I think seat belts are required by law. At least when I went to have my 1974 BMW 2002 inspected the guy checked out the seat belts saying something like...."you never know with these older cars"
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That depends upon where you are. IIRC, Arkansas no longer requires minimum vehicle safety inspections. In Texas only the law abiding are required to, everyone else gets a surrogate hundred dollar bill inspected.
Any car without seat belts would be more than 30 years old or would have had them removed. While there are some around they are not commonplace and are generally treated as collectables.
Fewer personal injury claims. There are different degrees of air bag coverage. The more you have the better. 2 years ago our 2000 VW Passat had air bags front and front side. Our 2004 Accord has Front and front and back side air bags and overhead side airbags. The Honda was a more expensive car by about 10% and our insurance on that car has dropped about $300 per year on that vehicle and there have been no claims or traffic violations in the last 8 years.
Older than that, actually. Seat belts have been required equipment (in the front seat, at least) for nearly *forty* years -- since 1968.
Exactly how do you go across the blade if you're using a blade guard? You'd hit the side of the guard, not the blade. The only real way to hit the blade, assuming you're using the guard properly, is to go from the front, under the guard.
Of course, if you're stupid enough not to use the guard, you deserve what happens to you.
Heh, my first thought was "Dr. Clayton Forrester" of MST3K fame. :)
Many states require seat belts and cars cannot be sold without them. If you are not wearing a seat belt, even if they are not present, you will be ticketed and I wouldn't be surprised if a car without them wouldn't be impounded as unsafe on the spot.
unless you're reaching over the blade.
we all know we're not supposed to do that, but sometimes I find myself doing it anyway.
The United States Government requires that seat belts be installed, the states have no say in the matter. But a car made before the seat belt law will not be impounded, there was a grandfather clause.
Further, I believe that the state laws requiring the wearing of seat belts have an exemption for vehicles that do not have them.
Be careful throwing those rocks. Dado's are impossible on most TS that have the stock blade guard.
Not quite right. Yes, it's the Federal government that requires the manufacturers to install the belts, not the states -- but states certainly
*do* have the say over whether those belts are *used*.Minor correction: for vehicles that were manufactured without them. I don't imagine you could avoid a ticket just by removing the belts from your late-model car. :-)
I can see it now. There are two things that could kill you during an accident. Being killed by the impact or from being sqeezed into a thin pencil shape by all the airbags.
No, I think suffocation. :~)
Oh yeah, the last antique car rally I went to, the police were hauling them away in car carriers...
And since dado cuts do not protrude through the wood, it's not possible to hit the blade while making a dado to begin with. Besides, we're talking about kickback, that's damn hard to do while making a dado cut.
After the wood goes through and is past the blades you are totally exposed to the blades and using dado blades does not reduce the risk of kick back.
Not hard to do at all, IME... Freud even has dado stacks with an anti-kickback feature, IIRC.
The slightest accidental twist (not hard to do because it generally takes more force, both downward and into the blade, to push stock through a dado stack) is all it takes ... particularly with those cuts requiring a miter gage.
Not something pleasant to experience.
The default guard is usually mounted on a splitter that should go a long way to prevent the kickback in the first place...
To answer the question about insurance issues. Sure folk can self insure, but if you self insure without understanding the risks its a fool's choice.
There is something of a difference between a saw in the hands of an experienced professional and a saw in a room full of teens... I am surprised that anyone wants to go in for that particular job.
Joe and all,
I manage a student shop in a college of architecture.
We've been running 2 of the first sawstops since Jan 05.
In the 18 months we've had the saws, the stopping mechanisms have triggered 8 or 9 times. So basically ~$50/month insurance policy. All but one have been user error: 1 chicken leg, 3 aluminum miter gauge/x-cut fence, 2 gap distance (between blade and brake cartridge), 1 foil backed foam, 1 aluminum sheet (forgot bypass), 1 green treated plywood. Hopefully we have fewer triggers as we and our our users learn where we need to change our modus operandi. Sawstop has given us maybe
3 free brake cartridges for our trouble. They have diagnosed "triggered" brake cartridges and called us with an explaination of what probably caused the event (green treated, gap distance).If conductive materials are embedded in a piece of wood, the sawstop will not necessarily go off. In order for the brake to trigger, a circuit must be completed, so unless the metal contacts both the blade AND the saw table (or the operator) it won't go off. When I initially tested the machine, I cut through dozens of nails and staples that were clear of the table or my hand. the saw cut through them with no problem.
A couple months ago, the sawstop was demonstrated at a meeting of the minnesota woodworkers guild. Unsatisfied with the usual hot dog test, the demonstrator turned it up a notch. A 2' long summer sausage was swung into the blade like a baseball bat. The blade got about 3/8" into the sausage. I cannot imagine any circumstance in which a saw operator could move into the blade as rapidly as that summer sausage.
I continue to be impressed with the quality of these machines, and look forward to additional offerings from sawstop. Staven Gass recently mentioned that the "other" saw manufacturers are settling sawstop related lawsuits. I think it is only a matter of time until they license the system or develop something of their own. Basically, I think it will become too expensive for them not to improve the safety of their offerings.
Good Luck Kevin Groenke snipped-for-privacy@umn.edu
Here are some comments I posted previously.
saws that we've had running since January.
has been great. We've had a couple more triggers, each time we've contacted SawStop to let them know what had happened. On the occasions of a false positive, or other technical problem, SawStop has sent replacement brakes and addressed any problem. Each of the "triggers" was technically our fault, we should have known that the SawStop would have been activated (blade/brake clearance, green treated ply, foil faced foam) and should have by-passed the mechanism. SawStop has taken back the spent brakes to analyze the data and has sent us more new brakes than we've deserved. As they should be, the saws are still like new.
years ago(not saying much really). An extension table flatness problem has been mentioned, but our tables and rt wings are flat within .010". We never put on the left wings since we installed sliding tables, so I cannot speak to that issue. The trunnions, arbor shaft, bearings, and even the main table are beefier than comparable parts on a unisaw and a pm 66.
Height & angle adjustment are smooth and easy (of course the machines are brand new, so they better be) .
the first scratches less painful.
through shut down.
intuitive even if more complicated.
adjust, and wedded to blade height like it should be.
blade- much less obtrusive than traditional guards.
expect significantly fewer kickbacks as a result of the "invisible" riving knife.
become easier as we do it.
We will probably start with sanding out the gloss, then get rid of the black if it is still too annoying. Sawstop took the color theme WAY too far here.
nutsucker waiting to happen.
build up inside the cabinet, how hard will it be to get out?
for smooth operation and less wear.
under the extension table, so it still won't be easy.
- seems a bit light.
be able to easily shut off the saw, but it will be a while before we stop doing so inadvertently. The arbor/arbor nut wrenches are WAY TOO BIG, this will encourage overtightening and our ARBORS will be STRIPPED in no time. Are you reading this Steve?
this is ok, but I don't really feel that they are flat/secure with no way to tighten them.
as is the "soft" fence handle.
(beneath our sliding table) this is too hard to get to for routine blade changes etc...
throat opening is larger than a unisaw's. This is ok access-wise, but having less of a smooth, flat tabletop can be problematic.
started in by-pass.- a pain if we're cutting a bun of aluminum all day.
scale lumber - sawstop requires 10" blades or 8" dadoes.
"washerless" re-installation. (We had welded a washer to a nut to eliminate this on unisaws)
table (same as biesmeyer). I re-drilled and lowered, now 1 of the doors doesn't open past he rail, arggggh.
comparable+ to a PM66.
keeps stock going in a straight line.
an issue of learning where the "locating pins" are).
we have enough suction to move the nuts to the most inaccessible part of the DC pipe. I suppose it's time for an access port.
side of the cabinet and is a pain to get to with the sliding table attached to the saw, oh well.
Delta/Jet/Grizzly get sued (and lose) because they failed to provide such a system. Perhaps they will be beating a path to SawStop for licensing sooner rather than later. Let the market decide I suppose, should be interesting to watch.
Thursday, January 13th.
etc. I enabled the bypass and cut aluminum, green treated and stapled pine. When in bypass mode you will get a code in flashing lights indicating whether the SawStop would have triggered. The lights indicated that the SawStop WOULD NOT have been triggered by cutting the green treated or the stapled pine, so I proceeded to cut them with the SawStop on.
easy it is to cut through a drumstick, pretty gory and except for the lack of blood, not unlike a shop accident. I've always thought of doing this during shop orientations, but decided that it could encourage sophomoric actions (the last thing they need is encouragement).
blade in order to get an idea how much damage would be done in the case of a slip or similar accident.
I could, the blade promptly disappeared and with virtually no resistance I proceeded to IMPALE the chicken leg onto the riving knife (oh the shame).
indicated that this happened too fast to discern). Since the drumstick was impaled on the riving knife, I have NO IDEA, how much damage the drumstick sustained from the blade before it's encounter with the riving knife. As you can imagine this was a little embarrassing. Here we've spent $6000 on saws that "save fingers", and I've got a chicken leg skewered by a chunk of steel, not so impressive.
as we had neglected to provide adequate clearance for the aluminum fence on the sliding table. DOH!!! Again observers were dumbfounded. Results: a tiny nick on the crosscutting fence.
was triggered, but aside from a solid THUD and the "disappearance" of blade, there are little dramatics.
Joe Bemier wrote:
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