ShopSmith saved my hand

cincinnati · Post by **cincinnati** » Thu May 22, 2008 10:39 pm

I have wanted to post this for some time. I was around 20 years old when I purchased my Shopsmith. One of the first projects I was working on called for a dado to be cut into a board. being inexperienced I started to make the cut and discovered I was cutting too deep. I let up on the pressure with the push block and the board kicked back and down on the blade went the push block.
Now Shopsmith could have saved a couple of bucks and not included the push blocks in my purchase. But in my case it saved my hand.

Thanks ShopSmith[ATTACH]1545[/ATTACH]

a1gutterman · Post by **a1gutterman** » Thu May 22, 2008 11:14 pm

I am glad for your hand cincinnati! Experience is the best teacher, and when you only lose or damage an object, and not a body part, all the better.

jg300da · Post by **jg300da** » Fri May 23, 2008 7:29 am

This one of the inherent dangers that always worried me about the Shopsmith design, and a reason that makes me super cautious when using it in the dado mode. The fact that the blade is stationary and the table raises and lowers always worries me when putting downward pressure during a dado cut, if that table lock is not exactly tight......I switched most of my dado cutting to the radial arm saw.

dusty · Post by **dusty** » Fri May 23, 2008 8:23 am

jg300da, et al

I wholeheartedly respect your opinion and concern for the degree of safety provided.

However, the Shopsmith or the Delta or the RAS is not the factor that causes or prevents accidents. Rather, it is the attention of the operator to details and safe practices.

Whatever you do, do what you believe to be safe but do "due diligence" before you make that decision. Adequate research and a full understanding and proper maintenance of your equipment is most important.

Ed in Tampa · Post by **Ed in Tampa** » Fri May 23, 2008 10:56 am

cincinnati wrote:I have wanted to post this for some time. I was around 20 years old when I purchased my Shopsmith. One of the first projects I was working on called for a dado to be cut into a board. being inexperienced I started to make the cut and discovered I was cutting too deep. I let up on the pressure with the push block and the board kicked back and down on the blade went the push block.
Now Shopsmith could have saved a couple of bucks and not included the push blocks in my purchase. But in my case it saved my hand.

Thanks ShopSmith[ATTACH]1545[/ATTACH]

Cinncinnati
I agree, I have a whole selection of mangled push sticks and safety blocks at I shudder to think what the consequences might have been had Shopsmith not supplied them with my SS.
I have a friend that feed almost his entire push stick to his Shopsmith, the only damage was the fan in the DC3000 that occurred when the pieces hit it.

To this day I get sweats over a recent event. About 6 months ago I was using my molder head. I didn't want the wood to slip so I really was bearing down on it. What I didn't know was that I was forcing the table to go lower. Right before disaster I backed off, and got my push blocks. 30 seconds later the table reached critical depth, I heard a bang, the wood went flying and the push block was molded. Had I not stopped and got the push block my hand would have probably gone into the molder head. Nothing to reattach when it has been molded, UGH!!!!!
I have since gotten an adjustable collar and some stop collars to put on the table legs to insure my table depth will not change. Plus I put the molder head on the shelf where it will stay for awhile. In the meantime my local milling operation will make some money.
Ed

woodburner · Post by **woodburner** » Fri May 23, 2008 11:29 am

Don't forget that you should and can use your feather boards when you need that bit of extra holding power. Especially when using a dado set-up or a molding head.

I use both the fence mounting and table mounting feather boards when doing these operations, along with the push sticks, push blocks, etc. They really help in holding your workpiece to the table and preventing kickback. But no safety device is fullproof. Your best tool for this is your eyes (always wear eye protection), ears (you should wear hearing protection), and commonsense (always be alert to what is happening).

You also do not need to take one deep pass per cut while doing these operations (dado, molder). Doing two or more lighter passes are safer and you will get the same result when finished.

You should not use "extra" human power to force a tool work correctly, that is just asking for an accident to happen.

charlese · Post by **charlese** » Fri May 23, 2008 12:22 pm

jg300da wrote:This one of the inherent dangers that always worried me about the Shopsmith design, and a reason that makes me super cautious when using it in the dado mode. The fact that the blade is stationary and the table raises and lowers always worries me when putting downward pressure during a dado cut, if that table lock is not exactly tight......I switched most of my dado cutting to the radial arm saw.

Your concern is well taken J.G., as illustrated in Ed's post. This had been a concern of mine also, until I got one of the adjustable stop collars (like Ed).
I no longer have a RAS, so all of my work is done on the Mark V. (except for thickness planing and some special routing needs.)

Ed - Sorry you feel it necessary to go to the molding shop. Do you take your wood to them?