Bandsaw blades

Walt2

Walt2

Joined
Mar 13, 2001
Messages
1,157
I would like to know where the makers who use 641/2" bandsaws get your blades. I have been getting them from a local supplier and have been having problems with them breaking in the splice. It appears that whoever is making them is ruining the temper in the splice area. The blade material is supposed to be Lennox. Thanks for any info.
 
I hope you are returning them as defective if they are breaking rapidly. If they are breaking under hard use, it may be something isn't set up right, or you have the tension too high. FWIW, Most blades seem to break at the weld.

MSC, Cyber Woodworking, many others supply them.
 
I have been returning them as defective. Most of the ones that break, if they do not have it when I first start using it, will develop a "thump" when the splice area goes through the cut. I have tried adjusting the tension as light as I can and it seems to make no difference. Many of the blades that develop the thump, upon examination will have a tooth missing at the splice.
Thanks for the replies.
 
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I get mine at a place RW Wilson told me about a fewyears ago. I must be a odd duck because I never could get the diemasters to work for me. I always shred teeth off the blade Im sure due to too course of blade but I know use a blade made by Simonds that work great Its a 14tpi blade but call up damon and co. in ny. and tell them your a knifemaker and what your looking for and they will fix you up. Im now getting 10 times the life per blade with these and im very happy. They are a small outfit that will send you your stuff and tell you to send them a check when you get them.Pm me if you need the contact info for damon and co.
Brett
 
Starrett makes great bi-metal blades.
I use 24 TPI, and hardly ever break teeth. I saw more thin materials than thick, but blades generally last me more than a year.
 
I get into trouble when cutting odd shaped pieces of salvage material. If I don't get it clamped well and it jumps, there go some teeth and here comes the thump thump thump.
 
I seem to be an abberation, but I have been having great luck with the 24 TPI bimetal blades from Harbor Freight. I tried the starrett blades from the local industrial supply, but the larger space between the teeth meant that I often didn't have enough teeth in the material for smooth cutting which shortened the life of the blade

-Page
 
I had the same problem buying Lenox blades I bought locally when I was running a 4X6 in my shop. I kept taking them back because they would break even before the "break-in" work. I'd get them on the saw, turn it on to let the band run a little while, and they'd break.

I went in to the shop one day with 3 broken blades (I had bought 5 to get a discount). I told the kid at the counter that it looked like the blades were getting really messed up at the weld. He took me to the back of the building and showed me their Lenox blade welder. He welded up a band that looked awesome, but had just a touch of extra weld material that needed to be removed. Their shop blade welder didn't have the automatic grinding head in it, so he took the blade out, slung it over a tire mounted to a post, and proceeded to grind the extra weld off with a 4.5" angle grinder!!! :foot: He removed about 3 teeth, and ground the blade to less than half its thickness for a 4" stretch.... all the while turning the blade all sorts of pretty silver/blue colors!!!! :rolleyes: :grumpy: :eek:

I told him if he could weld up some new blades for me, I had a grinding gadget at home that was made just for dressing the weld (a dremel! LMAO). All the blades worked just dandy after that!!! ;) :rolleyes: :D :thumbup:

I buy the 93" blades for my 7X12 there because that size is already welded from Lenox with a machine ground weld.

I just bought 5 Starrett bands for my little DeWalt from a fella on ebay for $25 with free shipping! The same blades cost about $21 PER blade from MSC.
 
Hi all, many of you know my shop is a band saw "weld center" for Lenox. My location and small market make it prohibitive for me to compete with the large suppliers in the lower 48 states, so I recommend you DO NOT buy blades from me. My purpose here is to help a little if I can, so to that end I will not sell blades as a result (if any) of this thread. Stacy, if this is inappropriate, please remove it.

For the small wheels on 64 1/2" and smaller saws, and all three wheel saws you should ask for blades of .020 gauge. Blades of .025 thickness are recommended for saws with wheels 10 inches and over.

It's very challenging for weld centers to make welds that go around small wheels well but it can be done. You should expect to get new blades if yours break at the weld before the teeth get dull. Many times, blades on small saws start to get cracks in the blade about every six inches or so before the teeth get dull. That's a symptom of small wheels.

Tooth shear is another story. That's a symptom of not enough teeth in the material. Many of us adhere to the rule of thumb of "three teeth in the material". For stainless and other tough steels four would be better. At any rate, if you are shearing teeth, pitch down a size.

Many manufacturers make bi-metal blade stock that is .020 thick with pitch choices (number of teeth per inch) of 24, 14, 14/18, and 10/14. The last two are variable pitch blades, that's about a half inch of one pitch and then a half inch of another. This is to cut down on harmonic vibration and lengthen blade life, helpful in thick material but not so much in thin knife blade stock. It doesn't hurt anything either unless the bigger pitch is too big for the material you are cutting. I recommend 24 and 14/18 for knife work.

We have a lot of fans of Lenox blades here on the forum but Starrett and Simmons are both very highly recommended too.
 
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