On Smoking a Saw and Learning How to Cut Pieces from 6 cm Thick Oak
A Farmer's Saw
Was it last year or 2011 that we heard about a chap in Turnov selling some oak, which had been drying outside for 4 years? Anyway, the price was not too bad and, with transport pre-planned thanks to the assistance of professional carpenter Bazant, a commitment was made for just under 2 cubic meters of the stuff. Bazant was to deliver all but about 0,3 m^3 to our barn. This was in the era before the acquisition of the Metabo Planer/Thicknesser and Bazant had been commissioned to prepare the cross-sections of wood I needed for the Memorial Bench Project.
The rough cut oak boards were/are about 6 cms thick, up to 30 cms wide and 4 meters long—far too large for a mortal man to handle reasonably. Thus the portions we acquired became just 2 meters long; even these pieces are so heavy that spousely or other assistance must be rendered while loading a new board for ripping.
About a year before the oak was acquired and stacked in the barn, I had purchased a very nice 250 mm Bosch Table saw, maybe 1,9 kW, which was just the job for my needs and I was very happy with it. Previously, I had ripped a few pieces of the rough cut oak boards into workable widths for jointing and planing and the operation inevitably created some smoke from saw burn. On this occasion, in June of this year, though, the smoke was a little more prolific and did not smell at all like burnt oak. Worse yet the smoke continued after I had stopped in mid cut, dismounted the board in process, unplugged the saw and carried it outside to where it was less likely to burn the entire barn and contents to the ground. A few simple attempts at running the motor suggested the urgent need for service.
The saw was duly loaded into the car and off to Bauhaus we went; fortunately the saw was still under warranty and even more fortunately, we actually could find the receipt for the saw. The saw was deposited and a call from Bauhaus Service was promised to advise when the saw would be repaired. The call came with some good news and some bad: the saw was unrepairable, but our full purchase price would be refunded in cash. Evidently, a new motor would have cost about 70% of the original purchase price and this was not an exciting prospect to either Bosch or Bauhaus. We went to pick up the cash and see what more sturdy saws Bauhaus might be selling. Nothing. A few quick trips around the Czech internet yielded nothing.
So, off to consult with my favorite tool supplier in Turnov, Naradi Jiranek, whose brother happened to work for the company which made something called a farmer's saw, pictured above. This is scarcely a precision table saw, but with a specially selected 500 mm blade, 6 or 7 kW at 380V 3 phase, it makes unbelievably smooth, burn free rip cuts; it seems unlikely that I would be able to smoke it and, to date, I have not done so. Petr Jiranek delivered the saw to the position outside the barn shown above and collected the pressure washer for service on his way out. The machine rips the heavy oak boards like a hot knife through butter. The only residual problem is that I do not have a table saw which is safe to use for fine cutting. I think a band saw may just be the missing link!
The rough cut oak boards were/are about 6 cms thick, up to 30 cms wide and 4 meters long—far too large for a mortal man to handle reasonably. Thus the portions we acquired became just 2 meters long; even these pieces are so heavy that spousely or other assistance must be rendered while loading a new board for ripping.
About a year before the oak was acquired and stacked in the barn, I had purchased a very nice 250 mm Bosch Table saw, maybe 1,9 kW, which was just the job for my needs and I was very happy with it. Previously, I had ripped a few pieces of the rough cut oak boards into workable widths for jointing and planing and the operation inevitably created some smoke from saw burn. On this occasion, in June of this year, though, the smoke was a little more prolific and did not smell at all like burnt oak. Worse yet the smoke continued after I had stopped in mid cut, dismounted the board in process, unplugged the saw and carried it outside to where it was less likely to burn the entire barn and contents to the ground. A few simple attempts at running the motor suggested the urgent need for service.
The saw was duly loaded into the car and off to Bauhaus we went; fortunately the saw was still under warranty and even more fortunately, we actually could find the receipt for the saw. The saw was deposited and a call from Bauhaus Service was promised to advise when the saw would be repaired. The call came with some good news and some bad: the saw was unrepairable, but our full purchase price would be refunded in cash. Evidently, a new motor would have cost about 70% of the original purchase price and this was not an exciting prospect to either Bosch or Bauhaus. We went to pick up the cash and see what more sturdy saws Bauhaus might be selling. Nothing. A few quick trips around the Czech internet yielded nothing.
So, off to consult with my favorite tool supplier in Turnov, Naradi Jiranek, whose brother happened to work for the company which made something called a farmer's saw, pictured above. This is scarcely a precision table saw, but with a specially selected 500 mm blade, 6 or 7 kW at 380V 3 phase, it makes unbelievably smooth, burn free rip cuts; it seems unlikely that I would be able to smoke it and, to date, I have not done so. Petr Jiranek delivered the saw to the position outside the barn shown above and collected the pressure washer for service on his way out. The machine rips the heavy oak boards like a hot knife through butter. The only residual problem is that I do not have a table saw which is safe to use for fine cutting. I think a band saw may just be the missing link!
Manipulating the heavy rough oak boards required two persons and rarely produced accurately ripped boards, due to the edge guiding on the saw, the lack of flatness of the oak, etc. So it was decided that another approach had to be taken, rendering the use of the Big Green Saw to 'Occasional'.
This is an image of the 'map' of one of the 2m long rough oak boards. To avoid unacceptable scrap, the concept of 'mapping' parts for a project to each oak board was developed with the help of EazyDraw 8. A board was measured and drawn in as a polygon to the project file. Each individual component was drawn and fitted a well as possible into a board.
A Metabo Band Saw was duly acquired from Mr. Jiranek along with a brutish Bosch Reciprocating Saw. Using the Bosch Reciprocating Saw, which zipped through the 6 cm oak without hesitation, and a clamped-on saw guide, a group of parts could be rough cut; for example, the three "B" pieces at the left. This large, but mangeable, piece was then cut into three pieces on the Metabo Band Saw; each of those 6 cm thick pieces were planed on one edge and then split thickness-wise into approximately 3 cm thick pieces. The Band Saw can easily cut through 12 cm to 15 cm thick pieces. The 3 cm thick by 12 cm wide pieces could now be dimensioned to the required size when all "B" components had been rough cut. The method had the advantage that each of the quantity of each part required could be accounted for as each successive board was mapped in EazyDraw. In total 8 A1's, 25 B's, 16 E's and 4 G's were required for this project and, thus, easily accounted for.