: I won't argue but I will make a suggestion to everone. I do a lot of
: woodworking, mostly furniture. I have a well equipped shop and all 8
: fingers! Two thumbs too. My table saw is a 1946 Unisaw I restored. When it
: got it had no guards either. Which was fine because they are a pain the
: rear too. Most all of them are.

: But they have one feature you should keep. Thats the splitter behind the
: blade. Reason is, while it is not common I have had it happen a few times.
: I never had a kick back only because I saw it happening.

: Your ripping a piece of wood and you release the tension in the board. It
: starts closing up the kerf you just cut. The wood tightens up on the
: blade. The rear of the blade lifts the wood and suddenly it is on top of
: the blade, the teeth grab the board and launch it with great force at you.
: The splitter will in most cases keep this from happening by not allowing
: the wood to close up on the blade. Plus I rarely the splitter in the way.
: Except for cutting dados I keep a splitter on mine all the time.

: I made my splitter from an old guard off a Craftsman. I scrapped everything
: but the splitter. Cut all the mounts and stuff off. Before that I made
: wood throat plates and just mounted a wood splitter in there. It worked
: fine but I would break them when I hit them with a board. So I started
: looking for some metal to make one from.

I agree on this wholeheartedly. It's just as important on a circular saw. I had mine break once and didn't notice. Everyone still has all their body parts but it nearly jumped the saw from my grip when the timber closed on the blade.
And make sure it's straight and true.

Mike Savage
South West Cork