Question
I did a forum search on bandsaw tuning and everything pointed to Mark Duginske's book "Mastering Your Bandsaw". I searched the web and there is a 60 minute video as well. I've owned an 18" bandsaw for a couple of years now and have a 1/2" woodslicer blade that cuts beautifully. My problem is resawing. I am still getting too much drift in my cuts when resawing and need to learn how to tune my saw once and for all. Would you recommend the book or the video or both? Not very expensive but don't want either to end up collecting dust. Thanks for any input.
Forum Responses
(Solid Wood Machining Forum)
From contributor A:
True drift can be defeated by angling your resaw fence with the direction of the drift.
Draw a straight line down the center of an edge of a 1x4 that has square and parallel edges. Start sawing and adjust the piece of wood until the saw is cutting straight down the line without further adjustments. Then, without disturbing the position of the board, stop the saw and mark the saw table along the board’s edge. This will be the angle to set the fence at for that particular blade.
You didn't say how wide across the grain you were trying to saw and if you are getting drift no matter how wide the stock is. The point is that you can get to a place where you are asking too much from a band saw that was manufactured for cutting curves in 1" material. Tuning is pretty straight forward. Adjust the blade tracking to where the center of the blade rides at the center of the top wheel. True up the ends of the blade guides and set them close to the blade and true to it. Set the guides to where they are behind the saw teeth and set the thrust bearing to prevent the teeth from being able to cut the guides.
I find that I get the best resawing results with a fairly taught blade to resist snaking.
I have read some good articles in Fine Woodworking magazine where the author says he gets excellent results resawing with a 1/2" wide, carbon steel blade with 3 TPI or teeth per inch. The blades are inexpensive and he doesn't put high tension on them.
I have one of those Japanese dedicated resaws that can run a three inch wide blade. This machine allows me to resaw up to 12" across the grain at ridiculously thin slices and with extreme accuracy.
The idea I am told is that it makes only point contact with the wood and is supposed to stop the blade wandering when resawing veneers and boards, and allow you to move the board around to follow a line. Every book I have read and every DIY TV show I have seen everyone uses a high fence. Could this be the culprit, since with the above setup I am not using the fence at all?
