One of those Doh:smack: moments when it all becomes clear. I never know whether to kick myself for not thinking straight, or hug myself for finally figuring it out. :haha:

@ Glatt,

It's the boatbuilder in you...

Yup.

nice

Check out the bandsaw of the gods.

I had good luck with these...

Was that saw's nickname "Linda Lovelace"?

Most often it was referred to as, "Who the Fucking DoAll Last".

Have seen this?

https://woodgears.ca/bandmill/bandsaw.html

That's the guy whose plans I'm mostly following.

I recognize that guy from somewhere.

I've posted videos of him before.

His most awesome one is the wasp sucking machine.

Riiiiight...

He's all "Here, hold my Epi-Pen and watch this!"

What could *possibly* go wrong?

I went to YouTube and checked his channel. I remember him from both the wasp sucking machine (reckon they make those for Gravdigrs?:D), and the better mousetrap videos.

Clever guy.

I had a mutant colossal wasp nest in the foundation of my house. I set up the shop vac and had it running for a few hours and they still kept coming in droves. After sucking up a coffee can full of wasps I just spray foamed them in.

They're still alive.

and now they're cozy

I've been crazy busy lately, but took Friday 6/24 off to meet a stamp dealer to sell some stamps, and then was leading a weekend Scout camping trip starting that afternoon so had to pack. But taking the entire day off, I had the morning free. Perfect to putter around a little and make some band saw progress.

I wanted to tackle this one part again.
Attachment 57190
Last time I worked on this, I had machined this part out of solid maple. It wound up being too small because I had built my frame thicker than the plans called for. So I need to adjust the plans. This time, I don't have enough large pieces of maple this size, so I'm going to use plywood for the backing and make a couple smaller parts to glue to the plywood. I annotate the originals plans with measurements to account for the actual thickness, and draw out the little pieces I'm going to make.
Attachment 57191

Turns out I'm directional challenged or something, because I cut the 35 degree bevel on the post on the wrong side even after eyeballing everything a half dozen times. I can flip it around and still use it, but that messes up the dimensions a little. So I had to modify the plans for the clamping block again to compensate for that mistake. I think it won't really matter, but I may wind up trying to make these particular parts a third time. Ugh.
Attachment 57192

Here they are clamped up to dry.
Attachment 57193

And the corners on the frame are supposed to be eased. Not sure it serves a function other than to look aesthetically pleasing, but I do it. I clamped the frame to the bench and cut the corners with a hand saw.
Attachment 57194

Corners cut.
Attachment 57195

I wanted to secure the motor in the bracket I made. I was kicking ideas around in my head, and decided to try drilling and cutting a huge hose clamp. It worked, but I only had time to do one side of the motor.
Attachment 57196

And after meeting with the stamp guy for a couple hours, I rushed back home, took a shower, packed, and then met the troop of 14 boys and 4 dads to lead them out into the woods to this nice hike in campsite along the Potomac River and C&O Canal.
Attachment 57197

With those hose clamps, the current total is about $240 and if you include a saw blade, that's about $260. It's fair to include a saw blade because if you buy a saw new, it will have a blade.

This thread : priceless

word

The more times you make a part the better you'll be prepared to start mass production. :D

I had the evening free last night, but this weather just sucks all the motivation right out of me. I walked down into the shop and looked at stuff, and thought about it a little bit, and then went to watch tv and do computer file maintenance. It wasn't even hot in the shop, I was just wiped out from the walk home from the metro.

It's the first time I haven't had any motivation to work on this when there has been time. *shrug*

I feel you

Shit, glatt, this is supposed to be a fun project, it's crazy to make it work when you're not into it.

Yeah, this is your break from the real world. Take a breath or two.

7/10/16 I spent an hour or so Sunday afternoon wiring up the motor to a power cord, and clamping it to the frame. Tried to align everything the best I could and put a blade on.

Attachment 57338

This saw still lacks blade guides and an enclosure, but I figured I would stand on the other side of the shop and plug the thing in to see what it does.

It works! And it's not too loud either. Doesn't vibrate much at all just sitting on top of a milk crate.

I came closer and shot a video. The microphone in the phone camera makes it seem louder than it actually was.



I wondered how it might cut, but it would be really stupid of me to try cutting anything when there is no table to support the work piece, and there are no blade guides to keep the blade from falling off the wheels, and no enclosure to capture a blade that falls off a spinning wheel.

So I tried it anyway, but put on a face mask first. :dunce:




It works!

I learned a few things.

Saw dust builds up on the lower wheel tire fairly quickly. The enclosure may help with that.

The belt is currently rubbing slightly on the frame near the motor. I need to try to lower the motor or cut a notch out of the frame. Or move the wheels further out away from the frame.

The blade speed is a little slow. Based on the number of turns of the motor's pulley for each turn of the wheel, and the wheel's diameter, I find that the blade speed is about 954 FPM. It should be about 3,000 FPM for cutting wood. So I need to get a bigger pulley for the motor shaft. Maybe I will make one. I think the slow speed is partially responsible for the sawdust buildup on the tire.

Attachment 57339

The dust builds up quickly on all bandsaws because half of the dust is falling on the wheel side of the blade. Dust collection is the best idea. Drill a 2-1/4" (I think that's a shop vac size) hole in your housing and stick a vac hose in there.

If the wheels are co-planar, free of twist, and properly tensioned the blade will track w/o bearing or guides. Not to say you don't need them but the blade isn't riding on them.

Your belt is vibrating, that will add noise and may make the saw vibrate, making cutting less pleasurable and possibly less accurate. Try tightening it.

What sort of table will you make?

You inspired me to get my bandsaw tuned up. It's run like shit ever since I got it ten years ago. I got out Duginske's book and went over the whole thing. Turned out my wheels were not in the same vertical plane, were twisted, the tires were crap, and the stand was flexing.

I got the wheels squared away, put new urethane tires on it, replaced the so-called thrust bearings and replaced the metal block with cool blocks, bolted the metal stand to a plywood base with wheels and replaced the belt with a power twist belt I had laying around. It runs great now, so thanks for the inspiration!

I'm looking forward to the table being installed.

getting close now....

It's been almost a month since I did anything with this project. The big problem is that my shop was a mess. Literally not a single empty flat surface to work on in the entire shop. My son loves to work in the shop, but he just doesn't clean up after himself. The big problem is that he doesn't have any designated space that is his, so his stuff doesn't have a home and just sits around.

So I spent about 45 minutes on Sunday July 24th, just cleaning up the shop and putting stuff away. I eventually got both the table saw and work bench cleared off.

Then I spent another 45 minutes actually working on the saw. I'm focusing on the blade guides now. I cut the notch on the blade guide arm. The upper blade guide will mount in that notch.
Attachment 57436
And then I started cutting up the parts for the blade guides. I'll still need to drill holes in them and mount bearings, but this is the basic configuration they will have.
Attachment 57437
That dark colored wood in the front is bocote, an exotic tropical hardwood. The plans call for it by name, and I actually had some because my brother gave me a box of exotic wood samples years ago. It sat unused until now because the samples are so small, they are fairly useless.
Anyway, bocote is called for because it has a high oil content or something and is very slippery. Great for coming into contact with the running blade to keep it on track.

Cool brother glatt.





My work bench is completely covered with crap right now.

Cool Brother Glatt should be his username. Has a nice ring to it.

Cool Brother Glatt.:cool:

I made some forward progress over the weekend.

Saturday 7/30/16 : I got 2.5 hours of work in.

I was focused on making the upper blade guide. The plans call for the blade guide bearing to touch the back of the saw blade with its round surface. I wanted to mount the bearing so it would contact the rear of the saw blade with its side on the flat surface. So I needed to rework the bearings and think about how it would all go together. The plans were little help here.

I started by spreading everything out, including the plans, and looking at it all and taking measurements. I basically emptied a bunch of different fasteners on the table to see what I had that might work.
Attachment 57471

I started focusing my thoughts and came up with the following components that I would use.
Attachment 57472

I didn't get a picture of this step, but I took a hex head bolt and filed the hex head round, and then used a hacksaw to cut a screwdriver slot into the head. The original hex head was too large and would block the potential path of the band saw blade. I filed it round to make it smaller.

Attachment 57473

Then I took a look at the bolts that would hold the bocote blade guide blocks to the backer block, and saw that they were all too long. So I made a little jig to hold them so I could cut them all to the same length. I used the calipers to have them stick out of the maple block a consistent amount, and I cut them off flush with the maple block.
Attachment 57477

Then I drove them a couple turns deeper into the block so the cut end would stick out a little bit, and I filed the cut smooth.
Attachment 57475

Meanwhile, I prepared these backer blocks for the t-nuts by drilling holes, including 3/4 inch counter sink holes and and little holes for the prongs that hold the t-nuts in place. I also drilled two holes in the center for the drywall screws that will hold this backer block to the even larger block that will mount this thing to the guide block arm.
Attachment 57476

The next day, Sunday 7/31/16, I spent another 2.5 hours working on this.

I started with a first for me. I actually found that a Dremel tool was the exact tool I needed to do the job. That never happens. I used a carbide carving tip to smooth out the holes I had drilled on the drill press. A chisel would have been better if the part was bigger, but with this tiny thing, a Dremel was best. A file or rasp would have been great, but mine were all too big to fit in the hole.
Attachment 57478

This is the blade guides assembled to see how they fit. Pretty nice looking. I'm happy with them.
Attachment 57479

And here, I've used the two drywall screws to mount them to the larger block. I failed to take a picture of drilling the long hole for the bolt that holds the bearing. I also tapped that hole with the threading tool as deep as it would reach. About an inch. And then I took another bolt with the same threads and drove it down into the hole, in and out with the impact driver and basically burned the rest of the threads into the maple block. The friction was so great that smoke was coming out of the other end of the hole.
Attachment 57480

The bearing can be moved forward and backward by turning that bolt head with a screwdriver. It is supported in the rear with a nut you can't see in the picture. And the side blade guides can be moved in and out to just touch the sides of the blade.

And I didn't get a picture of this, but I drilled a long notch in the side of the big block in the back so it can slide forward and backward as the blade tracking is adjusted.

I drilled a hole in the support arm to hold a carriage bolt that goes through that notch. Normally with pine, you can just tighten a carriage bolt and crush a hole in the pine with the square part of the bolt head. But with hard maple, I cut a square with a 1/4 inch chisel around the hole.
Attachment 57485

And this is the whole thing assembled. You turn that black knob on the side and it loosens the carriage bolt so the entire blade guide assembly can slide forward by as much as an inch.
Attachment 57482
other views:
Attachment 57486
Attachment 57487

Nice

Very tidy

I get that a lot too.

I like the bolt customization, you and I seem to be cut from the same cloth.

The whole guide assembly looks so clean and elegant, really nice work.

Since you are all about bolt customization I'll share a trick I learned. Take a spare bolt (or even the one you intend to use) and with either a dremel fitted with a cut-off disc, or the corner of a true and flat grinding wheel, Cut three or four grooves along the length of the bolt a bit deeper than the thread depth. The grooes should be more or less evenly spaced, e.g. 12:00, 3:00, 6:00. 9:00. Now you have a crude but effective tap. It will cut wood and chase metal threads.

I actually tried this, but the dremel wasn't doing a good job cutting the threads, so I just gave up on it. I need better cutoff wheel attachments for it, I think.

Why am I not surprised you already knew that trick?

If your hardware store has a welding section you can find cutoff wheels for angle grinders that are very thin, 1/8" maybe. I find dremel tools are great in theory but lack the fortitude needed to get the job done. A Foredom tool would be ideal but $$$.

A triangular file could work given time and patience.

The impact driver was fun though. Brute force. And that bolt got HOT. It was no exaggeration to say smoke was pouring out the other end of the hole . I backed it out and drove it forward again. Over and over. Made quite a racket in the house.

I'm having a hard time finding the words to use without it sounding like I'm going for an obvious double entendre. How do you describe ramming a bolt into a tight hole back and forth so hard that smoke comes out without sounding like a perv?

In that case, the perviest description possible is advised.

And appreciated.

Tell us slowly... Yeah... That's right.... Oh... Yeah.....

more lube!

bears repeating.

It all blurs together. I was working on a bunch of different stuff in the shop late last week and on the weekend. I'd guess I spent about 6-8 total hours working on the band saw on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

I looked through the pictures I took and am presenting them out of chronological order at times in order to make things seem more clear. Grouping different tasks together, even though I did them in fits and starts as I waited for glue to dry and performed other tasks.

I had completed the upper blade guide arm last time, and needed to attach it to the frame. It's critical to get the alignment correct. There is adjustment up and down with the arm, and forward and backward, but no adjustment side to side, other than the possibility of shimming in the future.

So let's start with putting a blade on the saw, tightening it up, and marking where the blade is on the frame. I placed a long straightedge directly under the blade and marked a line on the frame.
Attachment 57564

Next, I wanted to see exactly where the blade guide should be mounted. So I held the blade guide against the frame and lined up the saw blade location pencil line with the spot on the bearing where I wanted the blade to track. then I drew a second pencil line at the edge of the blade guide arm. This is where I would cut the notch, and it was critical that it be in the correct location.
Attachment 57565

Then I needed to mark how deep into the frame I needed to cut the notch. This wasn't critical from the blade guide point of view, because the blade guide was adjustable in that direction, but the clamp that will hold the blade guide arm will only fit if the arm is a certain depth. So I mark that spot and set the saw to the correct depth.
Attachment 57566

This is the frame with the blade location pencil line showing on both the upper and lower parts of the frame, and the blade guide arm notch's width and depth marked on the upper part.
Attachment 57567

I decided I wanted to run the hand held circular saw on a track to keep the cut nice and straight. So I made a track and screwed it to the frame.
Attachment 57568

Then I cut the notch out by running the saw back and forth on the track but shifting the saw away from the fence an eight of ah inch or so each time. The stupid saw tilted a little bit to the right when I was hanging it over the edge of the track a little bit. Partly my fault, but it's also a cheap saw that doesn't have the flattest base. So you can see on the picture below that the notch is perfectly flat on the edge where the saw was against the fence, but a little bit sloppy in the depth. I may have to fix this by cutting deeper until it really is flat, and then gluing a block in there to get it back up to the correct depth. You can see that I also drove a bolt into the frame that will hold the bracket that clamps the blade guide arm in place.
Attachment 57569

So I put that bracket on and tightened the knob I bought to see how well the arm would clamp in place. Even with the sloppy cut I mentioned before, it is rock solid and aligned extremely well. Woot!
Attachment 57570

The blade guide slides up and down beautifully and clamps rock solid in perfect alignment with the blade. I'm loving this!
Attachment 57571

I'm calling the upper blade guide done. It works.

So now I need to focus on the lower blade guide. It requires a big hunk of hardwood that will support the blade guide and also the tilting brackets that will carry the weight of the work table and whatever work the saw is cutting.

Only problem is, I am out of wood. Fortunately, we have new neighbors around the corner who just moved from two houses into this one they just bought. And they keep throwing away furniture. I snagged a beautiful maple double bed from them. It was too big with its head board and foot board to actually use as a bed (although it was nice enough) so I started cutting it up into lumber scraps.
Attachment 57572

It's a well constructed bed frame. None of that cheap Ikea crap. Solid maple.
Attachment 57573

The slats are beautiful, and while they are small, they might come in handy.
Attachment 57574

You can't glue up finished wood. The glue won't stick. So I had to scrape off the finish before I could glue these up. I noticed that the plans call for a threaded t-nut to be inserted in the finished block, and I see that the bed already has t-nuts in them so they can be knocked down and moved. I decided to use the scrap wood so the existing t-nut gets glued up in exactly the correct location.
Attachment 57575

I put blue tape over the end of the t-nut I plan to use because it needs to be free of glue, made sure it was in the correct spot, and then glued the scraps together.
Attachment 57576

Here they are clamped together.
Attachment 57577

And this is the drawing I am trying to copy. See how that t-nut is in teh exact spot it should be?
Attachment 57578

Here, I've cut the block up to match the needed shape.
Attachment 57579

It looks perfect, but the damn thing doesn't fit! The wheel is in the way. This makes it too close to the blade. By like an inch, maybe two. WTF?
Attachment 57580

I feel like I am going to need to cut a notch in it for the wheel. But first I double check my pile of printed drawings to see if one shows the back side. I'll be damned. It's supposed to have a notch.
Attachment 57581

The plans say a rough notch, hogged out on the table saw is fine. Works for me.
Attachment 57582

And now it fits. Perfectly. Awesome. This is gonna work.
Attachment 57583

So cool. Thanks for taking the time to keep us updated!

What Feet said.

It's the kind of thread I would enjoy reading. And also, by keeping you guys updated, it keeps me motivated to continue having progress to show you. It's kind of amazing that I've spent 6 months on this already. It's coming together, but there is still a lot left to do. My goal of finishing in 2016 is realistic, but I could easily miss my goal if I slow down.

This is a fascinating read. Love it!

Thanks. Hope to have more to post soon.

Glatt, not to be giving you ideas or anything, but, the September 2016 issue of Popular Mechanics has an article (an extremely short article) on how to turn a blender into a spindle sander.