is severed which always happens before the tail of the stock reaches the center tooth, the short fence allows a free zone toward the back of the blade and the rear rising teeth which is where the main danger of kick-back lies.

Sarge..

[Stephen Tashiro]

Are you ripping lumber that has a nice straight edge? I find that when boards are slightly out of square that they bind when the fence is in contact with the lumber after it crosses the blade. This is because I press the board against the part of the fence that is before the blade and out of square lumber makes the section of board that is beyond the blade want to turn into or away from the fence, if the fence is out there. On my low power table saws, I don't get kickback, but I get smoke and stalls.

[Steve Jenkins]

I haven't seen the video on the rojeck but on some of the european saws the fence can be pulled forward until the back end is before the blade. In this position it is similar to using the mentioned block for crosscutting since nothing can get jammed between the fence and the blade. I do this fairly frequently on my altendorf.

[Mike Shields]

I'm wondering if I'm making some of my rip cuts more difficult than they need to be:

how far do you allow your rip fence to extend past your blade?

I'm raising this question because of a Rojek video I saw where the rip fence was used as a measuring stop to crosscut on the right of the blade.
Hmm, I always thought that was not a safe practice.

It just got me thinking about safety.

Sorry for the confusion. My question is not about crosscutting, I was using the Rojek video as a safety thought-provoker.

The question is: how far do you allow your rip fence to extend past your blade?

And for the curious, here's the link to the Rojek video:

http://rojekusa.com/PHP/kps300v.php

...it looks like he has purposely set the end of the rip fence just shy of the blade. I missed that when I originally saw the video.

[Nissim Avrahami]

For ripping "Solid wood", I'm using the "Short fence" (well, I have a Euro saw of course).

Once the front teeth cut the wood - the cut is actually finished and any fence, 1"~2" beyond that point (i.e. the front teeth) can contribute only to one thing - Kickback - in case of reaction wood (but you never know).

The Euro "short fence" that came with my table saw is actually not short at all - it's adjustable fore and back and can be set also as a "full length" fence for cutting Man-made boards.

When I move the fence back, I get another benefit - I get a longer fence back of the table top edge that gives me much better support and guide of the board before entering the blade - especially with very long boards.

The Euro fence, comes with two positions "High fence" for re-sawing and "Low fence" for ripping....tell you the truth, I never used the High fence (I'm not re-sawing) and the "Low fence" gives some space that you can use a push stick very safely.

Regards
niki

Oh yes, pictures....

http://i208.photobucket.com/albums/bb151/matsukawa/01-2.jpg


http://i208.photobucket.com/albums/bb151/matsukawa/02-2.jpg


You can see how much of a fence I have before the blade
http://i208.photobucket.com/albums/bb151/matsukawa/Picture%20frame%20WIP/10.jpg


I was lucky, the wood "closed" on the blade.
If it would "open" from the blade and I would use a long fence....this picture would be very "red"....
http://i208.photobucket.com/albums/bb151/matsukawa/Picture%20frame%20WIP/11.jpg

I removed the guard just to show the distances, other wise, the blade guard is always "ON".
http://i208.photobucket.com/albums/bb151/matsukawa/Picture%20frame%20WIP/14.jpg

http://i208.photobucket.com/albums/bb151/matsukawa/Picture%20frame%20WIP/16.jpg

You can make the "Short fence" just from a piece of 'L' shape ply or MDF clamped to the original fence...I would suggest that you make it long so you can get a good support from far beyond the blade.

And because I can move the fence far back from the blade, of course I can use it as a stop while cutting with the miter gage.

Regards
niki

[Frank Drew]

Without saying that your "strips sled" approach is wrong, Niki, it does seem like a lot of setup for just a rip cut.

[Jim Becker]

Using your table saw for cross cutting you do not want to use your fence and miter gauge together.

True, but most Euro machines and the UniFence allow the whole fence to be slid back parallel to the blade so you can use the fence as a stop for setting cross cutting length, but there is no fence engaged with the workpiece at the blade. This is one of the great features about this fence as you can use the fence scale without adding math to the process as you would with a stop block attached to the fence. (Note that the OP mentions a Rojek saw)

Relative to the OP's question relative to rips, it's common practice with Euro fences (and also possible with the UniFence) to have the fence end just past the blade. This, combined with the riving knife really mitigates the possibility of pinching pretty well during the cut. On my MiniMax saw I've been moving more and more toward this method in the increasingly rare case that I rip using the fence, rather than fastening the workpiece to the wagon and using the slider.