Kevin,KCollins wrote: Fri Oct 21, 2022 12:02 pm To answer you first question RF Guy - Yes... your assumptions are correct. That is the cut I'm attempting. Can I ask what you used to sketch that up? I like it. Is it SketchUp?
For me I'm worried about several things. First... getting an accurate cut... A square cut... I have cut plywood on my old craftsman table saw a thousand times but not on a SS... So lack of experience with a new table saw is a little intimidating. I'm confident with other table saws just not the smaller SS table...Which I'm sure will come with time. Second... is the only material I have cut this size has been plywood. NOT hardwood. I do have a new thin kerf SS cross cutting blade... So I'm hoping that would help. Third... I'm cutting walnut... Around here it's $16.00 a board foot... I DO NOT WANT TO SCREW THIS PIECE UP... I get one chance and that's it.
So I have few things running through my head at the moment. If it was plywood on a larger table saw I would have no issue cutting this piece. But Walnut on a smaller table... Intimidating.
Thanks. No, I am old school...it was drawn in Visio which I learned on the job years ago and still have a copy. I have played around a bit with SketchUp and Fusion 360...the latter is my preference. I just don't seem to get enough time to put into them or into my shop as I would like (life keeps interrupting).
We all have a different comfort level with shop tools, i.e. some are more confident than others at certain tasks. Some are overconfident.
Having been young and uninformed in my earlier years, I experienced kickback a couple of times in the past. Not fun. The main table of the Mark V does have some twisting motion to it, but it gets A LOT more stable when connector tubes are used to anchor it to the auxiliary table. Just this alone concerns me for myself making cuts on large items on the Mark V main table, i.e. any twist or lateral play could induce a kickback. This gets amplified with a bigger (heavier) workpiece such as plywood or this panel in this case. In comparison, a nice cabinet tablesaw is rock solid and doesn't move at all, so I might be more tempted to try this cut on a good cabinet tablesaw with a big enough wing table. I have cut full sheets of plywood on my Dad's Crafstman tablesaw many years ago and needed assistance to wrangle it by myself. I have done the same on my Mark V a few times. No more. I have the luxury of owning a tracksaw and I would never go back. It is so much safer and night and day difference in breaking down sheet goods. In fact, I only use my Mark V in tablesaw mode for rip cuts only now, and the occasional small crosscut (prefer my miter saw usually). I know there are others on the forum who will do full sheet plywood cuts on their Mark V and I don't judge them for it. To each their own. I just prefer to keep my own risk lower. The choice is yours, but I know you spent a lot of money and time on that panel so I was just trying to give you advice from my perspective. Also, that panel likely weighs quite a bit and that is A LOT of mass to come back at you should a kickback occur (same thing with a 3/4" sheet of plywood).P.S. If you do it on the Mark V, thin kerf is good, but also make sure your belts are tight enough. More than once cutting 8/4 cherry I have had my sawblade slow mid-cut because my belts needed to be re-tightened...and that was with a very sharp and expensive sawblade.
P.P.S. Not to confuse you even more, but if truly it is only 1/16" or less difference on the staggered ends, have you considered aggressive sanding? The trick is doing it and NOT rounding over the top/bottom edges of the boards. Assuming all of your end cuts are perfectly square AND you don't need a perfect squared end relative to the sides, e.g. depending on how this panel is going to be used in a piece of furniture...I have corrected this kind of problem at least once in the past with an aggressive sander. I have a Festool Rotex which when in Rotex mode is as aggressive as a belt sander when you need it. A belt sander could also work. Sanding is more trouble than squaring it with a saw cut, but it sounds like you are so close that maybe this could be an option for you...at least on one end since you want 51" final dimension, correct? I guess you would still need to cut the other end to finished length.
RF Guy
