Shop Tools #10: DeWalt 925 Radial Arm Saw

Check and make sure they have the right blade on it.
The last thing you need is to have that thing climb out at you.
If you bring it up to the height of your router table you can put longer board on the table. You might consider switching place with the router depending on the length of boards you intend to cut.
These things are sweet for running dadoes in sequence and real time savers.
Have fun with it Wayne and keep posting your progress,

Bob

-- A mind, like a home, is furnished by its owner

Thanks Bob. I am going to order a new blade and a dado stack for it. I debated which side to put the router table on. Easy to swap them around. I’m also going to order the book “How to master the Radial Arm Saw“

-- We must guard our enthusiasm as we would our life - James Krenov

Wayne, I have a craftsman radial arm saw and I found that when I set up my saw as directed, you are supposed to leave a small % of tilt to the rear for ease of return. This made my dado cuts at a uneven depth.
I had to go back and setup when used for a dado cut to 0% to correct this. ( a true pain ) The 0% really makes the blade want to plow more than usual. I hope yours will adjust easier than mine.
Good luck with the restoration and looking forward to seeing the finished product.
God bless

-- Gene, a Christian in Virginia

Hey Wayne, this looks like a fun project. I’ve got R. J. DeCristoforo’s Complete book of Power Tools. If you think it will help I’ll send it down. It has a huge section on RAS’s. It was written in 1972. If you want to use it send me your shipping address by private message. I just noticed that some of the photos are of your little saw. I doesn’t have a section just for that saw though but a lot of info from that time period.

-- Thos. Angle, Owyhee Design, Oregon

Thanks Tom. I may have the book already and will check. Your offer is much appreciated.

-- We must guard our enthusiasm as we would our life - James Krenov

Nice! These old Dewalts look like a real bargain!

-- You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation. (Plato)

Cannot beat the price…

-- We must guard our enthusiasm as we would our life - James Krenov

Way to go Wayne. It looks like a good one. I bet you put a new top on it soon. Maybe make a wheeled base so you can move it around where needed.

-- Bill, Turlock California, http://www.brookswoodworks.com

Thanks Bill. Definately a new top. Perhaps I will build a new base. The current one does have wheels on it and is quite easy to move.

-- We must guard our enthusiasm as we would our life - James Krenov

Good find Wayne. That’s a true classic. I had seen that post too, beautiful job. Do your restoration plans include paint and the whole shebang?

The RAS is a controversial tool. It will be interesting to hear how you like it when you have it back in shape.

Steve

-- Stevethepeeve -- I'm no rocket surgeon

Thanks Steve. Under the grime, the paint appears to be in good condidtion. Going to try to clean it up and see how it looks. I plan to take it slow and careful and do a lot of reading. I want to make sure I have a good handle on safe operations.

I’m hoping this will be a quick and accurate crosscutting tool once tuned up.

-- We must guard our enthusiasm as we would our life - James Krenov

Hi Wayne – you have made a gooid buy there! . My Delta 12” is in constant use – I rarely use my Makita compound or DeWalt Chop saw any more.

If you normally work from the right, you need to follow Bob’s advice and make some more space on that side. I have 5m to the right and 1m50 to the left (which is not enough). You might like to consider putting it on wheels, so you can pull it out for those extra long boards (They should fit niceley into the house, through that door)

Take care of this beast´- If you have not used one before take it carefully and slowly at first, if it bites into the wood that can come at you at a great speed. One set up they are a great tool – I hope you get it finished by January!!!!!

-- Tony - All things are possible, just some things are more difficult than others! - SKYPE: Heron2005 (http://www.poydatjatuolit.fi)

ANy progress?

If you ahve new photos please do share them.

I have bought and will be picking up this saw’s cousin next week.

I am excited to get it tuned up and humming…

No progress to report. I’m up to my eyeballs in work these days. Not had any time to play, even on the LJ site.

-- We must guard our enthusiasm as we would our life - James Krenov

Bummers Wayne. That happens at the end of the year doesn’t it? Maybe we will see something on this in January.

-- Bill, Turlock California, http://www.brookswoodworks.com

Hey, Wayne, glad to hear from you. We miss your wit and wisdom. Well, some times….....shucks.

-- Thos. Angle, Owyhee Design, Oregon

great saw wayne . i had one years ago and it was one smooth saw . dewalt was a great tool back in the day.

-- if you aint the lead dog the scenery never changes

Whayne, That’s awesome! Looks like it’s not in bad shape. You will have a lot of fun with that saw. I absolutely love mine.

To add to what gene said: If you take a close look at some of the pictures of mine you will see a little string attached to the powerhead. That is actually a bungee which goes through a tiny pulley which keeps the blade retracted. It works like a charm. The reason I didn’t just attach the bungee right behind the saw is that it would be too short and get too tight. But by changing it’s direction through the pulley I was able to make it just the right length for tension. Now whenever I let go of the saw it retracts back into it’s “parked” position. I can show you more pictures if this is not clear.

One thing you might want to think about is offsetting your saw (on the cabinet) off to one side. I tend to put the “measured” side of my board to the left of the blade. I might do this for the second generation of my cabinet/table.

Also I made the mistake of not having an adjustable table built in. I spent a lot of time trying to get it perfectly true and flat. But inevitably it is not perfect and I wish I had the ability to adjust and fine-tune it. Looks like that old cabinet that came with yours had the right idea.

Less than 10% of your dust/chips will go into that blade guard dust collector, so make sure you integrate a large dust chute (with suction) behind the blade. I have been able to get mine to be almost completely dust free.

I will be following your progress for sure. Good luck.

-- Dust collectors suck.

Thanks guys. I’ve not had any time to play with the saw. Work has been crazy. I’m in Singapore at the moment. I will be back in the US just before Christmas.

-- We must guard our enthusiasm as we would our life - James Krenov

I just finishhed my 925 restore a couple weeks ago. I threw a couple images into a new blog entry

I have a 1947 shopsmith that I am 99% done with that I will do a write-up for soon

Wayne,
My father had a DeWalt similar to yours. I have one that I bought new in about 1969 that is a little different. It came with pretty good documentation for setting it up. If you don’t have anything like that and would like, I could copy the set-up pages & e-mail them to you (pdf file?).
Rick

-- Rick, Menlo Park, CA

Years ago when this saw was built and delivered to the purchaser an instructor came with the saw to show all of the functions of the ras and how to use it safely. The last of these instructors wrote a book on the use of the RAS called Mr. sawdust. I highly recomend the purchase of this book.

Bryan

-- bryano

I had a link to it above in one of the early comments. “How to master the radial arm saw”. Great book. Thanks Bryan.

-- We must guard our enthusiasm as we would our life - James Krenov

Great acquisition Wayne. I paid $1800 for mine about 10 years ago. It is a very handy saw, use it mainly for docking these days but it is a versatile machine.

-- Grumpy - "Always look on the bright side of life"- Monty Python