Thread: Two questions, tables saws and adhesives

Originally Posted by bradleyheathhay

I just got a used Craftsman table saw and although I'll eventually upgrade I've got to deal with using this one for now. You don't find too many cheap used saws that work well and have a riving knife built in. This one doesn't have a specific riving knife, but it has a blade guard that's supported by what effectively serves as a riving knife. Problem is the blade isn't lining up with the 'knife' even though all parts seem to fit together as they should. Are there spacers out there that are designed to adjust a blade left and right on the arbor? Also, my new blade, a 7" Diablo combo is .04 thick while the saw's knife is .08. So in addition to adding a spacer on the arbor it looks like I need to get a thicker blade. Any suggestion there?

A 7" blade is small for a TS, usually they start at around 10"
The standard 10" Diablo 50T combo is 2.54mm (0.1") thick so should work with your riving knife

Question (subject) number two...caulk adhesives that will stick to plastic. I use liquid nails heavy duty for a lot of my slap together projects but it doesn't seem to stick to regular 4 mil sheet plastic that well. Can anyone suggest a caulk tube adhesive that sticks to both sheet plastic and wood well?

What sort of plastic is it?
Some plastics are near impossible to stick with liquid adhesive especially liquid nails - any plastic name ending with "-ene", eg polyethylene or poly propylene will be problematic.
In some cases thin double sided tape is about the best you can do.


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I believe I have the same set up on my Carbatec Contractor Saw. No riving knife but instead a splitter that is attached to the blade guard. When I picked up the saw second hand this was one of the many things that was set up wrong or was out of alignment. The bolt that fixed to bottom of the splitter to the saw has a washer. I cant remember which way is was but I changed it from one side of the splitter to the other and the alignment improved. Its still not perfect thought. Another thinner washer would probably get it right.

After spending a few hours on my saw I now have something that is fairly accurate and suits my needs. Hopefully yours work out for you also..

Thanks for the good advice. I read somewhere that using a 7" blade on a regular TS would improve cut performance. Decreases blade wobble and 'increases' horsepower for under powered saws. Looks like I may have giving myself a problem using these thinner blades though. I've since learned these 7" blades are usually thinner so maybe I need to switch up to a 10" blade.

I'm not sure exactly what the plastic is. It's just regular 4 mil sheet bought from HD in a 10 x 50 ft roll. I'll probably end up going with liquid nails fuze it along with mechanical connection.

Originally Posted by bradleyheathhay

Thanks for the good advice. I read somewhere that using a 7" blade on a regular TS would improve cut performance. Decreases blade wobble and 'increases' horsepower for under powered saws. Looks like I may have giving myself a problem using these thinner blades though. I've since learned these 7" blades are usually thinner so maybe I need to switch up to a 10" blade.

The HP output of motors is constant and not affected by the blade

However, 7" blades are thinner and won't cut anywhere near as deep as the 10" so they have less work to do in performing small cuts and this is what makes them efficient. This is of course achieved at the expense of not being able to perform deeper cuts

I'm not sure exactly what the plastic is. It's just regular 4 mil sheet bought from HD in a 10 x 50 ft roll. I'll probably end up going with liquid nails fuze it along with mechanical connection.

That's most likely polyethylene which won't stick. While not easy to find, PVC should stick fine.

I can’t recall what other brands Home Depot sells...do you have Sika or Soudal brand products? Or Loctite, which I got at Lowe's last time I found myself doing home repairs in that part of the world. You might have good luck with the Loctite urethane construction adhesive which is a dark tan colour.

Yeah...the saw blade is more suitable for a battery powered hand held circular saw. Amazon has lots of better choices for a more appropriate blade.

Thanks BobL. Over the years I've tried to get different caulk adhesives to stick to this sheet plastic and it almost never works well. Good to know what this stuff is now and that I'll have to add some kind of mechanical adhesion as well. In my particular application this should work.

Greg Q ... not sure on what brands HD sells but I'll check out the Sika and Soudal brands you mentioned. I've had the PL line of adhesives by Loctite suggested as well as Liquid Nails FuzeIt.