I finally took the plunge and purchased the 1/2" Lennox Trimaster for my Laguna 1412. It's going to be a few days before I can use it, so wanted to get some advice on it. OK, I may regret not getting the 3/4, but the idea was that I'm happy with the resaw cut quality I get with my generic 1/2" 3 tpi steel blades, and so it's really a matter of improving blade life. Want to resaw veneer for some larger projects. With 1/2" I can at least see if using the blade for other operations I do with a 1/2" is practical and just leave it on for general use.
Anyway, my biggest question is tension. I've heard these need more tension, so how do I figure out when it's enough?
I have the Laguna 14bx and the resaw King 3/4 carbide blade. I installed and tensioned the blade based the Laguna instructions with one exception. On average, I have kept the tension at the next size down on the tension gauge. If there is flutter I'll apply more tension. If you have access, FineWoodworking magazine has at least one article that discusses this. Also, the podcasts "shoptalk live" and "wood talk" have covered this topic and those are free to listen to.
While I have a Grizzly 17" bandsaw, it is equipped with the Lenox ½" Trimaster Carbide Tipped blade. The blade is an excellent performer. I am sure you will be happy with this purchase.
I set my saw up following the guidance provided in the YouTube video "Band Saw Clinic with Alex Snodgrass", with the exception of removing the bandsaw table. My table is too big and heavy to remove. With the blade tuned as Mr. Snodgrass recommends, I get drift free true vertical cuts even if the upper blade guides are some distance from the wood. He addresses blade tension along with other aspects of bandsaw tuning.
I have a trimester on my 14 inch powermatic saw and it tensions easy it's only a half in wide.I don't really use mine for resawing I have a 20 inch Aggizani for that.
I do use it for cutting nasty exoctic wood.
It's a good blade a bit slow cutting for my liking but I think you'll be fine.
Almost forgot to mention I use the flutter method.But only on my 14 inch saw since the spring is iffy.
thanks for the input. I threw it on and tried it out today. My first thoughts were that this thing isn't exactly thin kerf and it creates as much dust as my table saw. ha. I had some 7" walnut to resaw, a nice easy task and was pretty good. A couple mistakes but I'm thinking-hoping-they were my fault. The cuts I didn't choke on were really clean, I don't think i've done better. I can see the possibility of escaping planing between cuts so that will offset the kerf. on the one-quarter I resawed I put it through the planer once. I guess if it lasts as long as at least 6 regular blades it's unquestionably a success.
A couple questions that are probably more for another thread but will ask here anyway.
1) on my Laguna 1412, for you experts, what's the maximum length you think I can resaw successfully and safely. Assuming I build outfeed/infeed tables. I bought some two-quarter 48" mahogany but wondering if it's really doable.
2) One hiccup I keep forgetting about and then run into fresh yet again-the throat plate recesses a little below the table and as I'm pushing the stock through for resaw, the leading end catches on the table and the whole the whole process comes to a halt and leaves a mark. How is this typically dealt with? Just skill, nudging the end up to clear the table or is there a best practice for fixing this?
If you are going to resaw longer items, don't assume you are going to build infeed/outfeed tables. Just do it, and as long as you can handle the pieces with a good fence, you should be able to resaw any length piece of wood that you have.
Several layers of masking tape should take care of shimming the throat plate. .... Jerry (in Tucson)
Got started with the blue tape shim-I actually had to use it to get the fence square in the past-and it taped over a tiny bump. Went to remove what I thought was a wood chip and behold, in the four tiny little holes around the corners there are four tiny screws that take next-to-smallest allen wrench. sigh. months of putting up with that because i missed it. glad it's fixed though.
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