After leaving school, I started an apprenticeship as a printer at the local newspaper. These were the letterpress days commonly known as "hot-metal". One of the tools I worked with was the saw you see at the right. It's a "glider" saw meant for lead and wood.
The entire left side of the saw was a glider ... or slider. It held the material at a perfect 90 degree angle from the blade. You secured your material in the glider and held in place with a clamp and then slid it towards the blade to cut the materials.
The adjustment knob you see at the left was designed to adjust to the length you wanted the material cut. Extremely precise, and very safe. Everything was secured through the cutting process.
At the left is the "clamp" to get a better understanding of how secure this was. Of course, you could leave the clamp off and hand-hold the piece in place. I never did, felt more comfortable with the clamp.
When the letterpress industry changed technology, all of the equipment was sold off ... the dedicated printing gear was sold to industrial used equipment vendors, the gear that could be repurposed was sold off locally. One of the guys I worked with bought the old glider saw. I'm sure it's still working somewhere today. I always regretted not buying that thing ... but quite frankly even if I had bought it, I would not have been able to hang on to it. Most of the places we lived back then were small with no garage or workshop.
I have recently bought a used jobsite style table saw. A portable saw meant to be light enough to carry site to site. This is an older model and not in great shape. I figured it would be okay to take apart and build into a workstation. The plan was to have a sliding top just like the old saw I used to use way back in the day.
I only paid $25 for the old jobsite style table saw. I've been working on the plans to modify it and build it into a workstation. But plans change ... I ended up finding a more modern saw with a slider platform – similar in concept to the old saw I used back in the printing days. The person I am buying it from has only used it for one small project. Now he lacks the storage room, and I'm picking it up tomorrow.
Going this route has two advantages for me, well three if you consider the historical advantage of having used a glider table saw before. One of those is cost. This new saw will end up with an overall lower cost than the old $25 beater and modifications. The other advantage is portability ... it has a wheeled stand and remains portable, the $25 beater had to be dedicated to the workstation.
At the right is a stock photo of the saw I am buying. I'm sure the one I am getting shows wear and needs cleaning and lubricating.
At the left side of the saw, you can see the push guide. That fits the width of the sliding portion of the table. That guide swivels and allows for bevel cuts to the wood piece. I expect to not use that, I'll like make a new fence that is wider and fixed for 90 degree cuts. Also note that the saw has three possible extensions built in. At the back, you can slide out that piece showing behind the fence to extend the depth of the table. At the right you can see the right extension already partially out. And there's also an extension on the left side (beside the slider) that extends the width to the left of the blade. I'll get all the dimensions tomorrow after I pick up the saw.
That stand is included, by the way. And I expect all the parts to be part of what I am buying. That is an extra blade, extra blade insert (for dados), kick back and riving tool, push stick and the arbor wrenches.