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Tooling up. Bandsaw question

Welcome to VAF

Tom, welcome aboard the good ship VAF:D

Bandsaw blade----fine tooth for doing alum sheet will also work for angle stock, just let the blade cut and do not force it.

I like no more than 1/4" wide blade, trade off between ease of cutting curves and strength. Also stays on the wheels better than a 1/8" blade.

If you get a table top 3 wheel model you can probably get a varity pack of blades and just try them all to see what you like best.

Biggest issue with most band saws (from my experience) is not setting the guide rollers ---top and bottom---correctly or having too much blade exposed.

Good luck, its gonna be a fun time.
 
I got a cheap one on close out (9"-2 wheel). I use the wood cutting blade (6 TPI -oh the horror!). It cuts heat treated aluminum like butter - and the blade lasted for years. Not enough force for ball bearing guides. A rip fence is great for making strips

The blade will dull in one use with fiberglass.
The blade will heat and may break with low temper 6061, unless it is thin. Architectural aluminum cuts fine.

Ferrous is definitely out of bounds.
I cut the few 4130 parts with a Bosch sabersaw.

You can always spend more money, but this one got the job done for lots of cutting.
 
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For aluminum, you can get away with tooth pitch normally used for wood, and wood cutting blade speed. And more coarse teeth are an advantage; hacksaw-density teeth tend to clog quickly when cutting aluminum. Obviously finer tooth for steel, but the bigger deal is greatly reduced blade speed. Trying to cut aluminum with a steel cutting blade at steel speed is painfully slow and frustrating; trying to cut steel at aluminum/wood speed, regardless of blade, quickly destroys the blade.

Finding a saw with wide enough speed range for both used to be tough (expensive); might be easier now.

Charlie
 
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Thanks for the advice. I'm finishing the a few loose ends around the house and getting the shop set up. Pulling the trigger at Oshkosh
 
I have the crappy Ryobi tabletop band saw. It has worked OK for most things. I would never think to use it to cut long strips of aluminum or anything that needed to be too precise. I did find that the quality of blade makes a huge difference - at least it did for me. The one that came with the saw didn't last at all. I got a better blade on amazon and it has lasted be about 2 years. I don't have that much to fabricate at this stage but it cuts angle al and sheet pieces pretty good as long as you understand that the sanding belt and scotch pad wheel are going to fix the cuts and make the part the correct size. I have a Grizzly expensive band saw I use for wood working, but would not use it for metal of any kind.
 
I built my RV with a 14" three wheel table top model that I bought at a garage sale for $10.
I put

an 18 TPI blade on it and set the belt for the slowest speed and it worked fine for 15 years. Last month I bought an old Rockwell/Delta cast iron 14" two wheel bandsaw off Craigslist, changed the pulleys, blade, and power cords. Probably the best tool in my shop.
 
You can get away with almost anything for an RV build. However, if you care, the general rule for any material is 3 teeth minimum in contact with the work. This helps the blade track and maintains the best blade life providing ?speed and feed? are appropriate for material being cut.
Sheet = 32 tpi
1/8? stock = 24 tpi
1/4? stock = 12 tpi
Etc.... these are minimums.

For aluminum, a skip tooth blade works very well and helps with the soft material clogging on the blade.
Bi-metal blades, while more expensive, will last much longer than standard carbon blades.

For those trying to cut long straight cuts in aluminum, and don?t get good results: wrong blade, wrong speed, wrong feed, dull blade, saw isn?t set up correctly.... are the most common causes.

Building an RV isn?t a production environment so you can throw out the rules for the most part. Light duty wood saws and course blades are just fine. If you want to spend less time filing and sanding mill marks, you can up your game with a better saw and blade, but it doesn?t buy you much if all you do is RV kit stuff.

I use a 14? Jet with a course blade for aluminum and a Roll-in vertical with a 18/24 tpi (each inch alternates) for steel. If I had a lot of work to do in aluminum, I would ditch the Jet and blade up the Roll-in.
 
As mentioned, just about any blade will work. I use a 1/4", 6 tpi blade because they are cheap and readily available. Take it slow and it does just fine. Edges are finished off with a scotchbrite wheel.

ALWAYS wear goggles and gloves when cutting aluminum on a band saw.
 
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diamond;1259491 ALWAYS wear goggles and gloves when cutting aluminum on a band saw.[/QUOTE said:
If you have ever broken a band saw blade in operation, you will understand quickly how important eye protection is. I have seen blades ?snake? themselves out of the machine and spring into the operator.
Gloves can be counter intuitive. Yes for things like saws, no for drilling, lathe work, or other rotating equipment. Better to cut a finger than to mangle a hand or arm.
I have a BS in Industrial Education and in thousands of hours of shop time have seen my share of accidents.
 
I use a Shopsmith bandsaw. It utilizes a blade 72" long X 1/4" with a 14 pitch. It works great. The miter Gage from the table saw works on it allowing accurate cuts straight or on an angle.
 
Hello Bill,
I am setting my shop up for an RV-8 build. I too have a Shopsmith and have planned on using the bandsaw for my build. Actually the bandsaw and drill press. Did you try different blades before settling on the 14tpi blade? Can you get the blades anywhere else besides Shopsmith?

Don Johnson
 
Ditto on the coarse-tooth wood blade as BillL said in post #3. Works great, cuts fast.

But the cut is rough. I use a 12" disk sander to smooth that out, followed by a Vixen file to finish the edges. Last comes a fine mill file to deburr the edges.

Dave
 
If you know the length, you can buy virtually any blade pitch/profile/material/etc you can imagine, from a local machine shop supplier, or from a vendor like McMaster-Carr. Either will weld you a blade in whatever width/length/material/etc you want.
 
Bandsaw

I started with a bench top 3 wheel model and good blade. Did not like it at all..

I modified a HF 14" wood cutting bandsaw for metal. Not the cheapest build but it is now a real metal cutting saw.

The biggest problem with using a wood saw for metal is the blade speed. Even the slowest blade speed on a wood saw is far too fast for a metal saw.

I used a 10:1 reducer for my conversion and with a Lenox blade, it will cut about anything. I have used it for 2024, 6061, 4130, all sorts of stainless, brass and copper in thickness up to 2"...no issues whatsoever.

The cheapie will work but I'm a tool guy. Always wanted a metal cutting bandsaw, now I have one. Hmmm, I think a nice TIG welder is next!:D
 
Boelube

I also use Boelube on the blade. Works well for me, especially when cutting the lead counterbalance weights. YMMV.
 
Since posting on this thread back in May, I found a nice Rockwell Delta 14" bandsaw on Craig's List identical to this one for $400.

I changed the cords for the motor and light, the pulleys & belt, and put an 18 TPI blade on it.

That thing will probably cut through an I-beam without slowing down. It is much nicer than my old $10 three wheel garage sale special.

It has to many adjustments to list and appears to be very accurate and holds its tolerances very well.

They did produce the same model with a transmission on it so it can be easily switched back and forth between metal and wood. If you can find one of those for a reasonable price, snag it ASAP! If not, and you locate one like mine, let me know and I'll give you the pulley and belt sizes.
 
Nice find Bill. I have a few old Rockwell/Delta machines and they will last several lifetimes. They don?t make them like they used to!
Keep your eye out for a VFD (speed controller) and you can turn it into a variable speed if you anticipate cutting much steel, but it will probably be just fine on the lowest rpm setting for most jobs.
 
Nice find Bill. I have a few old Rockwell/Delta machines and they will last several lifetimes. They don?t make them like they used to!
Keep your eye out for a VFD (speed controller) and you can turn it into a variable speed if you anticipate cutting much steel, but it will probably be just fine on the lowest rpm setting for most jobs.

You are right!

It is one of those tools that makes you smile every time you use it! I would love to get an old floor model drill press to replace the bench top one I have now.
 
I am surprised to see people saying the blade speed for wood is too high for aluminum. The blades must be extremely poor quality if you do. We use lennox Bimetal blades, nothing too fancy, and cut up to 5000FPM and even higher at times to cut all grades of aluminum. 6061, 6063, 2024, 7075, 5052, 5083, etc. They all cut fantastic the higher the surface speed, and the relatively inexpensive Lennox blades last seemingly forever. I have run a single blade for probably 40 hours of cutting as fast as I can feed material by hand (probably 150 inch per minute) and it was still cutting great at the end. it was of course a little slower than the beginning, but still very serviceable.

Lennox Diemaster is the blades we use. Our blades are appx $100 each, but they are 19.5 feet long.

Our saw goes much much faster than the average saw and the only reason I dont run it at it's upper limit (15,000 fpm) is because it is hard on the drive belts and I dont want to have to replace them.

Of course once you want to cut anything else, you need to slow the blade down. Most steels should be down around 150 FPM (Feet Per Minute) some a little slower, some can be faster.
 
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