Anyone using SawStop overarm dust collection?

No, I don’t have the SS overarm DC…but congratulations on your new saw…sounds fun…drooling here…and wishin’ and hopin’.....

-- /\/\/\ BarryW /\/\/\ Stay so busy you don't have time to die.

Alright, trying to bring some life back into this thread. I’m really needing a review of the sawstop overarm d/c and is it worth it? Thanks!

-- Travis, South Dakota

I have the over arm guard. At first , like you, I preferred the riving knife since it is much simpler, but now that I have the dust guard sorted out, I hate to use the riving knife because dust goes everywhere. Once you get it set up, I think you will love it. I took off the metal rods on the dust guard . I think they are there to make sure the blade is higher than the wood so the stock won’t get trapped by the guard for a non through cut – but that so rarely happens to me, I just took them off. Once those were off, I don’t find it cumbersome at all. One downside is that if you are trimming very small slices ( say 1/8 by 1 ” or less, they can get sucked up in the dust guard and trapped there, until you knock them out from the back with a coat hanger. I also used a scriber to scratch the table near the front to show exactly where each side of the blade kerf is so I can line up the cuts. Take the guard out of the box and try it, I am predicting you will be hooked. If you have any questions – let me know.

Barry
Thanks so much for your input. I do like the idea of getting rid of the black bars – they are so big and seem annoying. I just might take it out of the box and assemble it as I sure do like less dust in the shop.

-- Travis, South Dakota

I have kept the blade guard on 90% of the time but I do not like it nearly as much as I wanted to. The biggest issue for me is how little sawdust is collected when trimming 1/8” or less off of a board. The dust hits the zero clearance throat plate on the left and just flies straight out the front. The guard inlet is even with the top of the board getting trimmed and never has a chance of grabbing the dust. I am hoping someone has worked out a modification to solve this. If a portion of the guard on the left of the blade were allowed to drop to the table surface and direct the chips up into the inlet it could work very well.

-Bryan

I have one (sawstop over head dust collector system) and like you I’m not sure I made the right decision. My problem is vision. I can’t see through the guard as well as I would like. I think one of the after market over hanging types would increase vision and of course allow using the riving knife which I favor.

In all fairness, I have only used the saw twice since I installed the dust system. It does a good job controling dust except for narrow cuts as noted above. However I don’t like it so far.

-- REL, North Jersey

I’ve got one and I’m still not sure if I like it or not. I like it for ripping and for cutting plywood but there are so many different misc cuts I have to do using jigs or a crosscut sled where I have to take it off that it ends up being off most of the time. And it’s often not worth the time to put it back on.

-- Don - I wood work if I could. Redmond WA.