Sensible words from an American on table saw safety

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"While it’s easy to poke fun at the British for their quaint use of our language, their fondness for strange-flavored potato chips and their inability to make a car that doesn’t leak oil,"

HOW VERY VERY DARE HE !!!!!!!! :twisted: :evil: (hammer)
 
Dangermouse":10i4pxwi said:
"While it’s easy to poke fun at the British for their quaint use of our language, their fondness for strange-flavored potato chips and their inability to make a car that doesn’t leak oil,"

HOW VERY VERY DARE HE !!!!!!!! :twisted: :evil: (hammer)

Yeh!!!!

Mellows told me about that comment when he brought my breakfast this morning!!

:mrgreen:

Jim
 
Dangermouse":2n5ibakk said:
their inability to make a car that doesn’t leak oil,

I'm sure it was tongue in cheek, but speaking as one who bought an American car brand new in 2005 which, before it's sale in 2007, had needed 4 homestart callouts because it simply refused to go, a replacement alarm module, 2 EGR valves, two ball joints, a complete torque converter and developed a rear main oil seal leak which took 3 weeks to repair, not to mention being stuck at the side of the road waiting for the AA to change a tyre because the factory supplied jack did not reach high enough to lift the car clear of the road, he might wish to reconsider comments regarding the relative merits of transatlantic vehicle reliability! :lol:
 
"All the things the Brits don’t think you should read are compiled in our digital publication The Essential Guide to Table Saws. Learn how to set up and use your table saw safely and efficiently."

LOL! I'm tempted to send him some complimentary DVDs...
 
I presume he knows it's called the 'English' language and not the 'American language' and I think he got 'oil' and 'emissions' confused.

I've put this link on here before now but it's worth another look, this is an American, Kelly Mahler, talking about table saw safety, he explains kickback properly and also mentions the 'English' riving knife.

http://videos.americanwoodworker.com/vi ... -table-saw

Andy
 
Dangermouse":23o1ljga said:
" and their inability to make a car that doesn’t leak oil,"

At least ours are capable of driving straight AND going around corners.
 
Chems":3pr5t1ta said:
Dangermouse":3pr5t1ta said:
" and their inability to make a car that doesn’t leak oil,"

At least ours are capable of driving straight AND going around corners.

And they are powerful and economical for their size.

When renting in the US I was laughed at because the 1800cc car booked was "only good for a city car". The 3600cc monster I ended up with was very comfortable, (floating sofa) but my 2000cc diesel powered Audi A6 is vastly more powerful and twice as economical :?

Bob
 
Lons":1h077ynp said:
Chems":1h077ynp said:
Dangermouse":1h077ynp said:
" and their inability to make a car that doesn’t leak oil,"

At least ours are capable of driving straight AND going around corners.

And they are powerful and economical for their size.

When renting in the US I was laughed at because the 1800cc car booked was "only good for a city car". The 3600cc monster I ended up with was very comfortable, (floating sofa) but my 2000cc diesel powered Audi A6 is vastly more powerful and twice as economical :?

Bob

Ah, the Audi A6, an excellent example of British automotive engineering. Thanks for reading gentlemen, and allowing me a bit of humour at your expense.

Bob Lang
 
That's fine, Bob, we regularly get humor (sic) at yours! :)

Actually it is good to see proper practice being promoted on your side of the pond. Kelly Mehler has been doing it for a long time. 2 down 299,999,998 to go, eh? Between us we will conquer the continent.

What we over here cannot understand is why such risks are taken in such a litigious society. We would expect American machines to be made in a way which makes them impossible to be abused, just to prevent lawsuits.
 
Not being a (woodworking) machine user, I don't usually comment on such matters, but in this case I can't resist. Having worked for years in an engineering environment in which a great deal of effort was expended to ensure high plant reliability, there are a few things I've learned over the years that may be worth an airing.

Long-term reliability is usually associated either with simplicity (absolute minimum - preferably no - moving parts), or with regular and intensive maintenance.

The American approach to tablesaw/circular saw safety does surprise me somewhat. Americans are not a stupid people (no more so than the rest of us, anyway), yet in this matter seem almost wilfully blind to well-known contributions to safe use. The riving knife has been in use in the UK and elsewhere - indeed, mandatory in commercial and industrial situations - for as long as I can remember, and probably a lot longer than that. It's simple, has no moving parts so is reliable, and works well; yet it took many years for it be adopted to any extent across the pond. Ditto crown guards - the simpler and more solid, the better, generally.

I was rather surprised a year or so ago by the fuss about the 'saw-stop' flesh-sensing technology device which some seem to want to make mandatory in the USA. It's a very impressive device, but it relies too much on sensors and devices, all of which could fail at the critical moment. It's not simple, and consequently, it's reliability could not be guaranteed. High technology devices are also prone to increased unreliability as the machine they are fitted to ages, especially if the machine is used unsympathetically and gets little cleaning and maintenance. The beauty of the riving knife is that (short of gross damage or physical removal) it will continue to function properly for the life of the machine. (I could see the saw-stop being a useful additional fitment to saws used in, for example, schools; additional safeguards for the inexperienced being generally a good idea, and being an environment where regular maintenance is usually relatively easy to ensure.)

There's a story told (probably apocriphal, as most such are) about the use of ball-point pens during the days of the space race. NASA discovered that they didn't work in zero gravity (they don't work upside-down, either - try for yourself) so spent a couple of million dollars developing a pen that would work in space. The Russians discovered the same problem, but solved it a different way. They took propelling pencils instead.

I wonder if America has suffered a slight case of 'technology blindness' with table saw safety. America is a society so used to technological solutions that (collectively at least), it automatically assumes that a problem must have a high-tech solution. Simple measures (riving knife, crown guard, push sticks, rip fence not extending past blade) have been well known for years, and must be better, simpler, cheaper and more reliable measures to adopt as mandatory fitments to new saws than costly and potentially unreliable flesh-sensing auto-stops.

I'm not taking a pop at anybody, here. I'm just genuinely slightly puzzled that a normally intelligent and pragmatic country seems to have had a slight mental block over this one.
 
Steve Maskery":2jj5k2ip said:
What we can't we over here cannot understand is why such risks are taken in such a litigious society. We would expect American machines to be made in a way which makes them impossible to be abused, just to prevent lawsuits.

I don't know about "abused"...I would go so far as say I'm surprised they are still USED!! :mrgreen:

We're missing the real point here aren't we? You can't use a dado stack without taking the riving knife out can you?

So is it not faster to just leave it off? Or not have one of those pesky things at all!?

Anyway...I'm surprised we are allowed to have anything called "knives" over here...after all we can't even be trusted to walk around the street with one without being accused of being Jack the Ripper's grandson! :roll:

I once tried to buy a bandsaw blade on the internet and wasn't able to get it until I proved I was eighteen!!! I kid you not! :mrgreen:

Jim
 
nanscombe":1qaj75tz said:
But it was their language once as well ... Until we changed it.

I have a feeling it was more that they forgot their OED on the boat and some bloke "Webster" was commissioned to try to remember all the words!

His school report age 10:

"Noah is a bright boy but his spelling leaves a lot to be desired. However his woodwork teacher says he has a natural flair for boat building"

The evidence is there if you Google it you know! :mrgreen: :mrgreen: :mrgreen:

Jim
 
I hope it was a joke.

But strange flavoured potato chips? - They're crisps. And cars that leak oil? - we don't make any cars. Tsk tsk.
 
Richard T":3ig61lxc said:
I hope it was a joke.

But strange flavoured potato chips? - They're crisps. And cars that leak oil? - we don't make any cars. Tsk tsk.


We don't make any cars? You jest, good sir!

Aston Martin, Morgan, Rolls-Royce, Bentley, Jaguar, Land Rover, Honda, Nissan, Toyota, Vauxhall. Probably others, too. We're also the world centre for automotive design and development (Ricardo, Lotus, Cosworth for example). Then there's Formula 1

(We used to make London taxis too, but Manganese Bronze have just gone into receivership. Stand by for a buyout by the Indians or Chinese.)
 
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