A desk noticed is among the must-have instruments for a flooring installer, offering the power to tear and crosscut flooring planks to suit into an area too small for a full plank. And though you probably make most or your entire crosscuts on the miter noticed, there’s no denying the desk noticed’s clear benefit over different instruments on the subject of ripping. However these instruments inherently are harmful, liable for hundreds of accidents yearly – accidents that value tens of hundreds of {dollars} in medical remedy, rehabilitation, and misplaced wages. That’s why it’s paramount to make use of your desk noticed safely.
Listed below are some useful suggestions and practices for utilizing a desk noticed.
Desk Noticed Fundamentals
As with different instruments, be sure that your noticed is tuned up correctly and in peak working type. Hold it clear, lubricate the inner gears (ideally with a “quick-dry” spray lubricant), keep correct drive-belt pressure (in that case geared up), and hold the blade aligned with the miter slots and rip fence (ideally inside .01”).
At all times put on acceptable private protecting tools: security glasses, listening to safety, and a respirator or mud masks. And all the time use the blade guard/splitter/anti-kickback pawls that include your noticed as a lot as attainable. When not attainable, use the riving knife to assist stop kickback.
Equally as vital is utilizing the correct blade for every lower. Use a 24-30 tooth blade for ripping thick hardwood planks, however a 40-60 tooth blade for skinny laminate or engineered planks; a crosscut blade for all crosscuts and miters (60-80 enamel); a specialised blade for chopping veneered plywood or melamine (normally 80 enamel); and a stacked dado set for chopping large channels, corresponding to dadoes, grooves, and rabbets. Many smaller benchtop and jobsite saws work greatest with thin-kerf blades – seek the advice of your noticed’s proprietor’s guide for the right blade specs. And don’t overlook, many flooring supplies comprise abrasives that uninteresting blades shortly, so hold a number of of every sort in your toolbox.
Along with blades, you additionally must have quite a few equipment available to make totally different cuts higher and safer. Your noticed ought to include a miter gauge, however they’re normally small and functionally restricted, so take into account upgrading to an aftermarket miter gauge with extra angle detents and a fence with flip cease. For crosscutting large items (greater than 8” or so), get a miter sled or crosscut sled to extend that capability and make these cuts safer. You’ll want a number of push sticks of various widths so you should use them when the rip fence will get near the blade, and a push block that can assist you management bigger workpieces. As a result of moveable desk saws have small tops and flooring planks will be lengthy, have a number of outfeed helps useful to stop planks from dropping to the ground mid-cut.
Observe Good Desk Noticed Strategies
Make certain your noticed stays put when chopping. This normally received’t be an issue with saws on stands, but when it turns into so, discover a solution to agency up the stand. For saws with no stand, be sure that to get one with rubber ft to stop scooting; these additionally stop scratching the flooring for those who transfer it together with you throughout a room.
At all times set the blade peak so it stands about 1/8” above the thickness of your flooring planks. An excessive amount of blade uncovered serves no good goal and will increase the possibilities of an unintended blade damage, even with the blade guard put in.
Comply with these pointers when chopping something on a desk noticed:
- Don’t attain over the blade or instantly behind it. As an alternative, use push sticks or push blocks to maintain your fingers away from the blade.
- By no means attain to take away offcuts till the blade stops. Too many individuals get injured doing this.
- By no means put on gloves when chopping – this will improve the possibility of a blade damage in case your fingers get close to the blade.
- At all times unplug the noticed or lock out energy earlier than making blade adjustments or eradicating the blade guard or riving knife.
- Join a store vacuum or mud extractor to the moveable noticed’s mud port to seize mud throughout all cuts.
When ripping flooring planks or lumber, stand to the left of the blade (or to the correct if the fence is on the left) to raised scale back the possibility of a kickback piece from hitting you.
If not already in hand, have a push stick on the able to seize throughout the lower. At all times push the part of wooden between the fence and blade all the best way previous the blade, then shut down the noticed and let the blade cease earlier than shifting the offcut.
When crosscutting, all the time use a miter gauge or sled – within the miter slot – to reference the board towards. Try to be standing in-line with the miter gauge/slot. In the event you’re chopping small items, all the time use a sled that means that you can clamp the piece earlier than chopping to maintain your palms protected and forestall unintended motion throughout the lower. If attainable, connect a sacrificial fence to the miter gauge or sled. This does three issues:
- It prevents grain tear-out,
- It sweeps the cutoff previous the blade, and
- The kerf reveals the place the blade will lower.
Defending towards accidents is high of thoughts for us at SawStop, the place we make the most of active-injury mitigation skin-sensing expertise that stops the spinning blade on contact with pores and skin in lower than 5 milliseconds. Our firm has logged hundreds of finger saves over the previous 20 years. We hope this text helps you’re taking desk noticed security to the next stage.
Bob Hunter is a content material specialist with SawStop. Previous to becoming a member of SawStop, he labored 17 years as an editor for WOOD Journal, the place he examined every kind of instruments and equipment, wrote how-to articles, and taught lessons on numerous woodworking strategies and subjects. When not working with wooden professionally, Bob can be discovered working with wooden as a pastime in his residence workshop. Study extra about SawStop’s saws and skin-sensing security expertise at sawstop.com.
