[galangalalgol]

Why are radial arm saws so dangerous? I have an old one and other than shooting wood into the shop wall when ripping, or holding the wood with your hand it seems pretty hard to hurt yourself. Circular saws seem way more dangerous, and the only injury I've ever had was from a portaband.

[Junk_Collector]

There used to be some pretty wild published advice on how to use a radial arm saw including ripping full sheets of plywood by walking the sheet across the cutting plane with the saw pointed at your stomach. They also travel towards the operator in the event of a catch because of the direction of the blade and the floating arbor. This makes positioning yourself out of the potential path of the blade critical and the one thing we know is that you can't trust people to be safe on a job site when they are in a hurry.

[ssl-3]

>There used to be some pretty wild published advice on how to use a radial arm saw including ripping full sheets of plywood by walking the sheet across the cutting plane with the saw pointed at your stomach.

So, similar to ripping plywood on a table saw, then? What makes one worse than the other here?

>They also travel towards the operator in the event of a catch because of the direction of the blade and the floating arbor.

So, like a modern sliding miter saw, then? What makes one worse than the other?

[buffington]

I have the original manuals describing how to rip using a radial arm saw. The blade is set at the level of your stomach and mere inches away from a spinning blade as you walk a sheet of plywood along it. There are so many ways for that situation to go wrong, and so few ways to make that situation safe. I have a beast of a radial arm saw, and I set it up to rip out of curiosity, and it would be insane to ever do it that way. It will cut your guts wide upon if you so much as slip.

And when that saw bites, and comes at you with enough force to be too much for you to react to. If parts of you are in the way, it'll rip right through them as it punches you in the jaw.