SawStop, Saws, Fingers, and a Saw Accident Lawsuit

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We recently published some table saw safety tips in the hope it might help you keep your finger tips.  But what do you do after you accidentally cut off your fingers?  Why, sue of course!  A recent article by Jenn Abelson from the Boston Globe tells us that “Carlos Osorio accused One World Technologies Inc., maker of Ryobi saws, of negligence for failing to include a flesh detection technology that would prevent most serious injuries, according to a copy of the complaint filed in 2006 in US District Court in Boston.” And believe it or not, Carlos won the case, to the tune of $1.5 million, even though they were asking for only $250,000. After lawyer & legal fees, I’m estimating Carlos himself will probably net about $7 for his troubles.  But it may be for a very good cause, improved table saw safety, industry-wide.  

Interestingly, the article also points out that there are “more than 50 lawsuits pending throughout the United States against the major table saw manufacturers for failure to adopt the technology, which would stop a power saw blade almost instantly upon contact with human flesh.” Those of you in the know are surely aware of SawStop, the only table saw currently being manufactured with flesh detection technology.

The inventor of SawStop, Steve Gass, developed the flesh sensing technology over ten years ago. Steve assumed the current saw manufacturers would jump at the opportunity to get this kind of safety technology, but instead, he found a less than enthusiastic response when it came time to pay up. As a result, he and his partners formed SawStop, and they now sell several saws that stop the blade within 5 milliseconds of detecting contact with skin. If you haven’t seen the famous hot-dog demo, you should definitely check it out here:

I find it sad that it’s been over ten years since this technology was developed, and yet SawStop is the only company that is producing saws with that kind of safety mechanism, patent or not. I have read a lot of comments about this table saw accident case, and unfortunately, much of the commentary was along the lines of “Too bad Mr. Osorio was too stupid to use the saw safely.” I happen to know people that have lost fingers to table saws (and other power equipment), and I wouldn’t describe any of them as stupid. Frankly, if you show me any serious contractor that’s never had an accident with a tool, I will be seriously impressed. Seriously!

We’ve all done stupid things with tools, and those of us that have done them with table saws have in some cases lost fingers as a result. That’s a hefty price to pay, and it’s even more hefty when you consider that many of today’s table saws could have been outfitted with SawStop technology years ago, if things had gone a little more smoothly in the licensing negotiations.

I do have to question why someone would sue for technology that was available on other saws (SawStop), and not on his budget-priced Ryobi saw. A reasonable question is why didn’t Mr Osorio buy a Saw-Stop table saw if he wanted the kind of safety he was suing for? While I couldn’t personally justify suing in a situation like this (I’d consider it my own fault for not buying a Saw-Stop saw), sometimes it takes a lawsuit (or fifty) to bring real progress to tool and industrial safety. And if this one lawsuit winds up helping bring SawStop technology (or another similar technology) to the masses, I’m all for it, despite the personal responsibility qualms.

I think there’s also a socio-economic dynamic at play with this safety issue in general. Someone like myself, supposedly well-educated and with readily accessible information, is in a much better position to educate him or herself with safety information, than many people that wind up using table saws on the job. While safety is a personal responsibility, it’s also a responsibility of employers, government and industry. Some of you are probably thinking, “But government shouldn’t mandate safety, I want the freedom to have my lifeless body hurled from my pickup because I chose not to wear a seat belt.” Sorry dude, seatbelts are the law now, and many thousands of people have lived on to another day as a result.  Perhaps more relevant, airbags are now the norm in vehicles, and they were controversial technology when they came out too.

From another article on the lawsuit and SawStop in particular, written by Amy Hsuan in The Oregonian, “The Consumer Product Safety Commission is considering whether to create stricter standards for table saws, said spokesman Scott Wolfson. However, the standard will not necessarily benefit SawStop. The CPSC will not write a standard to help one company,” Wolfson said. “The industry can find another way to meet the standard.”  The article also goes into more detail on SawStop’s attempts to license its technology, and provides this staggering stat, “According to the Journal of Trauma, an estimated 565,670 table-saw-related injuries were treated from 1990 to 2007 in U.S. emergency rooms. The vast majority involved a hand coming in contact with the blade, and about 10 percent ended in amputation.”  That is a lot of lost fingers!

While I believe in personal responsibility, I’m also a pragmatist. That’s why even though I don’t agree with this particular suit, I’m hopeful it might lead to a world in which table saws (all of them) are made safer. Who else wants to give an (intact) thumbs-up for saw safety!

Thanks to Marc Spagnolo over at the TheWoodWhisperer.com & Dr. Michael Sykes over at ICBE.org for bringing this case to our attention. You can also find some intelligent discussion on the topic here at MetaFilter.com. We welcome your comments below!

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About Marc Lyman

Marc grew up under a brave single mom who "encouraged" home improvement on the family home. Early toddler gifts included a tool set, and even a cordless Bosch drill when cordless drills first came out. In grade school (give or take a few years), Marc's mom said, "We need to cut down some trees. . . . here's a chainsaw." A father figure also involved Marc in many home improvement projects, including a summer of home remodeling in Palo Alto, CA. Toss in some Obsessive Compulsive personality traits researching everything home improvement related. The end result: a genetically pre-disposed, socially sculpted home improvement machine! For his complete profile, please visit our About page. Really, it's worth it.

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8 thoughts on “SawStop, Saws, Fingers, and a Saw Accident Lawsuit”

  1. This is another example of our Powerball/lottery legal system in action. If Sawstop is such an altruistic company, why didn’t they offer their technology free to any who wanted it? They wanted to make money, that’s why. So why blame Ryobi or any saw manufacturer for declining to pay the licensing fee and offer lower cost saws. Why wasn’t Sawstop sued for not offering their technology free to all the saw manufacturers? That makes as much since as the Ryobi suit. So does this now mean that if you lost a family member in an accident with a car that was manufactured without an airbag when the technology was available, you can now go back and sue the car manufacturer? There is technology to sense if gas is leaking in your home. Can we now go sue the gas utility for not providing that technology if our house goes up in flame from a gas leak. We see videos all the time of race drivers walking away from 200+mph crashes so we know that cars can be made almost 100% safe, but at what cost. $200K Honda Civic? How did we get to the point where individuals are no longer responsible for their own actions/stupidity. The scenarios are endless for hindsight litigation. The unfortunate truth is that this trial will have vast and far reaching consequences to all of us.

    Reply
  2. Seems fairly incredible to me that Mr. Osorio actually won the lawsuit. Admittedly all I know about the Saw-Stop tech is the Hot dog video and that part of that tech throws a rod into the saw, stopping it–and in effect–ruining the machine. I find a ruined saw much preferable to ruining (or losing) a digit. I do agree with Drew in that if saws are somehow mandated to provide this technology–the days of an affordable, mostly portable saw is going to go the way of the dodo.
    I understand that the inventor of Saw-Stop was doing it for demonstration purposes to show his unfailing confidence in his product–but the fact remains that any mechanism can fail.
    I don’t care if I invent a saw that can recognize my brain (or lack of) activity, and predict that I’m going to stick my finger in it–I’m still not sticking my finger in it. Do I want as many safety features that I can reasonably afford? Surely. Doesn’t mean I want to find out if they work by not paying attention.

    Reply
    • Hey Ty, thanks for your thoughts on this. I just wanted to clarify that when the SawStop technology is triggered, it doesn’t ruin the saw. It does ruin the replaceable brake cartridge, and most likely, the blade. Here are the details from SawStop’s site:
      “The blade stops within milliseconds of detecting contact, quicker than a car airbag deploys.
      During this time three things happen:
      An aluminum brake springs into the spinning blade, to stop the blade.
      The blade’s angular momentum drives the blade beneath the table, removing the risk of subsequent contact.
      Power to the motor is shut off.
      Resetting the saw is easy. It takes about five minutes to replace the $69 single-use brake cartridge and blade.”

      Reply
      • Ah–thanks for the clarification Marc. That’s what I get for buzzing about and not checking out the specs before commenting. Anyway you cut it (see what I did there?) it seems that having the additional safety and peace of mind if you did indeed slip, make it well worth the cost of a replacement.

        Reply
  3. While I understand the guys argument, to me this is a failure to take personal responsibility for your own actions. At the time of the accident, there was a saw available with “flesh detecting” technology, but he chose not to buy it. If something akin to the SawStop mechanism is mandated on all saws, you can kiss goodbye the days of small cheap saws you can throw in the back of your truck, for $100.
    The comparison to airbags is a good one too, because while they have saved countless lives, they’re also responsible for killing people, who didn’t have to option to turn them off. Forcing everyone to use a particular solution is not the best answer.
    Personally I think tool manufacturers should be indemnified from suit if the tool itself is not defective AS IT WAS DESIGNED, and that the design is not inherently flawed. Blue sky dreaming of a perfect saw doesn’t mean the one you have is defective. What’s next ? Demanding the SawStop brakes are installed on chainsaws, circular saws, bandsaws, and any other tool with a moving cutter ?

    Reply
  4. If SawStop wouldn’t have made the licensing of their technology so prohibitively expensive, there wouldn’t be any lawsuits. Of course because they patented it other saw companies that would pay for it would have saws almost an order of magnitude more expensive. That is not progress. The part that gets me is that the guys saw manual was full of warnings of caveats of what not to do yet he did that. The saw was not faulty yet they are sued anyway. If I take a hammer and hit myself in the head do I get to sue them because Stanley didn’t include a helmet with the hammer?

    Reply

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