Down in the basement shop there lurks a tablesaw that is older than I
am. It has lived longer than any direct drive saw has a right to
expect, but back then even the cheap Craftsmans were made well
apparently.

As I've gotten more involved with woodworking I've struggled a bit
with the limitations of a 9" saw with a 20" deep table. At one point
we were having problems with it and dad came home with this "thing"
that said Craftsman on it that I refuse to call a table saw. I fixed
the old one.

I've known it's going to get replaced at some point so I've been
reluctant to put anything into it. Finally though I got sick of the
non-carbide blades that get dull in about a week and bind in a
heartbeat. Didn't want to buy any 9" blades, but I broke down and got
a decent dewalt blade and a couple cheapos for ripping. They got
delivered two days ago. Made one test cut with the dewalt, it did
well.

Yesterday dad was down in the shop unsupervised, always a bad thing.
I come back and the blade won't go up/down without a lot of effort.
Investigation determines that one of the stop collars is way out of
position and it somehow got wedged in really good up against another
piece it had no business being near. Dad's typical solution when a
handle has more resistence than it ought to is to turn it harder.
When that fails, hit it with a hammer. Ask questions later.

So in the process of fixing that, I get around to making some new
inserts. It's a pain to make them as the lip is less than 1/8". Even
the steel one hasn't held up. So I made two of those, spent quite a
bit of time planing them down level by hand..

Today I go down after dad has once again been down there by himself.
I'm just about to make a cut and dad says hold on, need to make one
quick cut, this is too long. He takes an 1/8th off his piece. I go
up and wait for the blade to stop, get the height back to where I'd
had it. Turn on the saw... nothing. Dead.

Now I know he didn't burn out the motor crosscutting that 1x pine. So
it's gotta be something electrical. Tried resetting, plugging in
somewhere else and looked for a loose connection. Nothing.

Figures.

So it's not the end of the world. It probably can even be fixed, but
I think it's trying to tell us it's ready for retirement. And the 9"
blade, well, so I have a half inch less cutting height on the new saw,
who cares - at least I didn't buy a Forrest. We're going to have a
look at the Ridgid tomorrow, and if we can get over the experience of
that "thing" from the last time possibly the new Craftsmans that I've
heard so much about, but it's a bit of a drive to get to a Sears.
I've been looking at the Deltas and Jets on amazon. Not going to rush
into anything, there's always the "thing" if I get desperate.

I'm sure whatever we end up with will make me wonder how I ever did
anything with the old one, but I'll still miss the ol' girl.


-Leuf

"Leuf" wrote in message
...
handle has more resistence than it ought to is to turn it harder.
When that fails, hit it with a hammer. Ask questions later.

Sigh. Mine too. Always told me "Don't force it! Get a *bigger* hammer."

"patrick conroy" wrote in message
news

"Leuf" wrote in message
...
handle has more resistence than it ought to is to turn it harder.
When that fails, hit it with a hammer. Ask questions later.

Sigh. Mine too. Always told me "Don't force it! Get a *bigger* hammer."


Reminds me of a story from many years ago.

We had a girl move into a house with her boyfriend. We all used tools and
were familiar with them. She hardly ever saw a tool before and did not know
about them. This led to some very funny incidents. Nobody laughed harder
than her boyfriend.

The front door of the house was one of those old ones that was exceptionaly
big and heavy. It had six hinges on it to support the weight. It got out of
alignment and needed to be adjusted. But it was so heavy it was hard to hold
into position to tighten the screws on the hinges.

So we loosened the hinges and started to tighten them again. We put a shim
under the door. But we needed to "hudge the door a tiny amount. And we
couldn't get it to move. So my buddy went and got a hammer. It didn't work.
So he went to get a bigger hammer. It was the biggest ball peen hammer I
have ever seen. It was almost as big as a sledge hammer.

Linda took one look at the hammer and screamed. She thought John was going
to destroy the house. A couple taps with the monster hammer nudged the door
into position so we could tighten the screws. Problem solved. We never let
her forget that incident. The "bigger hammer" story was told again and
again.

In regards to get a bigger hammer the proper term is to "get the fine
adjustment tool". The bigger the finer the adjustment. Larry
"patrick conroy" wrote in message
news

"Leuf" wrote in message
...
handle has more resistence than it ought to is to turn it harder.
When that fails, hit it with a hammer. Ask questions later.

Sigh. Mine too. Always told me "Don't force it! Get a *bigger* hammer."

On Thu, 7 Apr 2005 07:02:54 -0400, the inscrutable "larry in cinci"
spake:

In regards to get a bigger hammer the proper term is to "get the fine
adjustment tool". The bigger the finer the adjustment. Larry

I called it the "Ford Finesser" when I worked at a Ford dealership.
It's about 4 pounds, has a short handle like a drill hammer, and
has a V-shaped peen on one end + a large octagon snout on the other.
It's EXTREMELY hard to use due to the uneven weight distribution and a
guy gave it to me because he hurt himself with it. I keep it around
for a weight. Has anyone else ever seen one like this?

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A #1.5 drilling hammer is my new favorite beastie.

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