In this episode I describe a table saw kickback that missed my wife by mere seconds. The reason for the kickback: Poorly designed, flimsy anti-kickback pawls, with a huge amount of slop that allowed side-to-side movement and did not grab the cutoff piece properly.
Edit to add: So, why did this happen? I believe there are several reasons – My Analysis:
Very sloppy anti-kickback pawls on the splitter that came with the new table saw. I replaced these immediately with an after-market splitter minus the overhead blade guard.
I did not joint the SYP (southern yellow pine) I was ripping – it looked straight enough!
The work piece pushed the cutoff into the blade as they both went beyond the back of the blade
WHAM!!! Kickback…..
And now you know the rest ya-da ya-da…
My #1 Rule after this incident: ALWAYS, ALWAYS joint my workpiece before ripping.
I would love to hear if you have had a similar problem, and what you did about it.
