New regs for Friday: Table saws

In Friday’s edition of the Federal Register, the Consumer Protect Safety Commission (CPSC) is proposing a new safety standard to make table saws safer.

CPSC said emergency rooms treated 33,400 table saw-related injuries in 2015, and 92 percent were likely related to the victim making contact with the saw blade. 

“CPSC staff’s review of the existing data indicates that currently available safety devices, such as the modular blade guard and riving knife, do not adequately address the unreasonable risk of blade-contact injuries on table saws,” the agency said in its rulemaking.

{mosads}Under the proposed rule, manufacturers will have to limit how deep the saw can cut to 3.5 millimeters in testing when a fake human body part comes in contact with the spinning blade at a radial approach of 1 meter per second.

The proposed rule would address an estimated 54,800 medically treated blade-contact injuries annually. CPSC estimates the rule could produce annual benefits between $625 million to about $2.3 billion in injuries prevented.

The rule is expected to cost industry between $170 million to $345 million annually.

The public has 75 days to comment on the proposed rule.