I have a friend who told me the following story yesterday: Last week her husband and two sons were working in their woodshop at their farm. David is an accomplished woodworker and has a nice shop set up. They were replacing ceiling tiles in a room, and David was using the table saw to cut them to size. Worried that the tiles would fall on the floor and break, he was watching the tile and not the blade…pretty severe cut to the top of his left thumb that was patched up in the ER. He’ll see a plastic surgeon to finish the repair. Now the sad irony: sitting on the floor of the shop waiting to be assembled was his new Saw Stop cabinet saw. Lesson learned. Tom
“Notice that at no time do my fingers leave my hand”
Replies
Much as I love (and will buy someday) the SawStop, I'd say the better lesson is "use a push stick and pay attention". What's a broken tile? No biggie! Glad he's still got a thumb for the PS to work with.
Hubby asked the important "first question" the other night: "How much is one of those saws?" It's only a matter of time now!
forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
Edited 1/24/2007 11:42 pm by forestgirl
FG
His wife asked me "how much does the cartridge cost?" I told her that when it's activated, you need to replace the cartridge and blade, about $200. I asked her to compare that with the ER bill, not to mention plastic surgeon, and the pain. Saw Stop is the way to go. Hope you have one very soon. I'll have one some day also. Tom"Notice that at no time do my fingers leave my hand"
I also forgot to add, he's kicking himself pretty good for worrying about the wrong thing and for taking his eye off the blade. All things considered, he's a lucky guy. Now to get that Saw Stop put together. Tom"Notice that at no time do my fingers leave my hand"
If you have time, hope you can add your evaluation of the Saw Stop to the other voices here, pros and cons, after it's been put through its paces!forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
It's bad that he cut his thumb but worse that he's going to expect the Saw Stop to save him when he makes the same mistake in the future. It would be better to think ahead so he doesn't need to worry about whether his tiles would break and keep his hands away from the blade. There's no good reason to keep pushing anything through any kind of cutting machine with eyes looking somewhere else. EVER!I don't know about him but after I narfed my finger on my router, I was a bit leery of going back to it in any hurry. I decided to jump back on the horse while I still had the bandage on it and walked up to it and said, "So, we meet again". Working with machinery that causes fear is a bad idea. Mistakes happen when someone is out of their comfort zone and they start thinking about all of the things that can go wrong but relying on a machine to save the day is wrong, IMO. I like any safety features I can get but I will never use one as my only means of assuring my safety. I caused my finger to get munched, it was not the machines fault, the wood didn't cause it, the Sun wasn't in my eyes, I didn't blink, sneeze or hiccup. It was MY fault and it was the fault of the person who looked away from the blade to make sure his $2 tile wouldn't break.
"I cut this piece four times and it's still too short."
My dad was an orthopedic surgeon, and he saw way too many bad results of being distracted at the table saw to ever want to be around one. I'm not that fearful, but I think respect and preparation are keys to safety. I always think through what I'm doing; I use push sticks and feather boards when I can; I have an after market splitter that helps a bunch; if I'm in the middle of a cut and something seems to be going awry, I kick the off switch with my leg while watching the blade--perfect example of this was a rip I was cutting in some white oak, and I watched the back of the cut close over from internal stresses. I shut down the saw, put a wedge in the cut, finished it with no ill effects.
That said, as soon as I can get the money together, I'll have a Saw Stop. Tom"Notice that at no time do my fingers leave my hand"
Tom,
Granted if the Saw Stop was hooked up and operating properly he might have had a cut on his finger but the extra trip to plastic surgeon would not have been needed. Than again if he were paying attention to the job he was doing the trip to the ER would not have been made. I guess when you use power tools yoour mind has to be on the job at hand.
Greg
No doubt. From what I hear he is doing a great job of beating himself up over this. I want to talk to him personally about it and find out how exactly did it happen. Never take you eye off of the spinning sharp thingy! The irony of this is amazing. Tom"Notice that at no time do my fingers leave my hand"
This forum post is now archived. Commenting has been disabled