If you were at the world’s biggest woodworking show in Hanover, Germany, called Ligna, you’d both be “making more with wood” (that’s its slogan) and you’d see some cool stuff, like room-size “table” saws, CNC machines that look Terminator-quality, giant mills, robots that look like they belong in an auto plant, and you’ll see this tool maker—The Felder Group—and its next step in flesh-sensing technology.
It's called Preventative Contact System, PCS for short, and the website says the patent is pending. It’s on one of the company's incredibly not portable table/panel saws now. It doesn’t harm the blade. And it adds no cost to the tool. What’s not to like?
It functions by sensing via the “electromagnetic law of repulsion” that your hand will touch the blade. Once sensed—and you have to be palm-sweating-ly close for this PCS to engage—the technology drops the blade beneath the table before contact is made. It takes milliseconds.
Resetting the saw only takes the push of a button.
Right now, PCS doesn’t appear to be on any tool that costs less than a really nice new car, so I wouldn’t expect to see much day-to-day change for us. For now, we’ll have to make do with table-saw tool reviews like this one of Ridgid’s wood sensing table saw.
They’re debuting the tech now at Ligna.
It even passes the official hot-dog test.
If you want a little more information, check out this article at Woodworking Network. Watch the video below for more.
