I have been asked many times, “why don’t we have worktables behind the table saw”? This is why.
Thanks to @cghaly for pointing out this video.
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Granted that kick-backs are dangerous and having a clear area behind the saw is a good idea, but drywall is pretty insignificant stuff. A good hard throw would have done the same thing into that surface. You’d more likely get a good bruise from something that wasn’t sharp (e.g. 2x4).
(edit: Followup, always wear your PPE! You’ve only got two eyeballs, about as hard as grapes, and they don’t heal back into a functional state after being punctured!)
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This is just plain wrong. A 2x4 kicking back from a table saw in this sort of fashion and hitting you will bruise you if you’re lucky – more than likely it will break ribs and could potentially kill you.
The SawStop is a 7.5HP table saw. It has the power to kill you.
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Great vid, @AlexRhodes . This is one of those things we need to see.
And @zmetzing there was a fatality in Europe recently where someone was struck in the neck by a bit of wood flying off a CNC router. People are squishy and fragile.
EDIT: I’d heard the router story from one of my coworkers who had heard it from a European safety specialist. I have nothing to back this up and don’t know the circumstances. Disregard. (I stand by the squishy-and-fragile comment though.)
Interesting thing is he is the safety guy & he doesn’t have safety glasses on.
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You are entitled to your opinion. Based on the kickbacks I’ve experienced and seen on saws of this size, I’d be more worried about eye damage or finger amputations (even the Saw Stop won’t fix that if your finger approaches it fast enough).
The saw in the video “Worker Killed” was a much larger, industrial machine and at some point, yes, the sheer power of the machine and the mass of the wood makes the projectile lethal.
(edit: Just to show I do think kickbacks can be dangerous – but usually not lethal – here’s one featured on HaD which just about had the demonstrator lose his fingers)
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It was also power fed, which is designed to prevent accidents like this.
I had an employee who was pushing a 2x4 through a small tabletop tablesaw and not using a push stick. A kick back bent his thumb all the way back tearing the tendons. Even a small saw is dangerous when used improperly.
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there was a fatality in Europe recently where someone was struck in the neck by a bit of wood flying off a CNC router. People are squishy and fragile.
Do you have a source for this? This must have either been an extreme circumstance or another type of machine with the label CNC, as opposed to what we think of when we hear CNC router.
And yes, a table saw can kill you or send you to the hospital via a kickback to your body.
Looong ago I worked in the scene shop for The Dallas Theater Center. Any new employee or volunteer was first shown what the kickback could do on a 15HP table saw. They had a 4x4 that went through a double layer cinder block wall and into a bathroom stall door. The left it in the door as an example. Sure wish we had camera phones then.
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