You can do exactly the same thing with a compund sliding mitre saw and a set of feed tables. About the only thing you can't do, saw-wise with the sliding miter that you can do with a RAS is rip stock.
Not without building a different bench and then it becomes a RA saw.
On 12/24/2019 10:54 PM, Clare Snyder wrote: ...
But there are any number of other things one can do w/RAS can't with compound miter. Moulding heads, etc., etc., etc., ...
But, for the typical home owner there are alternatives didn't used to be, granted. Still, having the 16", I'd not give it up willingly as I do quite a bit of larger material that the compound miter can't handle.
If you are cutting angles in 2x4 or larger, it needs to be a sliding miter saw (basically a RAS) or a 14" blade. Even then you are pretty much limited to nominal 4". They do have a use but probably not enough for your average homeowner to give up that much space. When I made the trusses for my shed, I made a jig and used my circular saw. It wasn't as precise as I could do with a RAS but it worked. My roof framer who did the hip on my addition did it all free cutting with a circular saw but this guy was a wizard. The truss pack, ordered by another guy in the business, didn't fit in the valley sections so this guy conventionally framed it. Robbie probably couldn't spell trigonometry and he had no idea what a vector formula was but he laid out some pretty complex cuts with nothing but a framing square and a tape. Everything fit tight. I was just sitting there being amazed. The inspector didn't question a bit of it, even though the plan showed engineered trusses. We just winged it on the strapping but I had a bunch of straps and clips so we overdid it a bit. I did lust after the point placement nail gun he had. You put the point in a whole in a strap and it puts the nail right in there. It makes those Simpson clips go pretty fast.
On 12/25/2019 9:34 AM, snipped-for-privacy@aol.com wrote: ...
All the geometry is in the framing square table stamped onto it if you know how to use it...not many do any more.
Guys that are good can do seeming magic freehand, agreed.
On the addition we didn't know how the roof was going to be framed going in until we had already got the walls up and then worked out how to make it match up with the two existing edges it had to meet. Laid out the ridge and they did same with jacks and regulars. Meets up as if laid out by a CAD program. As the fellow you had, the lead guy on this crew does know what he's doing...he'd shout a measurement length and angle out and the ground crew pass up the result.
You're also right on the hole guides...they had those too for the clips. Much handier.
My high school wood shop class ~45 years ago, Herbie the shop teacher is talking and it's going like this: "The radial arm saw can be dangerous, especially if you don't hold your work properly. For example, never hold it like this or you could lose a finger. ... GODDAMNIT! Who's got a car? I need a ride to the hospital!"
He took off his left index finger at the first knuckle, just like he predicted. They were able to sew it back on, but he lost the ability to bend that finger at the first knuckle. I guess it fused as it healed.
OTOH, every single tool in the shop was dangerous in one way or another. I never realized that a RAS was more dangerous than the rest. Herbie told us stories about a guy who took off 4 fingertips on the jointer, a guy who lost a thumb on the table saw, a guy who got messed up when a handheld router got out of control, and more. No stories of eye injuries that I can remember, but Mom was good enough to fill that gap. "You kids stop that! You're going to take an eye out."
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