Shop-Made Safety
Accessories
Shop-made safety accessories are another source of devices to use to increase your safety while oper- ating the table saw. When care is taken with the setup and design, shop-made tools can be an invalu- able resource for making the safest cuts possible.
Here are some of the basic items you may want to consider:
•Push Sticks made from the shop are very popu- lar among table saw owners because they are inexpensive and easy to make. Particularly good are those that keep your hand a safe distance away from the blade, offer stable support and grip, and are comfortable in the hand. Figure 59 shows an illustration of a sim- ple push stick.
•Featherboards similar to the one in Figure
60 make good anti-kickback devices. To use these, they must be clamped to the table or fence. The angled ends and flexibility of the fingers allow the workpiece to move in one direction and lock up if the workpiece moves backwards.
•Zero-Clearance Table Inserts can be pur- chased or made from wood and substituted for the factory inserts. The advantage in these devices is that there will only be as much space between the blade and the insert as the blade requires. Many woodworkers have a dif- ferent insert for different heights and blades. Zero-clearance table inserts result in clean cuts with less tear-out and a reduced chance that a small piece of stock will be pulled down inside the saw or will be kicked back. Figure 61 shows an example of a “blank” zero-clear- ance insert. When making a zero-clearance table insert, never hold the insert in place with your hands or try to lower the insert onto a moving blade. Hold or clamp the insert to the table with a sacrificial board, and use a smaller diameter blade to plunge the initial cut through the insert.
