Small or home made sawmills

Wayne · July 7, 2021, 2:35pm

Wood everywhere . Looks like I will have plenty to do for a while .

Dualfuel · July 8, 2021, 12:28pm

What size stone do you use to sharpen bands with?

Wayne · July 8, 2021, 2:50pm

Hello Bruce

I have tried several different stones over the ears but have the best results with the bellow .

I only touch the back side of the tooth. I have tried working the front of the tooth but doesn’t work out for me.

I sharpen before the blades get dull and will usually sharpen 6-8 times before changing the blade.

Norman89 · July 8, 2021, 3:37pm

Iv never seen anyone sharpen a band saw by hand, everyone around here sends them in to get tuned up or gives it a real light touch up with a hand file just to finish a job if needed. Y’all in the south really are on a different level of self sufficiency then us pacific northwest guys. Up here is still a throw away anything broken and buy a new one culture. It’s incredible what people toss at the scrap yards here

trikebuilder57 · July 8, 2021, 6:05pm

I use a cordless 4 1/2 ‘’ grinder with a chain saw sharpener 4’’ wheel. I do it on the mill.

Dualfuel · July 8, 2021, 9:16pm

Thank you Wayne! I appreciate the detailed pictures! I will try the backside method.
Al, do you sharpen the back too or what do you do?
We built a table, and I sharpen the front side with a chainsaw stone on a 12v chain saw sharpener. The stone is too small and wants to run up the gullet and round off the tip…I want a bigger stone, say a 1/4" diameter. I hold my thumb on the tip and with my fingers, I brace the sharpener so it can’t run up to the tip.

Dualfuel · July 8, 2021, 9:19pm

Do your teeth come in threes? Left right middle.
I was shocked to discover they have no angle on the cutting edge. The circular saw has an angle which makes you alternate back and forth.

JO_Olsson · July 8, 2021, 9:48pm

I don’t want to interfere with you band saw guys, but I just wanted to share what I found out doing my homework prior to building my circular sawmill.
Cutting wood, across the grain, teeth should have an angle every other tooth. However, milling with the grain, teeth should be straight. My blades don’t even have leaning teeth. Cutting edges are just slightly wider than the blade.
Btw, I sharpen on the mill with the angle grinder. A slight touch on the back side of the teeth.

trikebuilder57 · July 8, 2021, 9:57pm

I use an angle grinder with a 4’’ wheel. I hit the back like Wayne showed the first few times on a new blade, then I will do the face, and gullet. Bandmills are sharpened at 0 deg with the set going opposite directions.

Dualfuel · July 8, 2021, 10:08pm

Ah ha!!! Yes I forgot what I had been sharpening. It was the buzz rig blades, which go across the grain.
I haven’t sharpened the Belsaw sawmill blade.

tcholton717 · July 8, 2021, 11:28pm

That is interesting about the set. I have never sharpened a blade yet. I bought 15 wood mizer blades and just swap them out so far with what little I have cut. I have a wood mizer setting gauge/tool I bought from a guy. Never used that either but I have watched a lot of video on doing blades and they talk about each middle tooth is unset and the the ones on either side are left or right. I have looked at my blades and can’t really see any set at all.

JO_Olsson · July 9, 2021, 7:22am

I don’t know much about bandsaws, but it just occured to me they cut the grain no matter what direction they travel through the wood.
A circular milling blade mostly split the grain. My “sawdust” looks like thin planer shavings.

Wayne · July 13, 2021, 7:08pm

Short video of me sharpening my band saw .

https://youtu.be/iXAH7LfO3bE

tcholton717 · July 14, 2021, 12:42am

Do you ever reset the teeth? I have wood mizer blades and I really can’t see much set if any in the new ones. I do have to keep the slab wedged up as I push through the log or else there is too much friction on the blade. Seems like more set would solve that.

Wayne · July 14, 2021, 12:37pm

Good morning Mr. Tom

I do have a tooth setter but it has been several years that I have used it. It seems after the teeth have worn down enough to need a set they end up not very sharp after setting . I think the very tip of the teeth have been heat treated and once this metal has been used they no longer hold a good edge .
I find it best for me to sharpen 6-8 times and then change out the blade for a new one.

There should be enough set in the teeth so that the body of the blade does not have contact with the wood. I think I use about .020 inch set on each side of the blade .

tcholton717 · July 14, 2021, 1:29pm

Since I built that mill I have probably cut less than 500 bd ft with it and that was either Maple of Ash. Not enough experience to learn much and definitely not a sawyer. Now that it’s rebuilt I plan to get serious about it. Try and get some Cedar and Tamarack out of the swamp and see what that is like for sawing. I have a big Red Elm that’s been laying for about three years. I’d like to cut that but it has probably been down too long.

ohlerron · July 18, 2021, 1:47pm

I ended up buying some saw sharpening equipment a few months ago. Reading the manual they instruct to put a knife edged grind on the teeth for a buzz saw. I can see how it would work nice but have much concern for life expectancy of the cutting edge.
I need a 36 inch diameter blade for a buzz saw I use. I bought a blade unseen on-line and discovered to my dismay that someone used a disc grinder to “sharpen” the teeth making the blade more than 1/2 an inch out of round and the teeth were of all kinds of shapes. I knew from my machine shop that there are a number of tooth shapes and how a hook tooth was self feeding. I I didn’t want a hook tooth but did want a positive rake.
I ended up making a template and a jig to draw a new shape for each tooth to be ground to using a disc grinder. I simply spray painted the tooth area of the blade to be able to scribe the new tooth profile into the paint. Sadly - because they had ground the teeth so poorly - the teeth were not equally spaced around the blade. I need to make a setup with the saw grinder and a dividing head to help return the tooth spacing to where it needs to be.
I think I spent 6 hours just rough shaping the teeth with a disc grinder…
The number of teeth was divisible by 3 so I went with a triple chip set as Bruce describes. I did file the face of the teeth on each side with a slight relief angle to help pull the chip away from each side of the saw kerf.
The positive rake definitely helps reduce feed pressure required for cutting. Too much positive rake though makes the saw grab. Cutting twigs becomes dangerous.
We use the saw - an old Whitte flywheel arbor type - to cut wood to heat 3 homes. Total wood cut is probably in the range of 30 bundles of hard wood slab wood that are 4ft x 4ft x 9 - 14ft long. I dress the saw teeth with the blade on the saw with a hand file typically 3 times each season. It takes about 15 minutes to dress the back side of the nearly 70 teeth. I broke down and bought a gumming file to file the face of the teeth. Touching up the face of all of the teeth easily requires 20 minutes. I might do that once each season. I have hammered the blade for a bit higher rpm than when I got it. I had to rehammer it multiple times as a friend who actually owns the saw was afraid to feed quickly - over heating the blade. He bought the saw from the 82 year old original owner who bought it while in high school and ran it with a hopper cooled motor.
We’ve fitted light conveyor rollers to the table to make positioning the wood easier.

We’ve adapted a towed combine PTO shaft to flat belt drive gear box to the saw. It provides an over drive condition that allows the Dexta tractor to power the saw at fast idle using just under 1/2 gallon of fuel per hour. I have more information on the youtube page.
https://youtu.be/6PIKPkZ61zk

ohlerron · July 18, 2021, 11:05pm

Carter Products in Grand Rapids MI makes band saw blade guide assemblies. I bought a couple from them 25 years ago for my Powermatic vertical saw. https://carterproducts.com I was rather surprised at the time that they were rather economical. I see the price went up considerably over the years. I’ve used heavier duty systems that used adjustable guide blocks but have been happy with the pair I got from Carter. The guide bearings are mounted on shafts that were machined with an eccentric that allows the bearings to be positioned closer or further apart to adjust for blade thickness, alignment and changes in blade width.