What did I do wrong

[Greg in Maryland]

Oh, and one more thing. In the future, when this sort of thing happens, STOP! Your saw is telling you something. Burning wood enough to set off smoke alarms and tripping circuit breakers is time to come here, ask questions, and research a little. SAFETY FIRST!

Point well taken.

[TheRic]

Not 100% sure, so I'll ask. The saw and vac are on two separate lines?!! If not there is your problem. IF two separate lines, hmmmm.

[Greg in Maryland]

You don't say: Is the blade sharp? Is it clean? Is the rip fence in alignment?

These are the only suggestions I have. A properly tuned saw with a sharp blade should handle this job with no problem. It certainly sounds like an alignment or blade problem, not a load problem.

Warren

I have only had the saw for a short time (<3 months) and have not used the saw too much. I would think that the blades are still sharp.

Before I started, I verified alignment of the fence to the table, but not to the blade. I'll go back and recheck that part.

Thanks for the info.

Greg

[cgallery]

Oh, and one more thing. In the future, when this sort of thing happens, STOP! Your saw is telling you something. Burning wood enough to set off smoke alarms and tripping circuit breakers is time to come here, ask questions, and research a little. SAFETY FIRST!

[cgallery]

A couple of things. First, the combination of the vac and the saw on a single 15A circuit is too much.

Next, hard maple is, well, hard. 1-3/4" hard maple would be a challenge for all but the largest contractor/cabinet saws. I would suggest making sure your blade is absolutely sharp. Then, cut 1/2 the thickness at a time. I may even make three passes.

Also, make sure your fence is properly aligned. Does the wood seem to feed fine at first but start to slown down a lot once the front of the board starts to clear the back of the blade? If so, the fence may be out of alignment and causing binding at the back of the blade.

Finally, I believe a rip blade can help with ripping thick stock like this. Although a sharp multi-purpose should be up to the task.

I don't have a lot of maple, but I do have some maple plywood. At only 3/4" thick (all seven plys are maple) this is some real tough wood. If I had to quantify it, I'd say my saw works twice as hard cutting it as it does baltic birch plywood of the same thickness.

[Warren]

You don't say: Is the blade sharp? Is it clean? Is the rip fence in allignment?

These are the only suggestions I have. A properly tuned saw with a sharp blace should handle this job with no problem. It certainly sounds like an allignment or blade problem, not a load problem.

[Greg in Maryland]

Hi

Tonight I was ripping 1 3/4 x 4 1/2 x 10 inch hard maple into a 1 3/4 x 1 3/4 x 10 inch strips. I did a total of two cuts and had a lot of problems. I was using the rip fence with push blocks and the blade was set so that the bottom of the teeth just cleared the maple. The blade is factory original. The maple had been planned and jointed, so it was very near square.

So here is what happened on my BT3100:

1) The saw really labored through the wood. I was trying to have a steady feed rate without pushing too hard but it really slowed down.

2) The saw burned the @#$@#$ out of the wood, to the extent that the smoke detector just outside the basement went off. Obviously, by the smell I knew the saw was burning the wood, but because of the noise of the saw and vacuum and the fact I wear ear muffs, I did not hear it until everything shut down, nor realized it was so bad.

3) Of more concern the circuit breaker tripped during the middle of each cut when the saw was struggling. That was a !@#$!@# moment when I initially thought I fried the motor. Fortunately, that was not the case.

The saw is connected to 15 amp outlet with a dedicated circuit breaker (it use to be an outlet for a refrigerator). In addition I used one of those Sears auto switches that turns on my vacuum when the table saw is turned on. This is rated at 15 amps as well. The saw was connected to directly the outlet, not via an extension cord.

I have a 200 amp panel with 19 single circuit breakers and 3 double breakers. I cannot tell how many amps each circuit breaker is rated for, so all I can do is count.

What's going on? Is the load from the saw too great for the line and/or the circuit breaker? I can have another circuit breaker added if that would improve the situation.

What are other's experiences with maple of this size on the BT3100? Should the BT3100 be able to handle this or is this a common limitation?

What work arounds are available to make the cuts? I have 18 more and need to figure something out. One thought I had was to set the blade height around an inch, run the piece through the saw, flip it upside down and finish the cut that way.

Any thoughts or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

Greg