My Friend the Miter Saw

I love my miter saw.

As a person with a lifelong fear of table saws, my miter saw provides me with a certain sense of security.

I realize table saws are necessary for many things. But anything I can possibly cut on my miter saw is going to find its way there.

The first thing my mom said after my husband bought me a miter saw for Christmas was to be careful. “You can chop your fingers off before you even realize anything has happened!”

I felt like Ralphie Parker with his new Red Ryder BB Gun. But Mom is a seasoned woodworker and she doesn’t make bones about shop safety.

Miter saws are easy to use. If you’ve never tried one, you don’t know what kind of fun you’re missing.

Sometimes miter saws are called chop saws, because the blade simply comes down and chops through the piece of wood in the desired place. These great tools cut through wood like a hot knife through butter.

Even better, miter saws are user-friendly and inherently safer than table saws.

Starting at the top, your friend the miter saw has: a handle with trigger, a blade surrounded by a blade guard, a deck where your material sits, and a rear fence which the material pushes against. Attached to the front of the deck is the scale and lock knob, which allow you to pivot the deck to make angled cuts. Somewhere on the side is a bevel adjuster, which lets you tilt the entire saw head so you can make various bevels, and a lock down pin that locks the whole saw head in a down position for storage and transportation.

Miter saws are safer because of their design.

The blade of a miter saw is attached to a head and covered with a blade guard. This means that while you could possibly lower the blade onto a hand or finger, there’s no chance of randomly slipping into a moving blade while you’re guiding a piece of wood across it.

The blade guard also makes the miter saw safer because it slides out of the way only as you lower the saw onto your piece of wood. This means that initially the spinning blade is covered, and when it is eventually uncovered there is a much smaller exposed cutting area versus that of a table saw.

There is also no wood movement with a miter saw. Unlike a table saw, where you push the wood into a fixed blade, a miter saw keeps the wood stationary and brings the saw to it. This means less chance of the wood getting bound up in the saw blade and kicking back at you.

With a miter saw, one of your hands is always on the handle, so you know at least that one isn’t going to get chopped off. The one that holds the wood while you’re cutting, however, is in considerable danger. But hey, you’ve already got a fifty percent safety margin over a table saw.

You’ve still got Ol’ Lefty to take care of, though, and because miter saws are so easy to use, people often forget they can be dangerous.

Even though miter saws are safer than many shop tools, you still need to follow a few basic rules to ensure your well-being.

First, follow all the basic rules for shop safety: adequate eye and hearing protection; no loose clothing, jewelry, or hair; check wood for screws, nails, knots, and stones before cutting; do not make adjustments while saw is running; unplug the saw when servicing or changing blades.

Then, make sure your saw is secure.

Pros recommend bolting the saw to the work surface. I use mine all over the place, so I don’t want it fixed, but I have a stand that lets me place the saw so it won’t move while I’m using it.

Check your wood for obstructions. These won’t necessarily cause the saw to malfunction or hurt you, but it will make a terrible noise and do awful things to your blade. Speaking from experience, I once plunged my miter saw through a piece of two-by-four and right into my four-in-hand rasp I carelessly left on the deck. Embarrassing and really bad for my saw blade.

Always try to use the clamps that come with the saw to hold your wood.

Clamps press the wood into the rear fence and ensure nothing is going to wiggle around in the middle of a cut.

If you’re feeling slightly dangerous and don’t want to use clamps, at least be sure you push the piece of wood firmly against the rear fence and down on the deck.

If the clamp won’t hold the wood, you probably shouldn’t use a miter saw to cut it. I’ll admit to sometimes cutting part way through a piece of wood, then flipping it for a second cut because I would rather use the miter saw than drag out the circular saw. But I always make sure to have a firm grasp with my fingers well out of reach of the blade.

In addition to clamps, make sure you have support for long pieces so your board doesn’t tip up into the blade. There are extensions especially for miter saws that accomplish this, or you can use a portable table or rollers. This is less for your personal safety that to make sure you don’t really mess up your wood or your blade.

It should go without saying, but don’t try making rip cuts with a miter saw. They are for crosscutting only.

Always keep a six-inch margin of safety on either side of the blade cutting zone. Some people actually recommend that your hand not even touch the wood at any place where the wood touches the base of the miter saw.

No matter how you choose to remind yourself, always make sure you know where your hands are before making that cut. This is one area where miter saws may be a little scarier than table saws. Just like Mom said, you can slice through several digits before you even realize what has happened.

Other safety tips include waiting for the saw to stop before returning it to the upright position.

Do I do this? Well, no. And a lot of other people don’t either, but it is a good habit to get into. Though the blade guard rolls right back into place as soon as you lift the saw head, there is a chance that you could get a wood chip right in the eyeball from a spinning blade.

Speaking of that wonderful blade guard, never raise it manually. That thing comes down when it needs to cut, and there is no reason you need to be tempting fate.

Make sure your lock knob is in place and locked when you are not using the saw. This means anyone who uses the saw will have to take a minute to check around the saw for any obstructions, and having the saw in a down position offers some protection for your blade in the event something goes flying across the shop.

Finally, when you’re in the market for a miter saw, make sure you invest in the best you can afford. Cheap typically equals dangerous, and your body parts aren’t worth saving a few bucks.

Follow these common-sense recommendations and you’ll get years of enjoyable use out of your friend the miter saw.