Stupid Stupid Stupid !!!

[Tullie Templet]

That's what I was calling myself all the way to the emergency room this morning. I was cutting a piece of luan 12x12". I made the first cut with the rip fence for width. The piece was 4 ft. long so I turned it and was going to use the mitre guage to cut it to length so I used the fence to set 12" so it would be square. Well like a DUMMY I forgot to move the fence before I started cutting and well I guess you figured out what happened next. Piece got caught between the blade and fence and shot that sucker like a rocket. It grabbed my right pinky and ripped it open basically from where it attaches to my hand, down both side to the first joint. Peeled it to the bone. It was pretty ugly but luckly it didn't cut any tendons so I can still move it. The piece shot so hard it somehow hit th mitre guage and turned the head from a 90 to a 45 degree angle and it was tight to. I was standing to the side of the blade behind the mitre guage, so it looks like the mitre guage deflected the wood away from my body and it shot all the way to the wall about 10ft. back. Now bfore I get any lectures I know exactly what I did wrong and it was very STUIPID and I hope this can be a lesson for someone else. If you still want to lecture and call me STUPID I'm OK with that cause I prolly deserve it. Just glad it didn't hit me in the gut.

[Aaron Wingert]

I took one of those in the gut once Tullie, and I know how hard things come out of the tablesaw. I was lucky not to get more than a bruise and a scratch.
Sorry to hear you got hurt but I'm glad to hear that you'll recover from the injury.

[Neil Brooks]

I won't be lecturing.

I WILL however, be:

• wishing you a FAST and FULL recovery
• thanking you for reminding us that -- no matter what we think -- it really CAN happen ... in the blink of an eye ... a moment's inattention ... that 15 minutes past "when you really should have called it quits," or....

[Chris Tsutsui]

Wow, I guess you can't underestimate working with luan.

Glad you didn't lose your digit completely... Thanks for sharing though, I think you convinced a lot of us never to attempt something like that.

[george wilson]

When I first started school shop,the teacher was doing a demonstration of cutting plywood. He was cutting an 18" square piece of plywood,using the fence to make the last cut. The saw flung the wood like a frisbee. The class was not in the way of the wood. he was puzzled,and did it again. The second piece did exactly the same thing !!!

[Prashun Patel]

Thanks. I sweat a little everytime I hear a story like this. I never think "how stupid". I think, "Damn, that coulda happened to me a million times."

Playing with fire...

[Van Huskey]

No lectures here, mainly cause I live in a glass house with all glass furniture! I for one am more scared of kickback than the blade (knock on some nice birdseye maple) I know where the blade is and is gonna be, wood from a kickback can end up ANYWHERE. Good luck and hope you have a full recovery very soon. Chalk it up to lesson "learnt".

[David Nelson1]

Wow glad your ok. I'll remember not to do that.

[Floyd Mah]

Years ago, when my table saw was just a Delta contractor's model, before all the add-ons, I happened to read an article online. The substance of the article was that the typical kick-back missile was a square piece of wood. It was basically the size that you described: 12" x 12". It described the usual situation, that many woodworkers would take the safety devices off (the blade guard and the splitter) and then neglect to restore them to the table because it was a nuisance. They would then cut a piece of wood. After the kickback, if the woodworker picked up the missile and and examined the lower surface, he would find saw marks in an arc, stretching from the cut edge to the trailing corner. This was the path of the saw teeth on the work piece. Usually the workpiece would bounce off the fence and then be caught by the saw teeth which would spin the wood, giving it the final Frisbee motion. In your case, you intended to use the miter gauge to perform the cut despite butting it against the fence, but in the usual situation, someone tries to cut the square piece along the fence without a splitter.

Anyway, the article scared the #$@#$ out of me, since I really didn't want to be engaged in a hobby that would try to maim me. At that point, I realized that the reason for not replacing safety devices was that it was difficult on my saw (I had to deal with two small, difficult-to-reach screws and nuts, get two different sizes of small wrenches and get into an awkward contortion to remove or replace the blade guard/splitter). I ordered a Delta blade overhead blade guard which came with an easily installed splitter. It made a big difference in my working safely. Last year, I came up with a riving knife retro-fit that has also worked well.

In my previous life, I worked in the operating room where things could happen unexpectedly. One of the most valuable things to do is to re-examine the mishaps and figure out how to prevent them from recurring. In your situation, you should see if there are things you could change with your saw or work habits that would increase your safety. I know there are those who seem to be proud of their luck working without safety devices, but that's like designing an ocean liner without planning for lifeboats. I think the lesson (for me) is that bad things happen without warning. As for those of you who don't use safety devices, I used to see people like you in the operating room -- as patients.

[Joe Shinall]

Caught a piece of 1 inch thick red oak in the arm one time from my TS from kickback. Hit me above the wrist. Chipped the bone and made my whole arm go numb from hand up to the shoulder for about 10 minutes. Nothing broke luckily, but i have a nasty scar from it.

[Mikail Khan]

Thanks for the reminder Tullie.

Hope you have a speedy recovery.

MK

[Bobby Thistle]

It seems to me that someone on here said something like this; "it's not IF an accident will happen - it's WHEN it will happen." These words stuck with me ever since I read them.

--Bobby

[Peter Aeschliman]

ouch! Sorry man. That sucks but I'm glad it wasn't a permanent injury.

Just to be sure I understand what happened, are you saying that you used the miter gauge and the fence at the same time?

[Terry Hatfield]

Will be praying for your complete recovery. Keep us posted on how you are doing.

Terry

[Lex Boegen]

Like I told my father when he fell off a ladder: "If you're gonna be dumb, you gotta be tough!"