Blade for Resawing 8/4 x 10 Inch Cherry

[Bob D.]

I have some 8/4 cherry I need to resaw for a project to make a bookmatched table top.

I'm looking at the Woodslicer 3/4" x 111" to fit my Rikon bandsaw. I've heard good
reports but wondering anyone thinks there is something better out there. Blades are
~$40 plus shipping. I will probably get two just so I'm not caught if I mangle one or it
breaks. I have about 16 lineal feet to resaw and one blade should do that no sweat.

Only place I know to get this particular blade is from Highland Hardware.https://www.highlandwoodworking.com/wood-slicer-resaw-bandsaw-blades.aspx

 

[Rob Z]

Bob, I had one of those blades for several years on a bandsaw that I recently sold.  I don't recall any problems or other issues and felt it was a quality blade for the price paid.

 

[chrisrosenb]

I have been using Woodslicer blades for many years. I have been very happy with them.

 

[Bob D.]

Thanks everyone. I ordered the Woodslicer.

 

[JohnnyEgo]

I think you made a fine choice, but for what it is worth, I have had great experience with a 3/4" Laguna Resaw King on my 14" bandsaw, and I have recently used it to resaw 8/4 x 8" cherry without any problems.  I've had it for a while now, and while it definitely does not cut as quickly as it did when new, it is still cutting and running smooth. 

 

[Bob D.]

Thanks, does Laguna make a 111" blade?

That's what the Rikon bandsaw uses.

 

[Crazyraceguy]

I have always used Woodslicer blades on my personal saw at home and we started using them at work too a few years ago. They have been great, even on my "not so great" 14" Rigid with a riser block.

 

[JohnnyEgo]

Thanks, does Laguna make a 111" blade?

That's what the Rikon bandsaw uses.

They do.  I was in a similar boat as you, but with less patience and a willingness to throw money at the problem in front of me.  I planned on ordering a Woodslicer, but the lumber yard I use had a Resaw King on the shelf and it appealed to my short attention span.  It's done the job well enough that I never got around to ordering that Woodslicer.  I have heard on forums such as these that the Woodslicer is better for veneer when new, but the Resaw King can be resharpened and lasts a good bit longer.  I mostly resaw for splitting boards into fairly thick stock, so my tolerances are probably a lot looser than someone needing thin veneer.  I do know it requires a fair bit of tension.  My 14BX does it without a problem, and it tracks very straight and true. 

It is substantially more expensive than the Woodslicer, but it has lasted a good length of time splitting a lot of boards without fail.  And it was available locally.  I have no regrets.

 

[Bob D.]

Good to know. There is nothing available to me locally.

Closest would be Woodcraft which is in the neighboring
state of Delaware and 38 miles plus a $5 bridge toll away.

 

[Cheese]

When I rebuilt my Delta 2 years ago, I did a lot of research and I narrowed my choice down to the Woodslicer, the Laguna Resaw King and the DoAll Penetrator. I think any one of them would perform well.

I finally decided on the DoAll because of its hardness and that it's designed to cut stainless or difficult to machine metals. It's made from M42 and initially it has a 67-69 Rc hardness and then it's TiN coated to produce a 83 Rc hardness.

A few years ago, I heard some reports that the Resaw King was prone to cracking on the smaller diameter wheels. I don't know if that's still the situation now.

 

[Bertotti]

Been using Timberwolf myself and they have always worked for me.
I haven't bought any in a few years though. My last order has kept me covered for years now. Using them on a 14"Jet with the 6" risers installed.https://www.timberwolfblades.com

 

[Bob D.]

After going over my BS the other day and finding a bad bearing, I ordered some replacements and they arrived today from McMaster. I looked on the Rikon parts website but it says out of stock. Plus they have the bearings only available as a kit of 6. OK, 3 upper and 3 lower but the saw uses different size bearings for the upper and lowers guides and their kit has six all the same size so not gonna work.

So questionable parts and not available to boot I looked elsewhere. They are a standard 6001RS ABEC1 bearing so I found them fast on McMaster and ordered three. The upper bearing all seem fine so I didn't order any of those.

Put the new bearings in and adjusted and the blade adjusted and tracking OK. Blade runs true. I set for .2mm clearance on each bearing and spinning the blade by hand not one bearing moves. Ran the saw at 50 RPM (blade cleaning mode) and checked how the blade was tracking and I heard a rub, so stopped to investigate and found that the blade guard rubs the upper wheel when it is near the top for maximum resaw capacity. So I fixed that then checked again at 200 FPM then 2000 and finally at 4000 FPM, all good.

So I made a test cut on a scarp of cherry 4 inches wide. Cut went fine and left a pretty smooth cut. I was impressed. I thought time to try it on the real deal. So I got the widest of the three boards I need to resaw figuring I would do the toughest one while the bade was still at its best. It was very slow cutting, at least I think it was. I recorded a video with my phone and when I checked the time from start to finish it took 8 minutes and 5 seconds and the piece is 44 inches long x 11 inches wide. That's 11.022 seconds per inch. Does that seem slow to you? I was running the blade at 4000 FPM and I expected it to go a little faster, but this was my first cut on a piece over 8 inches since I put the new motor on a while back.

 

[grbmds]

Since your blade is 111" I assume it's a 14" bandsaw. I will be curious to see how the 3/4" blade performs on the saw. I have a Rikon 325 Deluxe and, from everything I have read a 1/2" blade is best for resawing even though the saw has the capability for a 3/4" blade. I have never felt the need to use anything wider than 1/2". If the saw is set up correctly after installing a new blade, the 1/2" performs well; straight smooth cuts, no deflection.

I have had great success with Starrett blades. They seem to stay sharp longer than others, including the Woodslicer.

 

[Bob D.]

Yes, it's a Rikon 10-325 with the Striatech DVR motor and Rikon 10-900 guide upgrade installed.

I never ran a 3/4" blade before that I remember. I've always used a 1/4 or 3/8 blade and had success. But I was not resawing anything over 8 inches in the past.

I've got the blade and the saw setup right. My problem is not the quality of the cut but the speed of cutting. And that's not a real issue because I have no time pressure. I was just expecting this highly touted blade to perform better than it has. And maybe that's something I've done wrong which is why I started this thread in the first place.

I have some 1/2" blades but I don't remember what type they are or the TPI, I'll have to look tomorrow. I think you're right though in that tensioning this 3/4" blade feels like its the limit for this bandsaw frame. The last two cuts are on narrower stock so they should go easier. I'll find out tomorrow.

 

[grbmds]

I resaw with 1/2" blades and have tried a number of them, including the Woodslicer, Carter, Starrett, and a couple others. I don't find the quality of cut much different. It's usually the setup that causes quality problems. A 1/2", 3 TPI, Skip Tooth blade does a great job. I don't believe that installing a 3/4" blade will resolve your desire for more speedy resaws. Only a large motor, generally translating to a larger saw, will resolve that.

I would just add one thing. Regardless of saw or blade, a slower speed will almost always produce a smoother cut, which means less planing or jointing and most likely more accuracy.

Over the years, almost everything I have learned about bandsaws points to using a 1/2" blade regardless of the fact that the saw could handle a 3/4". I have found that to tension any 1/2" blade to it's appropriate tension requires tensioning to the 5/8" mark. It would be difficult to tension a 3/4" blade to the correct  tension because it would need to tension above the maximum.

I will be interested to see your results if you use a 3/4".

 

[Bob D.]

I did make one cut with this 3/4" blade yesterday. As I said the cut quality was good. I would have liked to have had a little more material to start with but my board was 1-9/16" (1.5625) after planing. Deducting 25 thou for the blade leaves two pieces 0.76875. After running through the planer to yield two boards the same thickness I ended up at 11/16" or 0.6875, so 1/16" less than my desired final thickness of 3/4". So I only removed about 81 thou from each board to get the sawn face flat again. I thought that was pretty good. It just went slower than I expected at ~11 seconds per inch. The lost 1/16 won't hurt anything in the end. These two pieces are for the table top and they don't have to match the thickness of any other piece in the table. As long as the two halves of the top are the same thickness they will be fine. They get attached to each other with hinges and the top is removable from this portable sewing table I am building. That 'lost' 1/16 will only reduce the weight of the top slightly and have no affect on its performance or function.

As I was running the boards through the planer I noticed that the bandsaw cut was fairly flat across the 11 inch width of the board. And coming right off the bandsaw when I separated the two pieces there was no sawdust remaining between the halves, indicating to me that all the sawdust was carried out by the blade and nothing remained to cause the blade to bind or wander off course. I should have taken some photos of the cut coming off the saw but I didn't. I went back and looked at the video I shot while cutting but I had stopped the camera before I separated and inspected the cut so nothing to be learned there.

I have a bad habit of doing that, I don't know why. I could have let the video run but I always find myself wanting to turn it off as soon as I think its no longer needed like I'm wasting film. I guess I'm still thinking in terms of actual film and forgetting that my 128GB SD card in the GoPro has hours of capacity and trimming is easy in post on the PC.

Here's the last few seconds of the cut.


And some photos I took this morning of the test piece I ran. This is a piece of the same cherry but only about 4 inches high.
These pieces have not been touched by a plane or sander, this is how they looked coming right off the saw.

Shown as run through the saw
View attachment 1

Splayed out after the cut to show the cut faces of each half
View attachment 2

Some ripples where I hit a soft spot and the blade advanced too fast
View attachment 3

This is the planned outer face on the left and the sawn inner face on the right for comparison.
View attachment 4

 

[Bob D.]

Well, I found my problem, at least I think so. I made my last two resaw cuts this morning and they were less than 8 inches so less load on the motor than the 11 inch piece yesterday. Those two cuts today came out fine as did the first it just went slower than I expected.

But when I was replacing the 3/4" blade and going back to a 1/4" blade and adjusting the lower guide bearings I happen to bump the drive belt tension handwheel with my shoulder and it was loose, way loose. I then checked the belt and yes it was very loose. So no doubt the belt was slipping yesterday and that was why it felt like I had no power. Took the belt off and inspected it and didn't see any damage so I put it back on. Finished setting the guides and everything seems fine with the 1/4" blade installed.

I don't know how long that belt has been running loose. There is no reason to change the belt tension except for jumping over to the other set of pulleys and that is only required if cutting stainless steel or titanium and I haven't been doing that. Right now it's a mystery but I will keep a closer eye on it and see if it gets lose again then figure out how and why.

 

[Cheese]

This comparison is amazing Bob...

[attachimg=1]

Do you think the 11 seconds per inch rate was caused by the loose belt?  Or do you think that's a good rate of speed to maintain?

I'd never resaw that slow but with the results you got that's now a serious consideration. Also, the complete lack of sawdust between the pieces is also something I've never experienced, again by sawing that slow you're giving the sawdust a chance to escape.

Do you have dust extraction on your Rikon?

Is that blade the Woodslicer?

 

[Bob D.]

I am reasonably sure that the loose belt was my problem. I don't know how much faster it would have cut. I just felt 8 minutes for this piece was long. Before I started I guessed it would take from 4 to 5, but that was just a WAG.

Yes, finding zero sawdust in there was amazing, and I am sure the low feed rate had a lot to do with that. Plus the 4000 FPM* blade speed with the DVR motor meant I was getting just over 7 revolutions of the blade for every inch of travel. That's 200 inches per second greater blade speed than the stock motor.
  * The stock motor gives 2950FPM on high and 1445 FPM on low speed.

4000FPM * 12 = 48000 blade inches/minute

48000/60 = 800 blade inches/second

800 * 3.5 TPI = 2800 teeth/sec

My feed rate was 11.022 seconds per inch or roughly .1 inches every 1.1 seconds, so if my math is right (feel free to check me) I was getting about ~3000 teeth moving through the work every tenth of an inch. That can move some sawdust.

Yes, I have my dust collector connected to the bandsaw. It grabs almost everything that hits the lower wheel cabinet, but I find the space under the table required to allow for tilting the table lets a lot of sawdust escape. I can't remember the last time I cut an angle other than 90 on this bandsaw, and I've had it since 2008. So I use some magnetic sheet material to stick on the corner of the lower wheel cabinet door and try to mask off as much of that open space as I can. It works sort of but the other two sides are still wide open and spill sawdust. I might try and setup a second collection point under the table. Been noodling on how I might do that for a while now and nothing has really impressed me as worth attempting.

Here's a short video of me sawing one of the legs. You can see zero sawdust when I separate the two pieces after the cut.
You'll also hear one of the upper guide bearings screaming during the cut. It started complaining during the first cut the day before. I ordered new bearings and they arrived today so I'll put those in tomorrow. Running these through the planer I only removed 48 thou to get them flat again.

 

[Cheese]

Ya, that's pretty impressive Bob when you separate the 2 halves & there's nothing inside.  [big grin]  I'm definitely going to try slowing down my feed rate and see how that works. My dust collection is under the band saw table using a 4" port and it really works well until...I separate the 2 halves and then there's sawdust every where. I drilled some holes in the ZC insert and that really helps in keeping the top of the table clean.

[attachimg=1]

I also really like your technique of cutting at a lower blade guide height until you actually need additional height and then you just dial the extra height in. That makes a lot of sense.  [thumbs up]

I may have to try a 1/2" WoodSlicer blade as I've never had much luck with tensioning 3/4" wide blades, the saw just isn't capable even though Delta says it's ok.