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Liberalism is a mental disorder
wrote in message
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The worst "kick back" (really the reverse) I've had was with my RAS. I
was
sawing into a 1" cedar board when it grabbed the blade and the carriage
came
at me. I had a few kicks when I was ripping with it, too. More than
one
board hit the wall. I've had no kicks on my table saw, yet.

I will not rip with a RAS, and will not allow my students to rip with it,
either.

In my opinion, there is not enough control of the stock while doing this,
and far too many "bad things" can happen. It can pull your hand into the
blade, or shoot the stock at you. I shudder when thinking about it.

Not trying to stir up too much crap, but as someone that uses a RAS to
rip sheet stock on a fairly regular basis, I'm curious as to how you
can have your hand pulled into the blade when ripping.

As I see it, on a TS, you are pushing a piece of wood into the
spinning blade while using a fence to guide the stock and the blade
sticks UP thru the material...on a RAS, you push the stock into the
spinning blade, using a fence, and the blade is above the stock. With
these set-ups, the TS pulls the material down to the table and the RAS
pulls the stock up to the blade guard...so the same effect, really.

I used to rip on a radial arm saw frequently. Could never understand what
was supposedly so dangerous about it. Has blade guard, splitter and anti
kick palls. You're right, no real difference. The blades are just orientated
180 out from each other.