Stupid table saw mistake of the day

[Chip Olson]

So, the other day I found myself with the need to take 8 4"x22" pieces of 1/2" plywood and put a roughly 1"x1" cutout in each corner, all of them precisely the same size. Not having a band saw, nor being sufficiently confident in my handsawing skills, I clamped them all together into a big stack and made the cuts on the table saw, doing the long sides first with the miter gauge. Then it came time to put the cuts in the ends, standing the stack straight up against the fence, with the offcut side against the fence. This sounds like a dumb idea already, doesn't it?

So I'm completing the first of those cuts, when it occurs to me that "hey, those little offcuts are trapped between the blade and the fence and under the rest of the workpiece, and when the blade gets through the last one..."

RAT-TAT-TAT-TAT-TAT-TAT-TAT-TAT!!!

"...they're all going to get shot out of there like a machine gun. Ow."

Only one of them hit me, and it didn't even give me a bruise, but a few inches to the left and it would have hurt a lot more. I did the rest of those cuts very, very carefully, with the offcuts to the outside and me on the other side of the fence.

[Ed Breen]

HoHo Chip,
Tried that and the bruise took a month to go away and I still had a little blue dot for weeks later.
Ed

[Bart Leetch]

Hmm Maybe a new moniker Machine Gun Olson. Or Chip shooter Chip....

Or you maybe a wood eater if.....

Or I've eaten wood because....

[Ted Miller]

Chip, Once I started to read your third line of your post, I thought, "look out". Glad you didn't get more than one hit...

[glenn bradley]

Yeah, those little mothers'll shoot right outta there won't they? Glad it was minor.

[Bryan Read]

It's amazing sometimes how you do things without thinking it through... I had my first srious kickback the othr day... straightened me right out!

[Brian Dormer]

Chip - glad you are OK.

For next time - try a jig saw. I was NEVER a big fan - but recently was faced with some cuts that there was NO OTHER WAY (well - hand saw, but who uses THOSE anymore) I bought a 5.5 Amp B&D orbital jigsaw with a laser - WOW!!! Loads 'O Power - cuts straight (even freehand) - SWEET! Now it's one of my favorite tools.

[Dan Lee]

Glad you're OK
The other day I was ripping some 3/8" thick by 2" inch wide by 24" inch long stock using a push shoe.
After "completing" one of the rips I had lifted the push shoe before the piece fully cleared the back of the blade. Lucky it didnt kick back but I turned the saw off and ducked till it spun down and quit for the night
Dan

[Burt Waddell]

Chip,

'Hate to admit the number of times that I have had the same experience doing that. Today, I had to do basically the same thing but this time I used my EZ square and a Hilti - kind of boring - no excitement - but it was safe.

Burt

[Sam Chambers]

Chip...

Glad you're OK. If you're like me, that fraction of a second when you realize it's coming at you seems like an hour. At least it seemd like when I dropped (yes, dropped) a 4" x 5" piece of MDF right onto the spinning blade. Them suckers hurt when they hit you!

[Randall Frey]

Glad to hear things didn't go real bad. I never had much faith in my hand saw skills until I bought a Japanese crosscut saw. Wow, I use it all the time now for real precise cuts with great results. Check them out, I think Woodcraft sells them, you won't be sorry.