Smart Saw

[Elkhunter]

I see now that they have a table saw that will stop within 1/1000 of a second if your hand or finger hits the blade. If a part of you hits the blade, your body part absorbs energy from sensors on the blade which stops it immediately causing no more than a scratch. I saw it demonstrated using a hot dog and it barely cut the skin on the dog. Soon there will be a circular saw to do the same thing.

 

[Mojave]

Whoa! How does it know the difference between skin and say balsa? That sounds like a hell of a product.

 

[Elkhunter]

I just saw it on the H&G Channel and thought about all the carpenters I know with less than 5 digits per hand. I can see this going a lot farther than just the table and circular saw and once developed, I can see every supermarket having a smart band saw. Great idea for sure.

 

[ELKCHSR]

I wonder how that will work at a butcher shop?
Were the sensors hooked to the individual, or was it some thing that could tell the difference between meat and wood?

 

[Elkhunter]

The sensors are on the saw blade itself. After I wrote that I realized that it could not work in a butcher shop, a blonde moment. The soft flesh of of the hand or finger, or in the case of the demonstration, absorbs something from the sensors, causing the blade to stop. It was pretty cool to see.

 

[ELKCHSR]

Thanks Bill...

 

[ringer]

Might be a moisture sensor. I own a small furniture factory and one of my guys holds his hand up when excited and says "gimme three"! I would buy something like that if it could work to retrofit older tools.

 

[dgibson]

That's cool! I bet that runs up the cost of the tool quite a bit, but what's the price of a finger?

We used to have a robotic cart machine here at work that, under the right conditions, could move up to 70MPH (ours never moved that fast, but anyway). It had a row of sensors along its arm that could stop that thing from full speed movement at the touch of a finger. I didn't believe it until the service guy demonstrated it...he got that thing moving as fast as it could go in our configuration and then stuck his finger in front of it.

 

[ELKCHSR]

It's probably cheaper than the labor and industries bill that they ding you with over the long haul...

 

[Quiet_One]

im not be mean but it not smart to try put ur hand or finger just see if works theres always possibilty it can mess up i guess we all know that but sensors real sensitive but what if is thing