Saw blade chips wood when crosscutting

16 years ago

I've a 10-inch Ryobi table saw. It cuts quick and straight. However, when cutting across the grain on white pine, it chips the edges back as far as 1/4 inch away from the cut. My 7 1/4 inch DeWalt circular saw has not this problem on the same wood. However, I would rather use the Ryobi because it's easier to get a straight cut with a table saw.

What can I do about this? Should I get a better blade made for fine work? How about laying some painter's tape along the path of the cut? Any ideas would be appreciated.

Thanks!

Marco

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Comments (5)

bobismyuncle
16 years ago
A good blade will help. I have a Forrest, but it's pricey. Freud's top end blades are almost at good at a bit less money.

You may also have an alignment problem. Have you aligned the saw blade to the table slots?

Another possibility is that using a 3" wide miter gauge is allowing the stock to wobble and shift. I'd highly suggest making a sliding cross-cut table. I use this ALL the time for cross cutting. It works equally well on 10' rough cut pieces and 2" blocks.

Finally, if the problem recurs, here's a technique:
Lower your blade so that it only cuts about 1/16" of an inch or less. Run your stock across and make a scoring cut. Then raise the blade and make the through cut. This relies on being able to hit the same line again, though :-)
green-zeus
16 years ago
When I want to make nice cuts on things like moldings, I use a paneling blade--I have one for my miter saw and one for the table saw. You won't have any more chips if you use one. Also, lower the blade as the above poster said and go SLOW.
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daft_punk
Original Author
16 years ago
Thanks for the help, bobsmyuncle. I got the Freud Avanti 80-tooth ATB at Lowe's. It cost 55 bucks - half as much as the Ryobi table saw it went on. The new blade was worth every penny, as my crosscuts are now COMPLETELY chip-free.

Green-zens...I don't know what a paneling blade is. Sounds like a disc of some sort. In any case, this new Freud makes clean crosscuts through 3/4 and 5/4 pine. Like the paneling blade you mentioned, it's relatively slow going. Yet the results are worth a little more time.

I didn't try "scoring" the wood first with a shallow cut. I would have had to score both sides - as the chipping was occurring on both top and bottom. Lining up all the cuts is a lot to ask from a 100-dollar table saw.

Peace.

Marco
green-zeus
16 years ago
It sounds like you got the blade to do the job. For future reference, a paneling blade is a saw blade with many small teeth on it. Something like 60 teeth per inch. It's intent is for cutting paneling without tearing it up. But works good for any wood you want a nice cut on. And they cost less,too.
bandit_tx
15 years ago
Google "zero clearance insert for table saw".