Thread: Making a Riving Knife

Hi Dave, My Jet 10" Proshop has a 2.3 mm riving knife, but it states that it is suitable only for saw blades with a kerf of no greater than 3 mm and a blade thickness of 2 mm. So I guess that one size does not fit all...depends on kerf and blade dimensions. Have you contacted the manufacturer or retailer? Good luck!

I would match the riving knife width to the blade every time.
In my experience if you are ripping a tight grain that tends to close in after leaving the back of the blade the kerf will close onto the riving knife. In the extreme the timber can jamb onto the riving knife and not let progress be made but the saw blade is still happily revolving with no load. I remember ripping some white cedar that closed onto the riving knife so tight that I couldn't push the timber at all

In the case above that I mentioned, as the timber was jambed and couldn't be pushed forward, I was able to shut down the saw blade and wrestle with the timber and riving knife safely.

When I bought my SCM Panel Saw the riving knife was long gone. I simply measured the width of the teeth of the blade and was able to buy that thickness sheet metal and made my own using and angle grinder with a 1 mm disc.

A good rule of thumb is half way between blade thickness and kerf.

It's probably a splitter you are thinking of making to hold the blade guard and not a riving knife. I tried that and wasn't impressed with my effort on a contractor saw. I think a blade guard mounted separate to the splitter is a more flexible arrangement. Because the splitter doesn't rise and fall with the blade (as a riving knife does) I swap between three different height splitters to match the blade height or be lower if I'm not making a through cut. Whatever splitter is in use doesn't affect the blade guard as it is mounted independently.