Are your tools dangerous?

[Brian Holcombe]

As a practical measure toward better safety, I have air clamps on some machines. On the chop saw this frees up one hand, so if I have a short off cut, I hold the off cut with a push stick so that the off cut doesn't get pulled into the fence or dust chute. I've seen little off cuts become a dangerous projectile or nearly damage the saw a few times.

On the shaper and Maka mortiser I have air clamps also.

I'm setting up the Graule and have plans for building air clamps to hold down material.

For miters, I used to cut them on the chop saw, I stopped doing that a long time ago. I now cut them on the tablesaw, which I used to do by tilting the blade. Now I have a dedicated fixture which clamps to the table. The table itself slides forward. I typically cut with a dado stack so that it wastes all of the material and all of the material becomes sawdust. No flying off cut.

I rarely rip on the tablesaw, much rather use the bandsaw with feeder then run the part through the planer afterward.

[Edward Weber]

If I may ask, what air clamps do you use?

[Jim Becker]

Brian makes a good point..."sharp tools" certainly can do damage, but so can the material. Good workholding fixtures and techniques can help deal with that additional risk. I like the idea of air clamps in that respect and if I was doing the production work it would even be more important because it adds speed to the clamping process.

[Brian Holcombe]

If I may ask, what air clamps do you use?

I made the clamps using Bimba cylinders.

[Rich Engelhardt]

I don't consider my tools as being dangerous.
I do treat them as though they are though.
I believe that's called - respect.

Sort of like our Coon Hound/ Great Pyrenees mix Quigley. Friendly as can be - right up to the point you get in between him and some turkey. The dog goes insane when there's turkey around. You have to respect the fact that he's 105 pounds of turkey-induced-frenzy.

[Edward Weber]

I don't consider my tools as being dangerous.
I do treat them as though they are though.
I believe that's called - respect.

Exactly, this is the way

[Edward Weber]

I made the clamps using Bimba cylinders.

Thanks, I'll look into them

[Tom Trees]

Link to online bghm manual.
https://www.bghm.de/fileadmin/user_u...b_BG_96.18.pdf

Vielen Dank, Joe, das ist das beste Dokument, das ich je gesehen habe!

So glad you posted this, I've been glossing over some very interesting stuff the last few days.
Certainly miles better than the UK HSE documents I've linked to.
Lots of stuff to go through, which I've not got the chance to research yet,
as many things mentioned are certainly worthy of a thread of it's own

To say it's very much appreciated, would be an understatement,
Cheers

All the best
Tom

[Joe Calhoon]

Agree with Brian about the air clamps, makes everything a more predictable operation. I do a few off line rips on the short stroke slider but if I didn’t have the straight line rip would be doing them on the large format slider or the bandsaw a Brian does. Used a Unisaw for ripping many years and don’t miss that.
Warren, the lady with the hand on the blade guard is running a swing saw. Quite a different animal than the radial. I recently got rid of my crappy Dewalt radial that I used only for rough cutting. It was convenient for production but a little dangerous. To save the blade on the Graule using the chain saw with a jig now.
also never liked mitering on the chop saw. Even the Omga. Prefer the Double miter on the slider. Good that it throws the small off cuts away from the operator.

[Warren Lake]

thanks Joe, couldnt really tell. I saw the negative rake and got that. In the real world ive had to use them enough times with no negative Rake. The british guy that taught us keep the arm straight was right. Probably the only thing learned from him. Sitting with a coffee and my brain is starting to fire ive had two hands on them past as well but mostly one arm straight. It works and ive proven it enough times, it can creep when you do that. You tell what the saw what to do not the other way around.

What is your knife projection on the tersa?. Photo 2b looks like Tersa and its 1.1 MM which is 43.3 thousands of an inch which is .0433. I see they also show high speed steel 2a the same at 1.1mm. I always set to .050 so im right on track. stopped using wood blocks and went with a dial. You dont know what your knife projection is with wood blocks.

[Joe Calhoon]

That sounds about right Warren. I have a Tersa drawing somewhere, when I get a chance I’ll look for it. Two totally different animals though if you are trying to compare to a normal straight knife head.

[Warren Lake]

Years ago I did testing with different knife heights. The higher I went then more noise and I could feel the knives more. This was General stuff so lighter machines smaller heads and thinner knives. I decided on a knife projection of .050. When I got SCM stuff I just went with that rather than what ever the last owners were using. Probably should have dropped rollers but didn't but can at any time.

The SCM stuff worked great with the same knife projection. The machines were heavier, heads were larger, knives were thicker.

Reading your info I see the projection I arrived at was .0057 different than the Tersa. So the German knife projection recommendation on high speed steel and Tersa is the same. Tersa emailed me back and said 1mm, I emailed this and they said they had not seen it and figured it was correct.

Here is your info. 2a is high speed steel, 2b is tersa.

I stopped using wood and went to a dial long ago so I could set to a number every time and have always set to .050 which is one full rotation of that model Dial.

1.1 mm Knife Projection is .043.jpg

[Rod Sheridan]

Hi Warren, you probably already know this however 1.1mm is the maximum allowable knife projection for hand fed machines (MAN rated) in the EU.

A shaper with a feeder still requires MAN rated tooling in the EU as the shaper could be hand fed by not using the feeder.

Regards, Rod.

[Warren Lake]

No I didnt. I'm from a different time. Ive hand fed and power fed old school tooling for a long time. I get new stuff minimizes snatch. Proper set up was fine on old school tooling.

The German info does not say maximum or less than it only states 1.1 one so i took that as that is what those are both set to. Maybe in the German writing it says other wise. Id have to send it to some friends to translate if so but the picture should be fine. On my own I already determined that number as working the best for me.

[mike stenson]

Here's your translation.

Adjust the knife protrusion using a gauge. Max 1,1mm