Norm kinda freaked me out last night

Sean Wright

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WNY, Buffalo Area
Last night I was watching a recorded episode of NYW. It was the one where Norm was rebuilding the bench where his Miter Saw and Radial Arm Saw lives.

Everything was going along fine, all making sense to me. Then it came time to put on the poplar edging for the bench. He mitered the corners...no big deal there.... then he used his plate joiner to cut biscuit recesses in the mitered corners to help keep them in place as he nailed the edges to the bench. The concept makes sense.... however he held/braced the work piece against his leg while he used the plate joiner on the mitered end. I might not be explaining this clearly, but if you get the chance to catch this episode, you'll see what I mean. This really freaked me out. It looked just plain dangerous to me. I understand that the blade on a plate joiner is on a spring, to try to pull it back in to the housing, and if you did get cut by the blade, it wouldn't be probably more than an inch deep, but still why take the chance???:dunno:

For someone who thousands of dollars of tools in his shop, you would think that he would have (or would make) some jig that would allow him to do this in a safe manner. As some one that a good deal of woodworkers look up to, Norm definatly wasn't setting a good example on this one.

Edit: What happened to his canned line, "Now let's talk about shop safety...." ?
 
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I would not do that any more than I would hold a 2x4 against my thigh and cut it to length the way you see our soon to be less than ten fingered friends do. It's kinda like holding something in your hand you're drilling through or air nailing into. You see folks do it but, not this cowboy.
 
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