Christopher Schwarz It's All YOUR Fault!
Bob Hutchins in central Texas
>While left to my own devices near the magazine rack at wallyworld by Her Ladyship during the recent gift season frenzy, I picked up a copy of the Popular Woodworking Hand Tools special edition. The articles on hand saws showed a dovetail saw with what I refer to as a 'gents' handle (round instead of like a REAL saw handle). It also showed a picture of a LN dovetail saw (with a PROPER handle). But all this got me to wondering about the differences between back saws and dovetail saws.
Now, I figured out that a backsaw is generally used to make crosscuts and a dovetail saw generally makes rip cuts; so the former would have the double bevel and less upright filing and the latter would have the more upright, single bevel filing of a rip saw. And, a backsaw might be expected to make deeper cuts than a dovetail saw, as a general rule; so I'd expect the distance between the teeth and the back of the blade to be greater for a backsaw than a dt saw. I'm guessing that a backsaw would have fewer, coarser (that is to say deeper and more heavily set teeth) and the dt saw would have more, finer teeth. But, what about tpi? How many for each? And set? How much for each?
And how does a tenon saw differ from a dt saw? Is it just bigger?
I know I've read this information someplace before but can't seem to find a reference at the moment.
BobH, anxiously awaiting your expert responses.