March Meeting of Tennessee Valley Woodworkers

3/19/02

There were approximately 64 people in attendance. The meeting was called to order by Bob Leonard at 7:00 PM.

VISITERS: Gary Hoyle and Marion Riley.

ANNOUCEMENTS: Bob Leonard stated that dues are now due and to pay Henry Davis. There will be a woodworking show at Expo on April 5-7. We will have our refinishing seminar at Foothills Crafts presented by David Duggan April 20th at 9:oo AM. The clipboard was passed around for members to sign up for the Lathe drawing. A reminder from Bob that Chuck Taylor has the refreshment duty for next week. We had four new people join the club they are Jim & Lin Kemp, Judy Babb and John Keiper joined tonight.

OLD BUSINESS: Bob stated that we had purchased 15 chairs with the money that was collected for that purpose.

NEW BUSINESS: Bob notified the members that we are in process of updating the Constitution and By-laws of the Tennessee Valley Woodworkers.

SHOW AND TELL: Don Powers brought in a turned vase. Phil Bishop showed us 1 of the supports he is making for a Granite Counter top. He carved, bandsawed and used the router on it. They are made out of Alder.

Tom Gillard Jr. showed us a sail boat tiller made out of salvaged teak. Jim Van Cleave told us about a museum in Winston Winston-North Carolina that had 30 rooms of period furniture. He brought in a large bowl and a bird feeder he made and another one that someone else made that was an example of how not to make a working bird feeder. Jim Parker brought in cherry legs that he made. He said he drew the legs out on 2 sides of a squared block of wood and than band sawed them. He than put in lathe and cut foot and than finished shaping with a rasp and spoke shave. Loyd Ackerman brought turned walnut bowls. Doyle Mc Connell brought in a goblet he made and finished with beeswax. He also brought in a picture frame that he made with an upturned angle. He had problems because of the upturn angle holding for gluing and finally used hot glue to put on temporary blocks that he could clamp. He used lacquer finish. Steve Shores made a jig for holding tools while sharpening. Billy Mays showed us a carved elephant out of Tupelo and he finished with Johnson floor wax. He also made a Dolphin out of basswood with a black walnut base. Ken Clark brought in a bandsaw box that he got out of Wood issue 51. He used cherry stain on it and floor wax. Chuck Tayor brought in a bowl he started at the turning " b" which was cherry with a lacquer finish and he also showed a natural edge bowl made out of Red Bud. Harold Hewgley brought in a chair, which was a copy of an antique. It was made out of Cherry and finished with Valspar Satin Black finish. He sprayed 4 light coats. Ken Gould made a lathe bench for his new lathe. He also did the black smith work on the Iron straps. It was cherry with 2 coats of cherry stain and 2 coats of Deft oil. Jim Kemp showed us a Myrtlewood pencil holder he had made.

MONTHLY DRAWING: We had our monthly drawing and the following people won Ray Cole honing blocks, Tom Mc Gill hearing protection, Tom Gillard maglite , Jim Roy long drill bits, and Gary Hoyle a maglite.

PROGRAM: Doyle McConnell introduced program guests who were Ray Hughes, Glenn Tatro, Mark Gomez and Doug Walston. All were from the Lenox company except Doug Walston who was from Precision Blade and Tool. Doug has supplies of band saw blade material from Lenox and can make any size bandsaw blade you might need. Glenn Tatro gave a presentation with slides on the different types of blades and their applications. He also handed out two catalogs which shows all the types of blades with the various pitches and gullets.

Selecting a saw blade involves it having the correct type of teeth for the job you wish to do. The Gullet is the space between the teeth where the wood chips go and the size they should be depends of the thickness of the wood. ¼ inch plywood you would use 6 teeth per inch, ¾" 4 teeth, and 2" 3 teeth per inch. Tooth and gullet have a direct proportion relationship. The Gullet depth is the distance from the tooth tip to the bottom of the gullet. The tooth pitch measurement is the distance from the tip of one tooth to the tip of the next tooth.

He talked about 4 different types of teeth. The standard tooth form that has evenly spaced teeth and deep gullets with 0-degree rake angle. The hook which he likes the best for wood because it is easier to push wood through and less likely to burn wood. The hook has evenly spaced teeth, wide gullets and a positive rake angle. The skip tooth has evenly spaced teeth, wide gullets and 0 degree rake angle. The variable positive tooth has variable tooth spacing, varying gullet depth and positive rake angle.

He talked about the set of the teeth, which is the bending of teeth to right or left to allow clearance of the back through the cut. The set is what causes the rough groves in your wood piece after cutting. When the set starts wearing that is what causes burns in the wood.

Another term he talked about was tooth rake angle which is the angle of the tooth face measured with respect to a line perpendicular to the cutting direction of the saw. Raker angle is what helps the wood to go straight as we are pushing it through the blade. The raker angle has a 3-tooth sequence, which is left, right, and straight and uniform set angle. The racker does not cut. In this configuration you have 33% of teeth not cutting and 66% are cutting. The Lenox set has 5 or 7-tooth arrangement, which the sequence is right, left, right, left and straight with a uniform set. There is 80% of teeth cutting in this arrangement. There is also an alternate set which every tooth is set in an alternating sequence with no raker teeth. It cuts faster, has no burning and less sanding. This type of blade is made for large furniture makers and will cut rougher.

There are 3 types of blades. Carbon Blades are the ones you see the most. It is heat treated Rockwell 64-66 and generally used for none metal applications. It will stand 550 degrees of heat. The number 32 wood blade is too big for using with 14-inch saws. You can get .025 thick blades for use with smaller saws.

Bi-metal Blades are the second type he talked about. They are of 2-piece construction with spring alloy steel used mostly for metal. They can take 1250 degrees of heat. He recommended the ¼ inch .025 thickness 6-tooth hook for wood.

The last type of blade is the Carbide Tipped Blade, which is of a 2-piece construction with spring alloy steel backing. Carbide inserts are welded to backing and they are a triple chip Ground tooth and the teeth have no set to them. Because of having no set the Carbide Tipped Blades cut much smoother. He estimates that they take about 75% less time to sand the work pieces. The 3/8 blade is .032 thick and should not be used on small saws but they also have a ½ inch blade at .025 that works well on the smaller saws.

He also talked about the importance of having your bandsaw set up correctly. Glenn said that tension on a saw blade should be about 30,000 psi but it is hard to measure and there are gauges available to do this. It is important to set up saw properly. When adjusting the tracking adjust tension first and than tracking and last the guilds. He did a quick demo of how to do this.

He talked about sawing fluids for woods of which there are two types. Bandade, which is for prevention of pitch and Wood pitch cleaner which, is for removal of pitch. Neither of these products will effect stain or finishing. Lenox had drawings for many saw blades and several handsaws. They also gave everyone a sample of both the sawing fluids.