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A bunch of new cheap table saws just launched on Amazon.
Let’s take a look.
The “jobside tabel saw” has a 10-inch blade.
It also has “Integrated folding legs [that] seamlessly form a folding stand” although the stand doesn’t look to fold from what I can see.
The table saw “can quickly tear hardwood easily.” I’m guessing they meant “rip” rather than “tear.”
It also features an “aluminum tabletop with excellent antioxidant and anti-deformation.”
Is that their way of saying anti-rust?
One brand advertises that their table saw can cut wood, plastics, aluminum, and even mild steel.
That’s not happening – you’re not cutting steel on a saw like this.
All of the different brands copy/paste a lot of the same claims.
What is a monocular shield?
The “blade guard,” with an image of the riving knife, is said to “prevent the blade from popping once breaking.”
Copper wire, for “start overload protection,” and a riving knife for “avoid blade fragments popping.”
“Shake the handle to adjust blade height.”
This image shows an accident waiting to happen. The user should be distancing their hands away from the blade.
These guys are wearing gloves – a big no-no when it comes to machine safety. Gloves can snag – especially loose fitting gloves as shown here – and then pull your hands into the blade.
It looks like the fence has bolt heads on one side and larger protrusions on the opposite side, looking to render it practically useless.
This guy’s not wearing safety glasses. They should lose the gloves, wear safety glasses, and also – where’s the blade guard??
Here’s another example of unsafe use, pulled right from Amazon product listings.
This user has a push stick, and they’re using it wrong!! Push sticks are supposed to be used so that you can get your hands away from the blade. Their right hand is going to pass too close to the fence – that’s where a push stick should be used.
In a lot of these images, the users aren’t properly guiding wood boards or sheets. You’re supposed to use the fence for rip cuts or a miter gauge for cross cuts.
Just pushing a board through a saw blade is a bad idea, and also unsafe – freehand cuts are dangerous. Freehand cuts could lead to kickback, where your workpiece or cut-offs fly back at you at high velocities.
Also, tuck your thumbs in and know where they are at all times. Use push blocks and push sticks.
Here, a miter gauge is used, but is backwards, which is unsafe.
How do you use a table saw fence that has bolt heads sticking out of it?
I could never trust brands like these.
It doesn’t take a lot of effort for a brand to depict safe use of a table saw, or to have proper features/specs translations. If a brand won’t put in the effort there, did they put any effort into making a safe and capable product?
Amazon recently started applying “frequently returned item” notices to certain products, but that probably won’t help with the “alphabet soup” brands that seem to launch the same products under new names anytime negative reviews start to mount.
