Excalibur Overarm Guard on a PM2000?

[Charlie Barnes]

Good Afternoon All,

I've been reading up on some of the past posts regarding the pros and cons of overarm saw guards and I have a simple question. Does anyone have an Excalibur overarm guard mounted to a PM2000 WITH the workbench option? It looks like the mounting location is right about where the vice on the end of the extension table is. I was wondering if anyone could confirm if this is the case and what creative solutions had been developed. It looks like the easiest answer is to just remove the vice since I don't use it much anyway, but I'd like to see if there's a way to keep it.

Thanks.

Charlie

[Paul Kinneberg]

Charlie
I have the gaurd on my PM66 and the mounting bracket runs almost the entire width after looking at the PM2000 with vise I do not see how you could keep your vise and use the arm. Even if you could come up with a solution to mount the vise outside the arm braket the 4" tube would greatly reduce the usable table from the end. May be you could mount the vise on an outfeed table?
Paul

[Pat Moy]

Paul,
I have the same setup as you. I use the excalibur with a 1.5HP Oneida Cyclone dust collector. In order to use the Excalibur with the PM66 stock splitter, the back plate on the Excalibur guard had to be removed (according to Excalibur instructions). When I did this, dust collection was almost non existent. I ended up buying a Biesemeyer after-market splitter so I can lower the Excalibur guard with the splitter in place. Even with the Biesemeyer splitter, dust collection has been mediocre at best. I am wondering whether I've made a mistake somewhere with my installation. How's dust collection on your setup?
Regards,
Pat

[Paul Kinneberg]

Pat I think my dust collection is about what I expected on a table saw not great but good. I have the same splitter although for whatever reason it doesn't appear it was installed in the picture. I personally am not a fan of blade gaurds and so I bought the excaliber hoping I would use it for dust collection and as a by product have a blade gaurd as well. I can see through it to the blade which I like but I do adjust it based on what cut I'm making. Also my Onieda is the 3HP gorilla not sure if that would make a difference.

[Charlie Barnes]

Paul - Thanks for the confirmation of my concern.

Pat and Paul - Based on both of your comments, it also sounds like the riving knife on the PM2000 would also be a problem since I don't want to rip without it and my primary objective in purchasing the Excalibur is dust collection. Are there any other overarm guards or options to improve the dust collection over the blade?

[Rod Sheridan]

I have the older Excalibur guard on a General 650 and dust collection is excellent.

I have an Oneida 1.5HP cyclone with a 4 inch hose going to the saw cabinet and a 3"??? going to the saw guard directly, not through the guard mount.

I have a Merlin removable splitter that projects out the back of the guard, so I installed the split flexible back plate on the guard. The split flexible plate effectively seals the guard so that dust collection works properly.

Regards, Rod.

[Pat Moy]

Rod,
Can you post a photo of your setup? Is the flexible back plate something they sell, or you made?

I had to mount the arm further towards the back of the saw so that when lowered, the guard can cover the Biesmeyer splitter. I wonder whether that decreases dust-collection efficiency.


Charles,
The riving knife can be covered by the blade guard if you mount the arm more towards the back of the saw, so you should be able to use the guard with riving knife during all cuts. But as mentioned, I'm not sure whether mounting further back decreases dust-collection efficiency.

Regards,
Pat

[Rod Sheridan]

Hi, hopefully these photo's are OK?

As I said, my overarm guard dust hose goes to a ceiling mounted blast gate as opposed to being connected to the arm.

The flexible back piece is a piece of 2mm? thick clear flexible plastic with a slit in it. It came with the Excalibur guard....Rod.

P.S. I forgot to mention that since I ordered my saw with 32" rip capacity, I had to cut about 12" from both support tube pieces to shorten the support arm, the standard arm is for 50" rip capacity saws.

[Ron Williams]

Mount it to the ceiling