Ts75 vs. 10/4 hard maple

ear3

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The ts75 was the first tracksaw I purchased, and I did so for the extra capacity it gave me over the 55, even though in the main I generally didn't and don't work with stock thicker than 8/4.  Since I purchased it over two years ago, I've used it a few of times to deal with cuts above 2", but most of those have been edge trimming operations, which didn't demand the full power of the saw.  But Ive just had the opportunity to drive the saw near it's full capacity and power, and just wanted to share how awesome were the results.

I'm rehabbing a staircase, installing hard maple caps on the edge of the tread (which consists in plywood covered in end grain doug fir tiles), and so I picked up a couple of 10 ft pieces of 10/4 hard maple, planed it, then rip cut 1/2" strips with the ts75 armed with the panther blade. You can see there are a few blade marks (which will get sanded out anyway), but absolutely no burning, and the saw didn't even come close to bogging down.  It's like having a cabinet saw on site!

Can't wait until I get to tackle a piece of 12/4 in similar fashion.
 

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[thumbs up] [thumbs up]

I use mine to straight-line thick timber and it works very well. I do not use the Panther blade, though. The finish you got looks pretty darn good. Awesome.

Hey - what are the saw-horses you are using? That looks like a great solution for larger cuts like what you are doing.
 
I use mine mostly in the CMS. I havent used for plain ripping of stock. But i got it just in case my TS55 couldnt handle the cut.
Using the panther blade I do get some saw marks in the wood, but nothing my jointer can't clean up in a few secs
 
[member=6605]ScotF[/member] Those are a Home Depot special -- folding metal sawhorses, topped with plywood!  They're actually my standard cut table, both for site work and at home base, since my one-half-of-a-two-car garage is too small to keep a full size cut table permanently set up.

ScotF said:
[thumbs up] [thumbs up]

I use mine to straight-line thick timber and it works very well. I do not use the Panther blade, though. The finish you got looks pretty darn good. Awesome.

Hey - what are the saw-horses you are using? That looks like a great solution for larger cuts like what you are doing.
 
Beautiful grain on the edge of the Maple. Is that to be the face of the stair edges? The 1/4 sawn face of the Maple? If you have a pic of the finished stair tread, I'd like to see it.
 
This is exactly the same reason I picked up the TS75 last week.  I mill my own lumber from my woodlot.  About 70% of it is red, sugar, or rock maple with the rest being pine, yellow birch, and poplar. 

First runs with the saw were made into some year-old seasoned maple that I thought was a softer sugar maple....nope...hard-as-nails rock maple* (affectionally nicknamed "cement tree") and I got crazy kickback throughout the first couple hundred board feet.  I have since switched to the Panther blade, for cutting this maple, over the Universal blade and things are much smoother.  Shame on me for not getting a more appropriate rip blade when I bought the saw.

But, the TS75 and Stihl MS461 are the two saws (of the 20+ around the house) that had me saying WOW on day one.  Usually I need a few days use before I've really grown to appreciate a saw.

*technically rock maple is sugar maple.  The "rock" designation is reserved for after it has been milled because it dries to become the hardest maple wood.  Some trees are also harder than others, and this particular one (once I remembered which one it was) was a bear to fell, ate two bandsaw blades in milling, and is definitely the toughest wood I've ever jointed.
 
When you use Panther blade and General Purpose 36T blade on the same rail do you notice that Panther blade cuts into the splinter guard? It should by 0.1 mm according to specifications, I am just wondering how noticeable this is for a naked eye. Thanks.
 
Haven't used the splinter guard with the panther yet.  But I have a whole lot of 8/4 maple to hit in the next few weeks.  Will throw it on and see.
 
I'm pretty sure that it did, and it was enough that I decided to reset the splinterguard after switching back to a non-panther blade.  This was a while back, though, as I put on a fresh splinter guard this time around.

rostyvyg said:
When you use Panther blade and General Purpose 36T blade on the same rail do you notice that Panther blade cuts into the splinter guard? It should by 0.1 mm according to specifications, I am just wondering how noticeable this is for a naked eye. Thanks.
 
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