Dedicated Dado Saw

I have wanted a dedicated radial arm saw (RAS) for years! Cutting dados for shelves and on cabinets carcasses is a pain with the hand router and it even takes a while to set up for each job when using a router table. Having a RAS with a dado blade already installed and waiting really speeds that process up and it can be used for everything from cutting tenons to making lap joints.

I have been spending some time reorganizing my shop this year and felt that I had both the space for a dedicated RAS and was at a point that it would see a lot of use.

I spent months cruising the local auction sites and Craigslist. I found a bunch of really nice 220v and 3-phase saws, but I didn’t need or want a monster like that. I finally found a 110v saw that was part of a shop that was being parted out because of downsizing. It looked great in the ad, was the right size, and relatively cheap.

One look at the saw and the guy’s shop and I paid him the asking price. It is 26 years old, has seen VERY little use, and the previous owner still had the original operation manual.

After getting some help from a buddy to load and get it home, I took it off the original base, cleaned/lubed all the moving parts, installed a Forrest dado stack, leveled the bed with machinist precision, and build a Frank Howarth-like RAS vacuum fence for it.

I still need to add a little height to the fence, but I am very happy with the saw and in the first two weeks of having it “done” I have used it to build a set of bookshelves, two organization cabinets, and a set of lap jointed cherry picture frames.


Frank did the fence better than me:

   • DeWalt GE Radial Arm Saw 2  

Mountainside Workshop’s Version:

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