A different take on a bandsaw fence

[Ttrees]

Hello folks
Just saw this last night and I'm impressed to say the least!
Have you ever seen a saw purposely set this bad, but still cutting this well ?
I have seen a similiar system before at a Taylor guitar video, but thought nothing of it.
It wasn't obvious that it would be especially useful on a smaller machine.

You could rig one up for a lot of uses, especially if you plan on slabbing and you have a machine
on the larger side also
Worth a watch !
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4k-r5utmU2Q


Tom

 

[Rorschach]

That was an interesting video. While drift is not something I have ever really had trouble with, it will make me think a bit more about my setups in the future.

 

[Lons]

WOW Made me think as well, I was expecting the blade to come off the wheels.
I think I need to watch it again to believe it.

 

[AES]

Thanks for that, very interesting, book marked. ;-)

AES

 

[toolsntat]

Very good but not sure about the teeth going blunt on one side statement, by being pushed to the side.
Good ad for the carriage.
Cheers Andy

 

[Chris152]

Yep, that's surprising. What does the gripper thing add to the equation? Wouldn't it be the same if you cut with the bulk of wood against the fence and let the veneer peel away from the open side of the blade?

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Very good but not sure about the teeth going blunt on one side statement, by being pushed to the side.
Good ad for the carriage.
Cheers Andy

I suspect it was the way he said it - I think he meant it would cut more quickly to the side the teeth protruded further off line on, rather than that one side actually went blunt.

 

[Blockplane]

Yep, that's surprising. What does the gripper thing add to the equation? Wouldn't it be the same if you cut with the bulk of wood against the fence and let the veneer peel away from the open side of the blade?

That's exactly what I was thinking

 

[AES]

I'd be very interested to hear what our resident guru, Steve Maskery has to say about this. Well I think he's one of "our gurus" anyway. That's 'cos when I first bought my little band saw I didn't have a clue until I'd watched Steve's DVDs. I still don't have much of a clue, but at least I now approach the band saw with some confidence - AND even get some quite acceptable results - sometimes anyway!

I was interested to see that this Little Griper costs 400 Canadian Dollars - quite a lot IMO, and MUCH more than I paid for the whole, admittedly "carpy" machine! Interesting non the less.

AES

 

[Lons]

Yep, that's surprising. What does the gripper thing add to the equation? Wouldn't it be the same if you cut with the bulk of wood against the fence and let the veneer peel away from the open side of the blade?

I've been using my bandsaw this afternoon and come to the same conclusion.

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Presumably the gripper is easily and accurately adjusted? The only downside of letting the thin piece peel away on the outside is having to reset the fence every slice.

 

[Lons]

The other option might be to fix a short stub fence to the original which ended in line with the blade teeth. Works on the tablesaw.

 

[custard]

Wouldn't it be the same if you cut with the bulk of wood against the fence and let the veneer peel away from the open side of the blade?

Interesting point Chris. The problem with having "the veneer peel away from the open side of the blade" is that you would have to move the fence towards the blade by a fixed amount between each cut, and it's tricky with a normal bandsaw fence to achieve the necessary precision and repeatability.

Because I use a lot of saw cut veneers I sometimes use an aftermarket fence that does exactly that.

The black wheel to the left of the fence cranks the fence in and out by 1.6mm per revolution, and there are indents at 0.1mm intervals, so it's easy to make repeat veneer cuts with the required accuracy.

In practise it's made more complicated because when bandsawing veneer you generally pass the workpiece either over the planer or through the thicknesser between each cut, so that you have a smooth reference face which you then lay down as the glue side of the veneer (if you laid down a sawn face as the glue side then you'd risk the saw marks telegraphing through the veneer).

It's this need to remove the saw marks on at least one face that's the really complicating factor in cutting your own veneers.

In fact unless I'm dealing with an especially awkward donor board that has a lot of internal stresses I just use the simpler method of setting the desired veneer thickness between the fence and the saw blade and then pass the donor board over the planer between each pass.

I usually aim to cut about a 1.8mm thick veneer and then pass it through a drum sander to bring it down to about 1.5mm for laying. After final scraping and/or sanding after laying, the veneer finishes at around the 1.2mm that I regard as optimum for saw cut veneers that are laid on ply or MDF grounds. If you're laying a saw cut veneer on a solid timber ground then you can cut your veneers thicker, indeed I'll usually aim for about 2.5mm to 5.0mm in that situation.

 

[powertools]

The other option might be to fix a short stub fence to the original which ended in line with the blade teeth. Works on the tablesaw.

This principle has been known for years. My Inca bandsaws came with a short subfence to fix to the main fence and the reasons are clearly explained in the manual.
99 persent of bandsaws problems are caused by :-
Blunt or poor quality blade.
Feed rate to fast usually to compensate for 1 of the above.
Using a full length fence for ripping through large sections of wood. We would not dream of doing that on a table saw but seems to be normal practice on a bandsaws.

 

[Chris152]

Wouldn't it be the same if you cut with the bulk of wood against the fence and let the veneer peel away from the open side of the blade?

Interesting point Chris. The problem with having "the veneer peel away from the open side of the blade" is that you would have to move the fence towards the blade by a fixed amount between each cut, and it's tricky with a normal bandsaw fence to achieve the necessary precision and repeatability.

Because I use a lot of saw cut veneers I sometimes use an aftermarket fence that does exactly that.



The black wheel to the left of the fence cranks the fence in and out by 1.6mm per revolution, and there are indents at 0.1mm intervals, so it's easy to make repeat veneer cuts with the required accuracy.

In practise it's made more complicated because when bandsawing veneer you generally pass the workpiece either over the planer or through the thicknesser between each cut, so that you have a smooth reference face which you then lay down as the glue side of the veneer (if you laid down a sawn face as the glue side then you'd risk the saw marks telegraphing through the veneer).

It's this need to remove the saw marks on at least one face that's the really complicating factor in cutting your own veneers.

In fact unless I'm dealing with an especially awkward donor board that has a lot of internal stresses I just use the simpler method of setting the desired veneer thickness between the fence and the saw blade and then pass the donor board over the planer between each pass.

I usually aim to cut about a 1.8mm thick veneer and then pass it through a drum sander to bring it down to about 1.5mm for laying. After final scraping and/or sanding after laying, the veneer finishes at around the 1.2mm that I regard as optimum for saw cut veneers that are laid on ply or MDF grounds. If you're laying a saw cut veneer on a solid timber ground then you can cut your veneers thicker, indeed I'll usually aim for about 2.5mm to 5.0mm in that situation.

Yep, Phil and Custard - I wasn't even beginning to think of repeat cuts for veneer, I'd only got as far as thinking about the tension released in the wood and how that could be relieved by allowing the veneer to turn away into space. I'm guessing placing the veneer last cut between the block and fence to move it out by the same amount won't be accurate - like Chinese whispers leading to increasing inaccuracy as the number of veneers increases? I'm quite sure that's been thought of and dismissed... :?