Bandsaw advice
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- This topic has 6 replies, 6 voices, and was last updated 5 years ago by Zeppos.
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Afternoon all,
I’m considering buying a bandsaw to make life easier when dimensioning rough sawn boards and was hoping people might be able to throw some recommendations my way. I’m thinking that re-saw capacity would be particularly important and I’m hoping I could purchase something decent quality for somewhere around £1000.
Any thoughts would be welcome.My saw is a 14″ saw. A few things that I like are
1) It can take a 3/4″ wide blade. Wider is better for resawing. I don’t know if there are 14″ saws that will go beyond 3/4.
2) The upper wheel has an easy adjustment for tilt. This moves the blade forward and backward on the wheel. You’ll find two camps regarding drift. One camp adjusts the fence to be parallel to the drift angle. The other camp moves the blade forward / backward via the upper wheel tilt to cancel out the drift angle to zero so that the fence is always square to the table. That’s what I like to do. I get the blade so that the gullets are at mid-wheel and the teeth are hanging off the hump in the tire. It then is a very, very small tilt adjustment to get rid of the drift.
3) It is relatively easy to change blades, which means I actually do according to the task.
Think hard about dust extraction. It takes a lot of air movement to do it right, more than most of us have unless a lot has been put into an appropriate extractor. So, this may say something about where the saw goes.
You are fortunate in the UK because your mains are 220V. I wish I were running my saw on 220V rather than 120V.
I’m new to maintaining a bandsaw, so take those thoughts with a grain of salt. The shop foreman used to do it where I used to work years ago, but at home it’s me or no one, so I’m still learning and discovering things I always took for granted.
I posted this some time ago.
On occasion I do resort to a bandsaw for some cuts. After struggling with an inexpensive 20+ year old small benchtop bandsaw (4 inch) from Harbor Freight which would not cut hardwood thicker than approximately 1.25 inch without throwing the blade I decided to look for an upgrade. After much research it looked like a 14 inch Laguna or 14-17 inch Grizzly (price $1500-$2000) was the way to go – until I kept reading such positive reviews of the 10 inch Wen.
The Wen is placed really well as it has a 6 inch rip (resaw) capacity versus the more common 4 inch for the bench top models. Plus it had a nice fence that is similar to a high end saw which has both a tall and short option for different thicknesses of stock. Couple this with a $250 price and I thought it worth a try. I checked Walmart’s return policy first and found that I had 90 days to return it so I gave it a try. Truthfully I was dubious.
The first task was to take a 6 inch piece of white oak and rip it. It worked perfectly somewhat to my surprise! Since then it has done everything that I have needed to do. Would a high end saw cut faster – sure. But, since this has met all of my needs with a low cost and smaller footprint I am more than pleased. Now the common 1 inch stock can be easily ripped to make the thinner pieces for projects like the Dovetail Caddy Project and the Coasters. Not to mention that after hand cutting all the pieces for the rocking chair my first use was to cut the rocker rails – it was a very nice experience!
I just wanted to pass along my positive experience with a relatively inexpensive bandsaw that has worked for me.
5 November 2018 at 3:41 am #553033Hi I just recently perchance the rikon 14in it I’d amazing!!! With the right blade it can resaw no problem curves cross cut has A 13 in resaw out of the box that was one of the main reason I got it was a little weary of having to buy and add a rise block a solid one piece neck just made more sense to me it also has a 1 & half horse motor a resaw fence is included easy blade change no vibrations at all I have also made veneer with it and have Re sawed logs no problem and i only payed $900 US
13 November 2018 at 8:26 pm #553229I bought a bandsaw for the exact same reason you are thinking of buying one. I went for the record power BS400, it does a steller job. It will take up to a 1″ wide blade but I tend to stick with a 3/4″ blade from tuffsaws. I have found myself using it quite a bit and it really does make a difference to the speed a project moves along. If I was going to buy one again id be tempted to find a used startrite or similar, not that there is anything wrong with buying new but you should find a good used saw for well under £1000.
Matt
If I was going to buy one again id be tempted to find a used startrite or similar
After some research I’m now also ready to place an order for a new bandsaw, and want to go for the record power BS400. Is there any specific reason you would go for a startrite now instead of the bs400? (I’m living in Sweden so have to buy those machines new, used market is not great here).
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