33-890 Delta Radial Arm Saw Table Dimensions

[wabaggett]

I have a 33-890 Delta RAS. The manual says it can cross cut at 90 degrees 14 3/8 in stock and I just don't see how that is possible. I have to rebuild the table and I have the front portion (part 257 on the below pic) but I have none of the other pieces. Does anyone have the dimensions for those pieces? (parts 258-261) If I knew there thickness and width I could get an idea of how this machine can cut that large a capacity. Thanks in advance.

 

[RTM]

The throw of the saw arm is all you need to care about.

The various pieces 261, 260, 257 are all set up to be interchangeable. You can shuffle them around to move the fence (262) closer to you (I forget why). On my dad's he used 3/4" plywood for the base. He had to cut those pieces himself, they did not come with the saw. He had one board behind the fence. Seems you could just measure the distance between the clamps that hold the boards in place, and rip some to fit in total. You want some combination to allow your to rip boards, so put the head at rip mode, and establish a minimum distance from the fence.

If you push your blade all the way to the back, mark the area in front of the blade, then pull it all the way forward, and mark the back of the blade, that should get you your 14-3/8", at 3/4" above the bottom of the blade.

 

[wabaggett]

The throw of the saw arm is all you need to care about.

The various pieces 261, 260, 257 are all set up to be interchangeable. You can shuffle them around to move the fence (262) closer to you (I forget why). On my dad's he used 3/4" plywood for the base. He had to cut those pieces himself, they did not come with the saw. He had one board behind the fence. Seems you could just measure the distance between the clamps that hold the boards in place, and rip some to fit in total. You want some combination to allow your to rip boards, so put the head at rip mode, and establish a minimum distance from the fence.

If you push your blade all the way to the back, mark the area in front of the blade, then pull it all the way forward, and mark the back of the blade, that should get you your 14-3/8", at 3/4" above the bottom of the blade.

That's the thing. When you add the fence at any safe place to cut a board on the saw it'd be 12 in max. I'm fine with that but I'm building a Mr. Sawdust Table (for fun) and want to make sure I exhaust all avenues to find out that I'm getting the max capacity I can.

 

[RTM]

Dunno then. I don't have access to one. One friend back in the 80's had one, his fence was set too far forward, thus I learned about interchangeable boards. Used Dad's in the 90's, terrified me, never again.

 

[RTM]

Interesting, on page 22 of the manual, they mention lowering the blade into the board, after the workpiece is in place. This means they are expecting you to use the bottom dead center of the blade as the starting point to your cut, and obviously the same to end the cut.



Also note for anything over 1" thick, they want the fence behind the fixed board



We never did that with dad's (cuz who has 14" material to cut?), we made sure the blade was behind the fence, and down, before we started the blade, then pulled it thru in one motion. Not lowering, then pulling forward. On a 3/4" thick piece of stock, that can easily get you 2-1/2" of cut extra.

 

[Cruzan80]

I got the measurements from another user a while back, can measure tomorrow and report back.

 

[crguy]

Seems like most people consider radial arm saws to be obsolete, and possibly dangerous. I got rid of my radial arm saw when the Dewalt miter saws came out and never looked back.

 

[Zeus36]

I have a 33-890 Delta RAS. The manual says it can cross cut at 90 degrees 14 3/8 in stock and I just don't see how that is possible. I have to rebuild the table and I have the front portion (part 257 on the below pic) but I have none of the other pieces. Does anyone have the dimensions for those pieces? (parts 258-261) If I knew there thickness and width I could get an idea of how this machine can cut that large a capacity. Thanks in advance.

May want to post your question on the Radial Arm Saw forum. They can give you all the info. Search: forums.delphiforums.com/woodbutcher
I have three DeWalts and one PowrKraft, been looking for the Delta RAS used by Norm Abram in the New Yankee Workshop...

 

[Ricky Joe]

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[jgrickett]

I have a 33-890 Delta RAS. The manual says it can cross cut at 90 degrees 14 3/8 in stock and I just don't see how that is possible. I have to rebuild the table and I have the front portion (part 257 on the below pic) but I have none of the other pieces. Does anyone have the dimensions for those pieces? (parts 258-261) If I knew there thickness and width I could get an idea of how this machine can cut that large a capacity. Thanks in advance.

I'm currently building a table for a similar one. If you look on http://vintagemachinery.org/, they have a number of manuals, parts lists, and such, that members have scanned and saved there as pdf files that you can download. I'm sure I saw at least one that listed the measurements of each piece. The originals were some sort of MDF or similar stuff with a 1/8" hardboard veneer on each side, probably about 6/4 altogether. I'm planning to make mine out of a piece inch and a half butcher block countertop that I picked up cheap. The reason for the multiple sections is also the reason you can cut a left miter that long. If you put the fence in the rear position and angle the lower arm to 45 degrees, you can start the cut with the blade very nearly at the right rear corner of the table. That's the big advantage of the turret radial arm saw over the single-arm RAS like the DeWalt. There's really no good way to cut a left miter on one of those unless you're cutting something that's got parallel flat sides so it can be flipped over and cut as a right miter. Wally Kunkel, in his book, Master the Radial Arm Saw, comments that he has no idea why Dewalt even put a left 45 degree stop on the arm and still less why everyone copied that from DeWalt. And he's talking from half a century of selling and using DeWalts.