Old timer at the lumber yard made me rethink my whole approach to ripping boards

I always ripped with the fence on the left side of the blade because that's how my first boss showed me. Then this guy I met at the 84 Lumber in Nashville watched me set up a cut on my jobsite last Tuesday and asked why I wasn't running it on the right. I told him that's how I learned and he just said 'you're fighting the blade the whole time, it wants to climb on you.' He showed me how the rotation pulls the board into the fence instead of away from it, and I tried it on a 12-foot oak plank and the cut was way smoother. Has anyone else switched sides and noticed a big difference?

2 comments

2 Comments

norathomas20d agoTop Commenter

Wait you've been running it on the LEFT this whole time? Dude I had the same thing happen with a guy at Home Depot and he looked at me like I had three heads. Swapped sides and it changed my life honestly.

henry60420d ago

Did you notice a difference in how the blade cut or was it just the dust collection that improved?