Simply stated, and as shown in the Instructable, setting your saw up to cut unattended just requires adding a bucket to the sliding table via, for example, paracord. The bucket holds some rocks. The weight pulls the fence and stone past your blade, without you having to be there to push.
When the racket of the cut stops, you know it's time to set up for the next cut.
To up the life of your cooling water pump, just fill a five gallon bucket with fresh water, let the hose trickle into the bucket to replace lost water, and drop the pump in the bucket. This allows the pump to draw fresh water rather than recirculating water with rock grit in it, which is how waterjets cut granite.
Here are the caps I just cut and polished (just the four edges needed polishing), then attached to the tops of posts of the fence [I put up to make my pups a doggie run]. This should add significant life to the posts by stopping any moisture from entering the posts by way og the tops (all the horizontal railing have about a 5 degree cut on top, so water wont sit on the supports.
These are the caps I'm going to install on the railing, after I pull all the existing railing cap. After these are secured, I'll butt composite [held in place via table top apron clips, to allow movement] between the caps.
A design defect of the railing is, my predecessors build it and it's a 40' run. Even in its prime, it made me nervous. To solve that problem, I added 3/4" conduit, after flattening the ends and bending them so the conduit would run from near the top of selected posts to about 16" back on the deck. Now, the railing doesn't move even 1/8" inch.
To deal with the braces, I have to cut granite long enough to cover what the other caps do and reaching back , just over where the brace ties to the deck, so about 5-7/8" x 21" then I'll have to build boxes to support the longer granite and hide the braces.
Mine is real similar as well, but in a sense they all kinda look alike. :-) Given a sharp blade I can cut all day without issue, and it's several thousand days old. IIRC I've had mine for a bit over 40 years, Never needed any changes except fresh blades. I've long ago lost track of my uses, and it has gone out to with friends, and workers over the years many a time. I can't remember what I paid for it back when, but it's turned out to be a great deal.
Author says 12 x 12 tile, which could be cut on this cheap auto pilot, but for smaller tiles I have always needed to physically hold them to get crisp cuts. I think by the time you figured out moveable clamping to hold the tile still, you may as well just do the cuts.
Now doing anything to keep the pump wet is a win. Flowing water does make the dream work.
I have the cheaper version of that saw for cutting the wife's glasswork and anything else I want to do. It's the 7", with the repurposed angle grinder for the motor. The sliding table was plastic and had a warp so I just kept the linear bearings and made a new table from 1/4" Al plate. A very useful tool to have!
Neighbor (a hoarder) died from a stroke a few years back and my other neighbor bought the place. i helped him clear out the junk and got ahold of a few goodies, (2x4 of ebony, etc). Among the treasures wad some lapidary equipment. Haven't set it up yet (I'm a rock hound) but there is potential. One item is an old rock saw, blade spin in a bath of oil (mineral oil typically) and has the counterweight drive for feeding. Someday I'll get it set up and slab off some agates for a project.
Yeah, George, little tiles aren't worth walking away from anyway. My blade moves through them pretty quick.
Where this really shines is, cutting the scrap countertop granite and stuff, which runs about 1-1/4" thick. It takes MANY times as long to get through as a 3/8" or so thick tile. All those light colored blocks and post caps were 1-1/4". And, the darker granites (catch all phrase) cut a lot slower than does most of the lighter stuff.
I've cut pieces up to three feet long on this and each cut takes a whole bunch of seconds, and then a thousand more.
When cutting the long stuff, I let it run about 20 minutes, then check on it. If the sled reaches its limit, no harm, no foul.
I just shut off the blade, push the block curf down the blade, then finish the cut. Wide pieces need tending until short enough to not be a tip problem.
As to crisp cuts, the 1-1/4" granite is, obviously, pretty heavy. It's not prone to wandering, and I've never had anything chatter, as it moves through the blade. The roughest cut I got was free-handing some rocks I was curious about.
In the end, this simple mod saved me a few hundred hours of standing in front of the saw over the years. My feet really appreciate that, or my butt, if I was sitting on a stool.
There were ones sold at Home Depot that looked like my saw, but this one came from Master Wholesale out of Seattle. It ran over twice what they did, including the stand (to which I added wood handles, like those found on a wheelbarrow.
That choice was per the recommendation of a granite place, the owner of which showed me how to cut granite using just a skill saw and a drip of water (I guess he didn't think I'd be much competition for his saws that take on slabs that would flatten the springs of my little 1/4 ton. He pointed out the HD ones are a bit like the Walmart tools - companies have to cheapen their product to take advantage of the big box sales opportunity.
For those unaware, a buddy was a bicycle repair guy and wouldn't touch the Walmart ones because, for example, parts of the same model wouldn't swap.
Anyway, this one has never bogged, but it does demand a real 12 gauge or better circuit.
THAT was a very worthwhile mod. It makes moving this beast around so much easier.
It might be the same model. Mine is an MK Diamond maybe a model #730. Ive heard the lower quality tools right from a tool manufacturer. Hilti stopped selling their tools in Home Depot because they wanted Hilti to make a cheaper version of their tools to sell at a lower price. Hilti refused to to make a cheaper line so no more Hilti tools in big box stores.
Corelz, GOOD FOR THEM. Anything less really is burning the public and should be outed. Nice to know Hilti is still the Hilti I lust for (wonder if they'd take my Bosh on a trade in?).
That's why Milwaukee tools from the big box isn't the Milwaukee everyone relied on. Hilti might take your Bosch but doubt you'll get anything in return. Hilti's hammer drills are hands down the best I ever used.
I believe mine may be the Hilti. I know for a fact I bought it at Home Cheapo, long long ago.
Kelly you want snert, my table for doing tile cuts was my first post at the other place. A real POS, took about 1/2 hour to throw together. Someone had a thread about adjustable height tables, and I decided to show the lower half of the equation. The down and dirty side. :-)
I had 2 Craftsman height adjustable stands, and just made a cheapo top to go over them. Went from 20" or so, up to 40" or so. Got the job of holding the saw still down pat, so it was plenty enough. Never gave a thought to making it better, wasn't broken.
The only "issue" that saw ever had was the cheapass plastic table. Vibration caused a good number of broken tiles. I was musing about a long term fix, and in the interim put a piece of really thick shelf liner on the table, and cut through it, so it padded the POS table. Didn't break another tile that entire day, that fix is still working too. What can I say. I only fix broken stuff. The tub never cracked, or leaked, which as I understand is rare, but it always had a nice wet area for the pump, and water flowed like it was supposed to. I cleaned it religiously after use, blew it out, and washed off all the sludge, and it's rewarded me with faithful use.
This thing is a wild thing at 95 lbs, atop a stand with swivel wheels (20lbs?). So the wood bars sticking out the front helps a great deal when steering the beast down a sidewalk or driveway.
I've cut as more 3cm/1-1/4" rock with this than I have tile, so I'm glad for the extra weight and power. Especially since I don't have to lift it and can just steer it.
When I'm done with the last home project, I'll peddle it and claim a bit more of the garage back. Just as with the 5 gallon texture machine.
Meanwhile, anyone else having problems with photos? Even when I cut and paste over to another browser, nothing comes through. No problem on other sites either.
The pics problem is from the site moving to a new server. I cut 2” granite flagging but went with a gas saw. The tile saw definitely would of made a nicer cut but I had a lot of cuts to do.
I was lucky. The granite shop owner, who tolerated the 40 year old kid (thirty some years ago) gave me a lot of tips that saved me money. At the start, and per his advice, I bought a Makit circular saw and dribbled water at the kerf to cut his scraps down to usable pieces. It worked wonderfully.
Later, he talked me out of buying the more expensive tile saw (3k) for the much lessor beast I yet have, which is fine for the play I do.
Getting knocked on your butt by a bit of water getting to an electric saw or grinder aside, I, ALWAYS, will take electric over gas.
Okay, then there is the electric car thing and that just isn't going to happen.
The granite store owner who showed me how to cut granite suggested I buy a Makita, because the bearing had pretty good seals and tolerated dripping water into the cut line well. I went that route and, a few decades later, the Makita still purrs.
If you're talking a carbide blade, I wouldn't touch that technique with a ten foot pole.
Diamond blades aren't that expensive. In a pinch, a Harbor Freight one would do just fine. And, running a blade forward or backwards on a stone sounds like a great way to make carbide shrapnel.
Key to making stone cutting blades last is cooling. If the water dribbling out of the bottle is enough to do that, great. It's fair game.
I added a modification to a garden hose that allowed me to run a 1/8" clear hose. A valve anywhere along the line will allow you to control the flow of water needed to protect the blade.
In the past, I found the 1/8" hose was so light it was easy to direct it over the front of the blade and hold it there during the cut.
I used the same approach on my variable speed angle grinder when I was using it to cut, grind or polish rock.
