Miter vs. Radial Arm Saws for Dummies

You can make a rip cut with a radial arm saw

We have several staffers who have at one time or another written for review sites. At one, the now-defunct Epinions.com, the locals often said that the best way to make money on the site was to review "anything with a cord." This led to behavior such as the woman who thought that the food processor she was reviewing was made by "Cuisinant" (she'd apparently never seen the thing), and the man who reviewed fifty to 100 vacuum cleaners in a year. The anything-with-a-cord mentality apparently extends to freelancing and eHow.com, where we found Patrick Gleeson, Ph. D., attempting to explain "Miter Saw vs. Radial Arm Saw" (the post's now at HomeSteady.com¹).

Just what a retired English Lit professor and investment advisor thought made him an expert on power tools is a mystery; but he apparently figured his research skills did the trick. They didn't... witness his opening sentence:

"Radial arm saws are popular workhorses for all kinds of construction."

Well, no, Doc, they aren't. They weren't, either: our founder still grieves the death of his 1985 Craftsman RAS, but it's a safe bet no one ever took one of those top-heavy beasts to a construction site. They were shop and factory tools, not jobsite. Table saws, on the other hand... but you're not talking about those. Gleeson continued demonstration of his unfamiliarity with the tools, telling his readers that,

"Miter saws are more specialized: they usually have smaller capacities in terms of both depth and width of cut, but they are portable and are generally more accurate."

The second clause is correct, the first half is totally bogus – especially if you are familiar with sliding miter saws (Patrick must not be; he never once mentioned them). Gleeson somehow decided that radial arm saws,

"...are usually set up permanently, or for at least the length of a construction job, with a large table supplied by the manufacturer augmented with two large feeder tables, one to the left and another to the right."

Huh? and then explains that among the advantages of the RAS is that,

"You can easily set up a stop... on one of the support tables, which makes it easy to put in successive pieces of lumber and cut them to a predetermined depth."

Two things are wrong with that claim: first, you're cutting them to a constant (not "predetermined") length, not "depth,"; and second, you can do the same thing with a miter saw, especially if it's on a stand. More bushwa from Gleeson, this time slandering miter saws:

"Ten- to 12-inch blades are most common; these limit the cut widths to 3 to 4 inches."

No, you putz, that's the cut depth. The maximum cut width is a function of a) blade diameter and b) whether the miter saw is a sliding or fixed model. A 10-inch sliding miter saw can generally cut 4-inch stock (3½"), with a crosscut capacity of 14 inches. Duh.

Gleeson left out some pretty significant differences: dado blades can be used on radial arm saws, but only some miter saws (sliding models only). Radial arm saws can cut wider stock, as much as 24-30" depending on the model. Perhaps Gleeson's most glaring omission, however, is that the motor carriage of a radial arm saw can be rotated 90 degrees, which allows an operator to make rip cuts. That's pretty much an impossibility with miter saws unless the workpiece is quite short. That's not the kind of omission a person familiar with the tool would make, which is why PhD Patrick is today's recipient of the Dumbass of the Day award. Maybe two of 'em, since the Good Doctor keeps talking about "board depth" instead of thickness. Sheesh.

¹ The original has been deleted by Leaf Group, but can still be accessed using the Wayback machine at archive.org. Its URL was   ehow.com/about_6076717_miter-vs_-radial-arm-saw.html

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