Band output before sharpening vs hardpoint handsaw

[wills-mill]

I had a little think a few weeks back, about the actual cutting surface covered by the life of a bandmill blade before it dulls and needs changing. The £10 for a sharpen is a bit dearer than a new disposable hardpoint carpentry saw....

 

If you take a cut on the mill that creates one face of a 14in wide board 10ft long, that's 1680 square inches. That's the equivalent of 210 cuts across a piece of genuine 4x2 (and most 4x2 is undersize).

 

If your band lasts for 35 cuts like that, that's 58,800 square inches of cut surface, or 7350 cuts across a bit of 4x2!

 

Not bad going!

[agg221]

The hardpoint saw is probably 24" long - how long is your band, as it would be reasonable to factor the relative lengths in.

 

Ripping is harder than cross-cutting too, so if you reckoned on trying to rip 8' lengths of 4"x2" in half lengthways it would be equivalent to 306 lengths. My saw band is 8' long, so dividing by 4 gives me 76.5 lengths. I don't reckon I would get that out of a standard hardpoint saw, but I have probably had the equivalent out of my coarsest japanese saw which is 12" long so 38 lengths.

 

Alec