So I've gotten myself into a bind and need some strips of white cut out of a eva block I have. I don't have a bandsaw but I do have a tablesaw. I was thinking of picking up a finetooth blade and cutting some thin strips.

Anyone ever cut strips on their tablesaw?

I know my mitersaw with a 120tooth blade cuts eva blocks very cleanly but I need some eva strips of white

Yes and it does quite a good job. Just be careful working with foam and power saws. They weren't really designed to cut soft items but with some care will do so quite well.

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what tooth blade have you used on your tablesaw

Be safe. Buy the foam sheets from a craft store and use those instead. They will make perfectly fine accent rings or whatever.

Gonna be pretty hard to get a thin piece cut with out it getting sucked into the machine by the blade. Wood is rigid but foam is not and will travel into the void next to the blade . Any attempts t hold it to prevent that will most likely put personal safety at risk. Plus you will waste as much as you cut due to the kerf. Get craft foam as suggested above. Works fine .

Freddwhy (Rapt-Ryte)

Likely the best method is to use a band saw to cut the eva or other similar type material.

Although a table saw would cut it just fine, if you try to cut narrow strips of this material - one runs the risk of personal injury or worse.

Be safe



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/03/2015 06:27PM by roger wilson.

I think we should all be glad that Roger posts on this forum. Always helpful

The pieces that are thin enough to get sucked down into the blade opening can be retrieved from the chip box or the floor, after you're done, if you want to go about it this way. If the same thing you're after can be achieved with craft store foam sheets, that's obviously the easier route to take. They do come in white.

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Roger have you tried what you suggested? I would think the heat generated from abrading the foam would produce an unacceptable finish to the cut.
Just wondering...

Thanks guys i just picked up some craft foam. The more I thought about it the more I envisioned a wicked kickback or bind.

John,
Yes, I have used my chop saw that has an abrasive cut off wheel on it to trim eva and hypalon grips to length and it works very well.

Obviously one has to watch the speed of the cut, but as long as you do that, it seems to work well.

I do use a "tool room abrasive wheel" which is only .060 thick which of course removes less material.

Be safe

Whatever you do, don't rip a narrow strip of foam on a table saw using the fence. This kind of cut is probably the most dangerous kind of cut you could make.

I am not well versed in wood working tools but with all the red flags I will go to the Arts an craft store [Walmart is closest to me ] to get what I need .

William Sidney
AK

Do you want to cut the eva lengthwise or in thin slices 2x2 ?

As John pointed out, it is probably best to just stay away from a table saw and attempting to cut foam by any means.

There is just too much danger if the cuts are to be for narrow strips - even if you use only a cutting wheel and not a blade and have a 0 clearance saw kerf on the blade.

Use the foam from the store as you indicated that you are going to do.

Be safe

set the fome on a piece of 1/4 " ply and set the fome on it and cut no voide.

to fall into

curtis drumm Wrote:
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> set the fome on a piece of 1/4 " ply and set the
> fome on it and cut no voide.
>
> to fall into


Curtis the problem is not just having too much clearance between the side of the blade and the throat plate opening, It's twofold: 1) it's the fact that the foam is soft and not rigid and 2) the rear of a table saw's spins in a circular motion upward and toward the operator. Because the rear of a table saw blade spins upwards a narrow strip of foam can roll up on itself and then bind between the spinning blade and the table saw's fence. This doesn't happen with wood because wood is rigid, however this is very similar to the kind of scenario that can happen with wood which causes the vast majority of kickbacks. When cutting wood with internal stresses, the stresses are relieved by the cut and the wood bends binding between the saw blade's upward-spinning rear edge and the fence and the wood kicks upwards toward the operator. The same kind of thing will happen with a narrow flexible strip of foam.

There's no way to avoid this problem on a table saw when ripping soft flexible materials and using the table saw's fence, it's a matter of WHEN it will kick back, not if it will kick back.

By contrast, the cutting action of a band saw is always downward and directly opposed by the support of the bandsaw's table. This scenario is infinitely safer with soft compliant materials (just as it is with wood). You can rip a very thin slice of foam on a bandsaw. In fact, a bandsaw's cutting action is so much safer compared to a table saw's cutting action that you can actually let go of your workpiece, mid-cut on a bandsaw, and walk away from it. When you come back later it will be sitting just where you left it. (Of course, I'm not recommending you actually try what I describe).

If you wanted to CROSSCUT, not rip, a narrow slice from the end of a block of foam to make a trim ring, you could try to crosscut on the table saw if you used a sliding table with a fence to support the foam while pushing it along. The key understanding here is that you are NOT using the table saw's fence to set the length of each piece you want to cut. When you cut the slice off the end of the block the slice can move or fall away from the rear half of the table saw blade where it is spinning upwards out of the table towards the operator.

On some table saws, you can slide your fence rearward or install a shorter auxiliary fence and use that to set the length of repetitive cuts. You might also clamp a short piece of wood to the fence to create a similar effect. The idea here is that the rear most end of the fence ends well before the start of the cut. At the start of the operation you slide the foam to the fence and then as you begin pushing the material forward the fence ends so there is open space to the right of the block of foam. Continuing pushing forward past the edge some distance you start the cut and complete it. Since the piece you cut off doesn't touch the fence it can't be bound between the blade and fence. I have, and use, a short auxiliary fence dedicated for just this kind of repetitive crosscutting and it works very safely. However, even with this huge improvement to safety, it's still no ware as safe as making the same cut on a bandsaw.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 12/07/2015 10:46AM by John E Powell.