Table saw question for experienced wood workers

[sshaw10]

I'm getting my old series 2000 10" Delta contractors saw cleaned up after a "friend" messed it up.  I aligned the fence to the miter channel but when I put the fence up to the blade they were not parallel.  I was able to loosen the whole saw chassis and wiggle it to get it parallel but obviously this is a critical calibration with kickback being the result if these are not parallel to each other.  I was looking online and some people are using dial calipers to measure how parallel these two are.  My question for anyone who's done this is can you just eye it and be OK?  I'm easily within a 64th and probably less but over the length of 4 feet will this be an issue?  I'm wondering if I should have a pro calibrate this thing or I'm just being too picky?

[michelevit]

I dont think anyone can set up a table saw by just eyeing it.
If you have a true piece of square stock you can use that to pass between the blade and fence.
I keep a piece of square stock aluminum that I had a machinist square up using a very accurate mill.
I set my blade, fence, and miter with it. I still verify with a dial gauge.

Pick up a simple dial indicator (20 bucks from harbor freight) and square it up right.
One kickback will cost more than 20 bucks for a dial indicator.

Table saws are dangerous especially if not set up correctly.

[kahlid74]

You can eye it up sure, but eying it up can result in injuries and cuts that just aren't straight.  Grab a dial and take the time to do it right.  Be patient.  This is your life we're talking about here.

[WaRpEd]

My Hitachi  table saw was dropped from a truck in my move after my marraige broke up and was a little off. After a piece of hardwood kicked back and hit me in the stomach. I had a friend come out and recalibrate the saw for me it was out a little more than a 64th of inch. My friend spent years as a setup person for Sears when they used to do this with new saws. You CAN'T eyeball it and hope it's right.

[Avery]

You can probably do this without a pro, but it's not one of those slide it into place and torque her down kind of jobs.

First, align you're saw blade with the miter slot. Your eye is probably not good enough, but that's OK - clamp a piece of square cut rod to your miter gauge and then use a feeler gauge to check the gap between that rod at the front and back of the blade.  Have the blade all the way up for this and use the same point on the saw blade for both measurements since there is going to be some runout in the saw blade. I'm not sure how close you need to be, but less is obviously better.  If your off by more than you're happy with (I'd try to go lower that 0.05") loosen the bolts holding your motor to you table top, GENTLY tap the motor, tighten everything down and try again. (Note - some saws have little set screws on the motor trunnion assembly, which beats the hell out of pounding on it with a hammer.  There are also little aftermarket thingies that add this capability to existing saws but I've never tried them.)

After you get your blade aligned with the miter slot, you lower the blade and align the fence with the miter slot. Some fences have set screws. On others you have to loosen something scoot it one way or the other, tighten it all back up and measure again, just like with aligning the motor.

If you want to make things a little easier, the harbor freight people will sell you a dial indicator for $15.  It's not going to be a highly durable tool your grandchildren will be proud to own, but it'll make aligning your saw a bit easier.

There are about half a dozen videos on you tube on how to do this.

[EvilNuff]

You definitely do not want to just do it by eye.  I would recommend going to thewoodwhisperer.com and searching his free videos for table saw ones.  He has one where he talks about adjusting it and another where he makes a cross cut sled that shows a method for measuring easily how much you are off.

[Generic Eric]

Huh, I had no idea.

[RoyalScam]

I've done it with a combination square. Pick one tooth of the blade and color it with a sharpie. Place the square in miter slot and adjust the blade of the square until it just touches the tooth on the front edge of the blade opening(nearest your belly).  Rotate the blade until the tooth is at the furthest point away from your belly at the far edge of the blade slot, and adjust the trunion or however your saw parallelism is set.  Needless to say the saw is unplugged though this whole procedure.  And yes a dial caliper and flat reference chucked up in the arbor will get you closer. Use them if you've got them on hand, I didn't.

Regards,
Scam

[DaOld Man]

Thanks for the link to those videos. Very useful info.
I measured my Hitachi saw from the miter slot with a combo square.
It was about 1/16" off.
I leveled it all up and it is now within 0.002 inches.
I couldnt adjust mine like that video showed, mine has two screws with jam nuts, you adjust the screws to change the angle of the blade.
Now it is cutting much better.
While I was on the tangent I checked the squareness of my miter saw. The pointer on it was about a half a degree off. (At 0 degrees). Needless to say, it cuts much better too.

[kahlid74]

Thanks for the link to those videos. Very useful info.
I measured my Hitachi saw from the miter slot with a combo square.
It was about 1/16" off.
I leveled it all up and it is now within 0.002 inches.
I couldnt adjust mine like that video showed, mine has two screws with jam nuts, you adjust the screws to change the angle of the blade.
Now it is cutting much better.
While I was on the tangent I checked the squareness of my miter saw. The pointer on it was about a half a degree off. (At 0 degrees). Needless to say, it cuts much better too.

Yeap, the woodwhisper is awesome with regard to that.  Great stuff  and good reminder by Evilnuff.