question on proper table saw use

[Commando Line]

I read the message below from davefr (thanks dave). It didn't answer the two safety/procedural questions I have on table saws:

1. Is it ok to make a "cross cut" with a table saw? -- i am installing my own floor (vermont soft pine) -- the boards are too wide (9 inches) to fit a in my miter saw -- i thought i read somewhere that you're only supposed to make "rip cuts" with a table saw -- not cross cuts.

i'm a woodworking newbie trying to save some money on my house. hence the cheap, kmnothole-ridden wood, which brings me to my 2nd question:

1. Is it ok to cut through a knothole with table saw? If not, what is the best tool for that?

Thanks very much,

C.Line

------------------------------------------------------------------- Search Result 1 From: davefr ( [e-mail]) Subject: Re: Table Saw safety guards View: Complete Thread (84 articles) Original Format Newsgroups: rec.woodworking Date: 2000/04/23

Most kickbacks are prevented by proper table saw use:

- Avoid using the mitre guage AND fence to make a cut. This is a big No No!!

- Avoid ripping warped or damaged wood. If you have to, then attach it to a straight piece of wood.

- Adjust the blade height enough to just clear the work

- Make sure your fence is calibrated so it's parallel to the blade. (it's a good idea to give it a couple thousand of an inch extra clearance at the rear) Check this annually and never assume a brand new saw is properly calibrated.

- Keep you blades sharp and use the correct blade for the cut.

- Don't stand in the line of fire. Work in a position that's not directly in line with potential kickback.

- Use a featherboard when needed

- If the cut will put you in harms way than consider using another tool. A bandsaw can be much safer for cutting damaged wood.

- Hearing protection, safety glasses, dust mask, and even a hardhat will help protect you.

- Work when you are fresh and alert and think thru every cut before you make it.

- Ask yourself if you can accomplish the cut safer using a different tool. Sometimes you can make a rough cut on a safer tool and use the table saw for a finish cut.

- Get an outfeed table for your saw.

- Work in a well lit area.

- If you are more comfortable using the guard then use it.

[Dave Balderstone]

Yes. It's bets if you have a crosscut or combo blade and most accurate and safest if you build and use a sled.

Yes. But the knot may fall out.

[Edwin Pawlowski]

Cut away. Use a combination or cross cutting blade. Use the miter, not the fence. Don't use both or that can cause a kickback because the fence will cause the board to skew a bit. . You can set the fence an inche further from the blade than you want to cut. Then you clamp a 1" spacer to the face of the fence, but only near the fron. You can bring the board to the stop and then ush ahead with the miter. That allows for a repeatable stop but without the potential kickback problems from the setup.

It can be a little hard to hold a nine foot board to cut off an inch. Use some common sense and be sure you are pushing the board squarely.

There are knots and thee are knots. If it is tight you can cut it. If it is loose at all, thee is some risk of it breaking and pieces becoming a projectilre. The guard helps with this sort of thing. There are names for the types of knots. I don't recall them at the moment.

[Larry Church]

I think it is easier to use the chop saw. Make the cut as far as the blade will go, then flip the board over and line the blade up with the kerf from the first part ofd the cut and finish. We've been making cuts like that for long enough to get tired of it so we bought the Makita 12" sliding miter chop saw that has a 12" capacity at 90 degrees. That helps, but now we are working with 12" and wider boards 10 or 12 feet long making 30, 45, and 60 degree cuts. You can't really do that on a table saw. Some of the material is surfaced 3 sides, so when the board is flipped, there is no straight reference on the back side. You have to take the time to accurately line up the board for the second half of the cut so that the blade lines up with the kerf to necessary tolerance. We used to use a worm drive as we are framers first - woodworkers second. A radial arm saw is probably ideal for this, but the lack of portablilty is a big negative.

I've had loose knots fragment and come flying out in my face on the table saw. Eye protection is mandatory. You're not supposed to have your face right in the line of fire, but I do a lot of free hand ripping to a chalk line (no fence at all), and when trying to maximise accuracy, its hard not to get your face in the danger zone. I've been thinking about a face shield acutally. Use the chop saw - the fragments get thrown away from you.

Larry Church Mintlake Lodge

[xrongor]

if you are going to do this, make a crosscut sled (searching will find tons of plans to make them). even with a good miter gauge its just too easy to start slightly changing the angle at which the board is being fed into to the blade and this is what causes the kickback. you can clamp the hell out of it to minimize it but thats time consuming and not as good as a sled.

basicaly, the sled insures the board feeds in straight by using both miters slots at once. one you've used a sled you will never go back, but you wont have to. you already made it.

randy

[xrongor]

frank and judy are common knot names, although shauniqua is growing in popularity

randy

[J. Clarke]

Dunno where you read that but take anything else that you read there with a very large dose of salt--a table saw will cut any grain orientation--the difficulty is not in the cutting itself but in supporting the piece and maintaining the desired alignment.

That said, if you _have_ a radial arm saw or other saw that has a controlled crosscut movement, you'll find such a saw more _convenient_ for cross-cutting, and you'll find the table saw, which tends to pull the work down onto the table instead of lifting it up in the air, to be more _convenient_ for ripping.

Sure--a knothole is just air. Now if there's a knot in it, that can be another story--if the knot comes out it can be thrown by the saw and hurt anybody in the line of fire. Check each knot that you're going to be cutting and if it seems at all loose knock it out first--that doesn't mean that one that's tight when surrounded by board doesn't come apart when the saw goes through it though.

[Wes Stewart]

I was in agreement up to here:

| but I do a lot of free hand ripping to a chalk |line (no fence at all),

Say it isn't so.

[Swingman]

It is a very common practice on construction sites around here ... AAMOF, you are more likely to see a good looking female framer working topless than a table saw fence before the trim crew arrives.

[HerHusband]

Yes, it's OK, I've done it many times. The problem is one of holding/moving the board. You need a sled or long miter gauge to hold the board square to the blade, and even then trying to support a long board (more than 3 feet or so) is going to be awkward or impossible.

Like another poster mentioned, I usually use my power miter saw (chop saw). I cut through as far as I can in one pass, flip the board over, and finish the cut. It's not a perfect cut, but it works fine most of the time.

If accuracy is important, you could simply clamp a straight edge to your board, and make the cut with a handheld circular saw. I cut plywood this way as it's easier than trying to juggle a sheet up on top of my table saw.

It doesn't really matter what type of saw is making the cut, it depends on the knot. If the knot is loose, trying to cut through it could send fragments flying, and/or the knot will fall out after being cut. But, if the knot is tight, it should not be a problem. I cut through them all the time.

Anthony

[xrongor]

im guessing these the same guys that remove or disable the safety device on the nail gun...

randy

[bridger]

depends on the jobsite.

I *have* seen good looking females working topless..... on a project at a nudist gathering...

[The Davenports]

I believe that he meant "free hand with a Skil-type saw" not a table saw.

I hope

Mike

[Leon]

Maybe. But with a TS I have seen Norm do it on TV. And I do it on occasion but only on 1/4" plywood panels with the blade very low. Keep an eye on what you are doing and know the problems that can happen and you can do it without mishap.

[Wes Stewart]

|> I was in agreement up to here: |>

|> | but I do a lot of free hand ripping to a chalk |> |line (no fence at all), |>

|> Say it isn't so. | |It is a very common practice on construction sites around here ... AAMOF, |you are more likely to see a good looking female framer working topless than |a table saw fence before the trim crew arrives.

I think it was common practice too when my Mother's step-dad removed all of his fingers on his left hand and ended his carpenter career.

Coincidentally, my wife's father lost a couple of finger tips ignoring common sense safety TS practices too.

When I tried freehanding a cut on a TS in a shop class the instructor about had a fit and told me in no uncertain terms that that's what the %&*#@+ bandsaw was for.

[Kenneth]

Howdy,

Indeed, you can but...

When something goes wrong (and it will) the costs may be profound...

The simple reality is that a sideways twitch of the board being cut can cause a problem that will reveal itself in tiny fractions of a second. At the speeds involved, the skills of the operator at that point are meaningless.

All the best,

[Swingman]

I am not advising you to practice it, I was merely explaining the reality of the situation.

... and what the wise guys on the construction site would tell you, in both English and Spanish, albeit less politely, is that according to ER statistics, yuppie hobbyists, with overpowered, fence equipped table saws in their garages, are far more likely to lose their digital attachments.

... and FWIW, my recent relative acquisition, Uncle Teet, tells me that he lost the first knuckle of his ring finger on a bandsaw ... so be careful either way.

[Swingman]

The first table saw I owned (yep, a Craftsmans benchtop model), and used to build two recording studios, didn't even come with a fence, IIRC, and was so underpowered that it would bog down before kicking back.

We used it primarily to cut sheet goods to size, although I can't tell you how many tubufours were ripped to 2X dimensions on that thing ... both almost always a two man operation, for _safety's_ sake.

Something I would be very hard pressed to try, or even think of attempting, on my Unisaw and without a fence.

[Leon]

Yes it will and can. Regardless of how careful you think that you are, that is not careful enough. I have been using a TS seriously for the last 20 years and professionally for the lasy 9 years. 15 years ago I lost half of my thumb on the TS. I was not cutting when it happened and this happened agter I has shut off the power to the saw. My mistake was that I got in a rush and started making adjustments before the blade stop spinning.

Agreed again. However I have observed a few things that have proven true and goes contrary to many peoples thinking about more powerful saws. First off, I do not free hand the cuts on wood that would not snap, break, or cut easily. I also always have a very firm hand on the wood during the free hand cut. What I have observed however is having used a 1 hp Craftsman TS for 15+ years and now a 3hp Jet cabinet saw is that the Craftsman being under powered was more dangerous. With a sharp blade on both models and a Jet fence on both the Craftsman and Jet cabinet saw the chance IMHO of a serious kick back lessens with more HP. I find that with a firm hand and more HP the TS is more likey to cut the board rather than get bound up slow down and toss the wood back. With the lessor powered saws you have to baby the wood to keep from stalling the motor and again IMHO the lack of a firm hand leads to a greater possibility of the wood binding and being kicked back.

[Wes Stewart]

[snip]

|I am not advising you to practice it, I was merely explaining the reality of |the situation.

Understood. | |> When I tried freehanding a cut on a TS in a shop class the instructor |> about had a fit and told me in no uncertain terms that that's what the |> %&*#@+ bandsaw was for. | |... and what the wise guys on the construction site would tell you, in both |English and Spanish, albeit less politely, is that according to ER |statistics, yuppie hobbyists, with overpowered, fence equipped table saws in |their garages, are far more likely to lose their digital attachments.

Wish we'd send all those Mexicans home. In Tucson, you're statistically far more likely to be injured by being in the crossfire between drug or alien smugglers or a crash (nearly happened to me) with them running from the Border Patrol, than by using a tablesaw.

| |... and FWIW, my recent relative acquisition, Uncle Teet, tells me that he |lost the first knuckle of his ring finger on a bandsaw ... so be careful |either way.

I'm reminded of an incident from my youth. I was working in my dad's automotive machine shop and cut my finger deeply doing something or the other.

I wrapped it up in a shop towel and drove myself to our family doctor. When I went to the reception desk and said that I might need stitches they went into full-blown panic mode and wanted to look at it, asked me if I was going to faint, etc. etc. I said it was no big deal and took a seat.

When I saw the doctor I related this concern by the receptionist and asked about it.

It seems that a week or so earlier a guy who worked for a drilling company had come in under similar circumstances and they just asked him to take a seat and wait. He was sitting there reading a magazine when another guy hurried in the door and said, "Hey John, we found your finger, maybe they can reattach it."

Lost fingers were so common in the drilling business that they didn't make much fuss over it.