Sawstop aftermarket dust collection - Excalibur / Exaktor / other?

[Ray Newman]

Before purchasing a 52” ISC SawStop in 2016, I ran a 52” Uni-saw for 30 years. The Uni-saw, utilized the Delta no dust collection (DC) split basket Uni-guard and an INCRA 1000SE miter gauge with an auxiliary/sacrificial fence extending about 3-4” to the right of the blade to act as a sweep to move cut offs from the blade. Except for not having DC that worked well.

The ICS came with the SawStop overarm dust collection/blade guard. However, the anti-kick back pawls and splitter would not allow the use of the INCRA miter gauge with a sweep. Also, even though I run an Oneida cyclone with 5” hose, the DC at the guard was not the best.

After about two years, I decided on the Floating Arm DC. Seattle Woodcraft had the SawStop on back order, but there was a new-in-the-box Excalibur floating arm DC available at a substantial discount. Recalling that SawStop took over the Excalibur tool line, my hand experienced a friction burn getting out my wallet. Straight forward installation. Took a few projects for the Floating Arms DC to become second nature.

To support to the Floating Arm DC pipe over the saw, I made a telescoping wooden support which is removed when cutting. I just did not like the idea of 52" of dead weight hanging out there with no support.

The only alteration to my DC system was installing a 4” Y to the 5” main pipe. Very good DC with the 5” cabinet and 4” Floating Arm hose. When cutting close to the edge, a minor amount of saw dust will escape. .

If anyone asks: (a) to prevent/reduce possible kick back, I utilize magnetic feather boards and/or JessEm Clear Cut Stock Guides; and, (b) the blade kerf on the miter gauge auxiliary fence shows exactly where the saw or dado blade is cutting/will cut.

[Steve Wurster]

Maybe check out Harvey's optional guard? It looks robust and a slick design. No clue on the price though.

They're asking $1000 for it, although right now it's $850 (maybe as an introductory price?). It does look slick, I'll give it that. It doesn't appear to be adjustable in width though, which is odd.

On my previous contractor-style saw I rigged up the Sawstop guard w/ dust collection to my splitter, connected to a Shop Vac. It worked great for rip cuts where the material was completely covered by the guard. For skim cuts or pretty much any miter cut the collection just wasn't that great. I second the comment from Brian about offcuts getting stuck at the top of the guard.

My current saw is a Hammer K3 sliding table saw, and it came with its own guard that mounts to the riving knife and has a dust collection port. I've got that hooked up to the same Shop Vac, and the performance is worse than it was with the Sawstop guard. I was able to rig that Sawstop guard up to this riving knife and therefore get better dust collection, but the design of that guard does not work well on a slider, so I abandoned that idea and went back to the stock guard.

I would love to use an actual overhead cantilever-style guard with dust collection, but they tend to have larger guard openings and there's no way my Shop Vac is going to pull enough CFM to work well with those. My DC doesn't pull enough CFM to support connecting to both the saw cabinet and overhead at the same time, although I guess I could mostly close off the port to the cabinet to ensure the overhead gets more flow. The larger horizontal space taken up by those guards themselves also makes me think they'll get in the way more when you're working. That is, are they in the way when you're pushing pieces past the blade? Maybe that's not as big of a concern with a slider.

[Alan Kalker]

I started with the Sawstop dust collector as the add-on they offer when you buy the machine. The Sawstop is a wonderful saw but their dust collection for me was seriously inadequate. After adding their bigger overhead collector it was somewhat better. Then my old dust collector broke for good and I upgraded to the Oneida Supercell. What a difference! If I had done that earlier I doubt I would need their bigger overhead collector. My guess is that most shops are using underpowered dust collectors. The problem of course in that kind of upgrade is $$. If you can do it though, the difference is enormous.

[Bryce Walter]

The info everyone has shared has been really helpful. I wasn't aware Sawstop acquired Excalibur. That explains why I don't see them sold anywhere.

My Sawstop purchase will probably be around March. I think I'll probably just go with the Overarm to start with. I'm leaning towards the PCS saw, so I would be able to get that free assuming they do their Spring promotion again.

That will likely just be a temporary solution while I evaluate what I like and don't like. The Harvey option looks nice, but my budget is already being stretched to buy the saw.

I appreciate everyone's insight.