New Saw Stop PCS Dust Collecting Blade Guard

[Brian Kerley]

"Laminar air flow" or not, it would be hard to do it all from underneath. I'm not an engineer, but the way the dust flies forward as the saw cuts would make it hard to pull it under the table without a hole in front of the blade for it to go into.

The only way dust gets flown back "up" at you is not when the blade makes the cut, but when the dust is carried by the blade <i>after</i> the cut and is pulled all the way around once it comes back up out of the table. If you can capture that dust under the table then it never has a chance to be thrown back up at you.

[Paul Ryan]

Paul,

Get a Y connector to attach to your 4" just before the table saw and add a 2 1/2" adapter to one side and simply connect that to the back of the guard and the other side to the lower DC outlet. Don't need to use your shop vac.

http://www.amazon.com/Jet-JW1015-4-I.../dp/B00005A1I8

http://www.amazon.com/Jet-JW1039-1-I.../dp/B000077CPN

Cheers

Frank,

Thanks!
That is to simple, I would have never thought of that. I would have made it a much more complicated engineer feat to accompish the same thing.

[Frank Trinkle]

I'd add a blast gate to the Y connector so that when I'm not using the guard, I can shut off that side.

Also... I wonder when SawStop will ship that and the other mods to those of us who were field testers...??

[Alan Schwabacher]

And I wonder if they will offer that guard as an add-on for their other saws.

[Paul Ryan]

Alan,

I read some place else that if you called SS and you had a ICS saw they were going to give away, yes give away, some of the overhead guards for ICS saw to promote that fact that the guard works on the ICS saw. Give them a call and ask if it will work. If you are lucky they may send one for trial.

[Rob Price]

I'Mm just hoping this guard doesn't deflect sideways as much as the current one does.

[Joaquin Franco]

Here is a bit more information on the dust collecting blade guard.

http://www.woodworkersjournal.com/aw...st-collection/

[Joe Jensen]

I have a SawStop Industrial Saw (original one), and I saw the new guard at the AWFS show in Vegas last week. The guard is very nice, and with a shop vac, the dust collection was impressive. It has extra side pieces that drop down to the table if the cut is less than a blade width.

The issue I see, is that it seems to be designed for a shop vac and not a dust collection system. The port on the rear of the guard is very small, maybe 1" inside. A good shop vac pulls 90" of water in suction, but will only do maybe 100 cfm. A dust collector, is designed for lower pressure, but higher CFM. The relationship between pressure and CFM in a port is approximately equal to the area of the port. A 4" duct can flow about 350 CFM with about 10" of pressure. At the same 10" of pressure, a 1" dia port can flow only 21 CFM. Since the shop vac has 90" of pressure, it can flow 9X the CFM through the 1" port. That would mean the shop vac could pull about 180 CFM. But, the shop vac can only pull about 100 CFM, so the best it could do is 100CFM or 5X what a dust collector can pull through that small port.

If you doubt this, drill a 1" diameter hole in a scrap that is at least the size of your dust collector opening. Put the scrap up to the end of the dust collector pipe and see how little air flows. Then put it against the shop vac hose and see how much more it pulls.

I have been using a Felder guard for a sliding table saw on my SawStop. It has a 1.5" diameter port, still very small. I may rig up a cheap shop vac near the ceiling just to pull dust off the top of the saw.

[Rob Price]

This will be interesting. I just bought a small shop vac with a 1.25" opening. It fits onto my plunge router, ROS sander, and works great for a quick clean up of the workbench. I have it mounted on the wall with an 8' hose. The smaller hose is much more flexible than the standard 2.5 shopvac hose. I wonder if this will work with the new guard? If so, I need to get it wired with a switch next to my current DC switch, or maybe go with the Y adapter someone else mentioned. I just wonder with the DC hooked up to a 4" port, how much flow will come through a tiny 1" hose going up top? The airflow is going to take the path of least resistance (ie 4" opening).

[Andy Sowers]

Any of the field testers get their new blade guard yet? Anyone know when its supposed to arrive?

--andy

[Chip Lindley]

With a totally enclosed blade...inside a dust extractor guard....would not an explosive safety brake which stops the blade within milli-seconds.....Be OverKill?

But, then again, there are some who still would have to raise the guard to see what's happening!

[Gary Venable]

Does anyone know if it is interchangeable with the guard on the Industrial Saw Stop?

[Joe Jensen]

Does anyone know if it is interchangeable with the guard on the Industrial Saw Stop?

I attended the AWFS show in Vegas and SawStop had the guard there. They said there was a version for the Industrial Saw. I think the price was like $99

[Paul Ryan]

With a totally enclosed blade...inside a dust extractor guard....would not an explosive safety brake which stops the blade within milli-seconds.....Be OverKill?

I tend to agree with that. It would be very difficult to injure yourself with that set up. But I know of some people that would find away to do it.

I for one did not buy the saw for the dust collecting guard, even though I am interested in seeing it. My plan was to use the guard on this saw more than I had other guards in the past. But I can't bring myself to use it. I have put it on the saw a 1/2 dozen times and still hate using a guard. It is the anti kick back pawls that drive me nuts. Once the new guard arrives I am going to take the pawls off the old guard and see how I like it that way.

[Barry Vabeach]

Paul, not that I would do such a thing on purpose, but I have the PCS and after using it and being frustrated by the pawls a few times, one of my files accidentally fell against each of the barbs on each pawl a few times until they were dulled a little, and I find that the guard is a little less frustrating. I also found that I don't use the guard much when using the miter gauge at other than 90 degrees because the guard tends to deflect to the side instead of going straight up over the stock. As Rob says, there can be quite a bit of sideways deflection, though as others have mentioned, it is still a great saw.