saw making questions

Re: saw making questions

William Duffield, on the Cohansey


>You beat me to it. That's just what I was going to do.

No commercial interest, etc. etc. Addy Protocol: In my day job, I sell saws, but neither Mike's nor Vlad's :^(

Re: saw making questions

mikew


>Yeah, but you sell Tom's--and they are great saws as well.

Now the others.... Ah, they are fine, too. Handles are funky, but that's why God invented rasps...

Take care, Mike

Re: saw making questions

William Duffield, on the Cohansey


>And I use Tom's saws too. I like them, and I tell my customers as much. I wish I had more time to try out all the saws we sell. All too often, I just have to tell the customer, "I don't know. I've never used that one." The frown only meant I haven't had the opportunity to use and sell yours. There's a limit to the value of the inventory any retailer can offer, especially if that retailer wans to maintain some semblance of credibility with their customers. We also carry dozukis, ryobas, cabinet saws, contractor saws, chop saws, scroll saws, jig saws, band saws, coping saws, et cetera, et cetera, and so forth. There's never enough time (or enough wood) to become expert at all of them.

Re: Black Arts

Warren in Lancaster, PA


>I was an oboe player before taking up woodworking 30 years ago. When it was time to learn to make reeds I was given great samples to learn from, but little instruction. If I asked "what do you do if...", I got "cut and try" (take a little off and see what happens}. If I asked "how do you know when..." I got "experience". We really made reeds on instict as much as conscious thought. Getting a tiny piece of cane to do just what you want it to do is something that takes tradition (learning from the masters}, experience (thousands of failures}, and intuition (guessing what to try next). If you are thinking there ought to be a logical system you can follow for making reeds, I can assure you that I once thought that too.

Today I think sharpening is a black art. I know some people think it is only a matter of grit size and honing angle, but a recent post by David Barnett concerning the burr gives a window on how complicated things are at that small place we call the edge.

Re: saw making questions

Andrew Lunn


>Bugbear, sorry I missed your post earlier. Thanks for the links and info!

Andrew

Re: Black Arts

Andrew Lunn


>Hi Warren, thanks for elaborating. I think of carving as something sort of like that, in the sense that there's so much hidden depth to it. Figuring it out is only in part a cerebral figuring like we're used to, where we can sit there and just think about something. It's more a figuring that involves your fingers and hands, and it's like they do something that is akin to thinking that clearly contributes to our understanding. It's not an understanding that you could simply arrive at logically, sitting in an armchair.

I think I caught part of that thread you mentioned. I agree it was very interesting. Take care.

Andrew

Re: saw making questions

Andrew Lunn


>Yes, Vlad, thank you. You did answer my questions. Keep up the nice work! This is really impressive bunch of people here. Take care Vlad.

Andrew

Re: Assumptions

Adam Cherubini, NJ


>Bugbear,

You are uncharacteristically making a lot of assumptions:

Do we know those hammers were used on hardened metal? They may have been the tools used to work annealed steel, in which case one could imagine that their shaped heads would actually work. This conversation (at least my part of it) has only been in reference to "tensioning" hardened tempered spring steel.

Adam

Re: RANT ON What's the difference between...

Adam Cherubini, NJ


>Andrew,

Sir William's rant really has nothing to do with you. Its a nice theory and a good lesson and I agree with it to some extent. (obviously old beech planes aren't exactly like logs) so there's a line there.

The practical problem with using old saws is their thickness. Longer saws tend to be thicker saws. So if you want a panel size saw and the thin blade that goes with it, you may not be able to start with a long one. At the very least you may need to start with a pristine #12 and cut that down.

The saws in the Seaton chest have very rectangular shapes. It was originally my intention to use old saws. But no $5 saw in my extensive collection had sufficient material in its toe to make a rectangular shaped saw. So while it all sounds good to just go buy old saws, or newer old saws, its not quite that easy, at least in my experience.

Adam

Re: RANT ON What's the difference between...

Andrew Lunn


>Adam, so are your saws based upon those from the Seaton chest? I've seen pictures of some of them, but it would be nice to see different pictures, or pictures of different saws. Do you know anyplace on the web to do so?

Andrew

Sir Will...It's not the destination...

Joe Rogers, Northern Virginia


>It's the journey :-) Seems like it could be fun too! Hmmm, Lets see which saw do I try today? JR

Re: saw making questions

William Duffield, on the Cohansey


>Do you think I could "sell" a saw making course, or even a hand saw sharpening course, to my customers? I'm not sure many of them are ready for that journey. So far, I haven't even been able to "sell" them on a course in making cabriolet legs, even if I start with a bandsaw instead of a bowsaw.

Now, using several thousand dollars worth of Delta forked tailed apprentices (jointer, planer, sliding compound miter saw and cabinet saw) to dimension rough lumber, that they understand, and I get plenty of students to sign up for that course any time I want to teach it. It seems what they like best is how I can flatten a twisted or cupped board that is wider than my jointer. D'oh!

Re: saw making questions

Paul Kierstead


>It seems what they like best is how I can flatten a twisted or cupped board that is wider than my jointer.

Jeez, My jointer is only 2 1/2" wide or so.

Oh, I see. Sounds like a good hand-tools course to me :) What do they do if it is wider then their planer?

Re: saw making questions OOPS

William Duffield, on the Cohansey


>My previous post was intended to be a response to Joe's comment. I hope it might make more sense within that context.

Well, they'd do the same thing you'd probably do if you had a very wide board with too much cup to get it flat. They'd rip it down the middle, flatten each half separately, joint the matching ripped edges, and glue it back together. Or, if there was going to be problems getting a good match on the figure at the glued joint (these are often problems seen with flatsawn boards), they'd rip it and use the narrower boards for some other purpose. Alternately, they might lay the board out on the lawn on a warm sunny day, convex side up, watch it carefully for wood movement, and bring it in and work it quickly once it has moved enough to flatten it. This sometimes suffices for panels you are going to constrain in a frame, and for table tops you are going to constrain by screwing down to aprons. At least, these are techniques I try to teach them.

Re: Ah, clarification...

Paul Kierstead


>I was actually asking (not so clearly) what is the powertool instructions when the 'finished' product is not flat enough, eg your panel has moved a bit in the clamps, etc. and it doesn't fit the planer. It is probably just my poor technique, but my panels rarely come out dead on. I guess you could take a sander to it and go mad (though flat would be a tough requirement in that case).

Not that I disagree, but I have found that if a wide board is severely cupped, ripping it and reglueing often doesn't seem to work out so well, as the sub parts really really want to move; the board seems somewhat doomed to cup. You flatten, it re-cups. You saw and flatten; the narrower pieces cup again. Well, this seems worse with twist, which is somewhat more 'inherent'. Anyway, it is way OT and I am not nearly so experienced as many here, so I am mostly talking out of my ...