On Tue, 14 Dec 2004 12:55:13 -0500, Hank Gillette
wrote:

I may be overly suspicious, but I think the saw manufacturers don't want
to put it on their saws because in effect they would be admitting that
their previous saws were unsafe.

Hank -- Assuming that the technology works, then I can see the saw
companies coming to this very conclusion (with a number of twists and turns
in the analysis) as a reason to not go that way. After all, they might
have offered two lines -- one w/, one w/o. Certainly there is some
substantial market out there for this feature. (Of course, as always, there
are costing issues.) Actually, I would take a slightly different view than
yours: Not so much that adding sawstop would say that past TSs were unsafe,
but that a significant market would still want the less expensive saws w/o
this dealie and that selling w/ and w/o versions would look bad -- that is
what the companies may have concluded.

While car companies have offered air bags as optional equipment on some
cars, maybe from a jury perspective a "safe" saw and an "unsafe" saw could
not be justified. People think they understand cars; even some of us who
use TSs are still working out all the dynamics.

Think about how various safety features of today's cars came to market,
from collapsing steering columns, padded dashboards, and crumple zones, to
airbags. Generally, there was industry opposition and eventually courts,
Congress, or stockholders required them. At least until maybe 10-15 years
ago, safety was not embraced; it was eventually accepted, IMO. Think about
roll cages in minivans. They make huge sense in light of the fact that
minivans are sold to families, yet Detroit did not rush to design them into
minivans. IIRC, the feds eventually set a deadline. Sure, there have been
some companies to jump on a new safety opportunity -- the Germans and the
Japanese often are in this group. But base on looking at what US-based
companies bring to market, the _general_ view is that "safety" only sells
to a marginal group.

There can be an irony in the law about such things. If the sawstop
technology does work and it catches on, then if a company that does not
sell sawstop is sued for its "plain" TS, the plaintiff can say, "They could
have added this new technology but they refused." OTOH, if the same
company had licensed sawstop and then was sued, the fact that it had added
a sawstop line would not be admissible in court. YMMV, depending on your
state, but that irony exists in many states. FWIW. -- Igor