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Table saw case... Posted by Snowmobile [Email]  (#686)  [Profile/Gallery]
(more from Snowmobile) on Sun, 4 May 2014 04:19:34
In Reply to: Re: Happens in all cars...., Justin VanAbrahams  [Profile/Gallery]
, Fri, 2 May 2014 10:27:50
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I remember when this came up in Fine Woodworking. The Saw Stop system is really cool - they demonstrate it by sticking a hot dog in the spinning blade and it does minimal damage. Pretty amazing.
However... this is a case of complete lunacy in the legal system. The impression I got from reading deeper into this (several years ago, so I may be a bit off) is that the guy was cutting free hand on a small cheap jobsite saw and was not taking proper safety precautions. Saw Stop had pitched this technology to the manufacturer (Ryobi in the link below), but I can't see this being something in a $200 saw at least as an early adopter. Saw Stop saws are pretty expensive even today.
What is worse, is if one develops a cavalier attitude when working with saws (because the spinning blade is supposed to stop if you touch it), and then for some reason the system fails, well, imho that is worse (and perhaps could be a bigger cause for a lawsuit depending on how the feature is advertised)... Saw Stop should be a last resort, not a first line of defense! My hands are never near a spinning blade. I use ~2' long push sticks, and for dangerous work (eg shaping long complex hardwood cove moldings on a tablesaw with only a clamped on angled fence), I enlist a helper! If a piece of lumber kicks back (which has happened before - I do rip wood with only a fence and no blade guards or riving knife), worst thing is I'm going to get hit by the board - and to avoid that, I never stand behind the board. This is all stuff I learned in grade 7 shop class. It's not rocket science!
Watching other people use table saws makes me cringe! Compound mitre saws even more so! But these are tools meant to cut wood. We *need* that utility, and it is foolish to compromise their utility because of a stupid schmuck files a lawsuit after using a tool unsafely... what if I don't wear safety glasses and lose an eye from flying debris? should the saw have protected me from that? can I sue the manufacturer? I think Saw Stop is great, but I wouldn't use their saw any differently than a saw without it.
So to go back to the car - well, yeah, drivers really do need to be able to start a car that shuts off on the road because that could be a result of something unrelated to manufacturer negligence. We learned this years ago in drivers ed: my instructor would randomly (well at safe times obviously) reach over and turn the key off and I needed to hit N, turn the key to start the car, and get back into gear without taking my eyes off the road or my other hand off the steering wheel.
The reason I say GM is still at fault is that they failed to address an engineer's opinion that the switch was unsafe and act on replacing a cheap existing part with a better but still cheap existing part. That is different than failing to add a non-mandated additional new safety feature to a machine. The key element is the "new feature" vs "inadequately specified" for the expected forces and load.
btw, "inadequately specified" could be the result of an earlier engineering mistake, or more likely, simply that a change was made to the weight of the key (2001 was a time when more elaborate and heavier keys were becoming common place) such that an existing part that was sufficient years ago, no longer is sufficient necessitating a change. Good engineers calculate all this stuff before they sign off on a design.
->Posting last edited on Sun, 4 May 2014 04:33:07.
, Wed, 30 Apr 2014 10:33:46
, Wed, 30 Apr 2014 10:38:46, Thu, 1 May 2014 18:33:06, Fri, 2 May 2014 10:27:50, Sun, 4 May 2014 04:19:34 <-- Viewing This Message, Fri, 2 May 2014 10:29:26, Sat, 3 May 2014 09:17:58, Sun, 4 May 2014 03:46:27, Fri, 2 May 2014 08:30:40, Fri, 2 May 2014 14:18:24, Wed, 30 Apr 2014 10:38:20, Tue, 6 May 2014 13:04:53
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