Bandsaw blades

[lynx]

Whats the word on the street these days, who's hot and who's not?

[jfc]

Glad you asked cause i'm having real problems with my record ones wandering .

[paulm]

Dragon Saws on 01443 819910 [e-mail] are the ones I use, get through a lot of blades on my startrite resawing logs and turning blanks.

Have used duredge too and they are good also but don't have their details to hand.

Cheers, Paul.

[Scrit]

DureEdge
21 Station Road
Woodley
Stockport
SK6 1HN
Tel : [phone]
Fax : [phone]

Scrit

[lynx]

Scrit, Number Unavailable

[cuttingsolutions]

You pay yer money and make yer choice.
Haven't dealt in bandsaws for a long while but one of the best used to be Starrett. May well be what Dragon are using.

There is a brand called Lennox, which are dogs whatsits but their prices used to be very high, though I know they gave their dealers whopping discounts
I could check out the prices if desired...let me know the sizes.

Dave

[wadkin1]

Hello Cutting Solutions.

I take it you are involved in the tooling industry?

Re; Lennox i have heard similar word regards their quality but have never tried sourcing them or used them, it would good to hear of other peoples experiences.

I do currently buy from Dragon bi metal vari pitchs and without doubt they are extremely good both regards quality of product and customer service is second to none.

Prior to using their products i was using some starret gladiators, i cut a lot of exotics ebonies, and rosewoods and i would say the starret had a slight edge over dragons products when it came to holding their edge. However i can purchase almost 2 dragon blades to 1 starret and when you use a lot, i have so far found it to be the best choice to go with the dragon product.

I am always interested to here of potential new suppliers so if you are toying with the idea of stocking the lennox blades let me know. The band on my old wadkin is 15'6"

Cheers Andy

[Scrit]

wadkin1 said:

Re; Lennox i have heard similar word regards their quality but have never tried sourcing them or used them, it would good to hear of other peoples experiences.

The Lenox Trimaster TCT bandsaw blades are indeed the dogs dangly bits for resawing, however the downside is that they require a substantial bandsaw to tension them adequately (they are a very heavy bodied blade) and the range of sizes is limited. I'm particularly keen on the Trimaster III 2 to 3 tpi vari-pitch hook tooth for ripping hard timbers - cuts like butter and the variable pitch reduces harmonics and delivers a brilliant cut, however it is only available in 1in and wider and really requires something like a 600mm saw to be able to tension it. There are a few people on here and over at UKWS who've taken my recommendation and bought them and they all seem to agree with me about the blades. The biggest downside is that these blades aren't cheap - you'll potentially be paying £80 to £120 for one - the upside is that they last, and last, and last......

And I can get you a blade from my distributor if you want one.

Scrit

[wadkin1]

Hello Scrit

Never chatted before, thats very good of you, i use a wadkin bursgreen bzb, it is just a big lump of cast. The bands are 15'6" i replaced the springs with some heavier die ones when i purchased it as it was the only way of achieving close to the tensions required for the starret powerband gladitors. Do you know the gauge and resulting kerfs on the resaw blades you mention? I looked through a few overseas posts and almost everyone sings their praises. My only concern is the kerf as mention was made regards this, i normally run powerband gladitors 34x1.10 have a kerf of less than 1.5mm until i started using the dragon bands with a similar resulting kerf, this is as much as i like going up the extractor.

I am very keen to give them a try would it pay to go down to a 1" to keep the kerf smaller.

I do on occasion cut quite a bit of cocobolo which clogs the gullets like you would not believe, do you ever cut any oily timber yourself and how does it fair clearing.

I will say i have seen various posts by yourself, were you a wadkin salesman in a former life?

Thank you for the advice.

Andy

[Scrit]

wadkin1 said:

I use a Wadkin Bursgreen BZB, it is just a big lump of cast. The bands are 15'6"

I know the machine well:



It's what my Bursgreen MZC wants to be when it grows up! ;D (for anyone not in the know the MZF/MFC bandsaws started life in the late 1940s as Bursgreen designs, the BZB was introduced around the time of the Wadkin take-over of Sagar, Bursgreen's parent firm, the BZB is fundamentally a larger, heavier version of the MZF)

The 1in Trimaster III has a body thickness of .035in (.89mm) and comes in 2/3tpi and 3/4tpi variable pitch as well as 4tpi skip tooth form. The 1-14in blade has a body thickness of .042in (1.07mm) and is available in 1.5/2.3, 2/3, 3/4tpi variable pitch and 3 tpi skip tooth. Lenox recommend a minimum of 25,000 psi tension for the Trimaster III for maximum life and straightness of cut. These blades will cut at lower tensions it's just that the cut won't be as straight and the life will be shorter. Those figures are, incidentally for accurate veneer slicing although how you set them up without a gauge I don't know. I've been happy with the 1in blade as it has a kerf of around 1.2mm

There's a review of the TCT blades here if you are interested

wadkin1 said:

I will say i have seen various posts by yourself, were you a Wadkin salesman in a former life?

No, not at all. If anything I favour Robinson, Sagar and White! (depending on the machine) I do have to say, though, that Wadkin very much led the industry in the UK from the late 1920s (first to introduce a full range of electrically powered machines, early adopter of many safety features, first to introduce high speed spindles into moulders, first in the UK with a high speed frequency motor pin router, etc.) until well into the 1950s when they took over the other innovators, Bursgreen, by the simple expedient of buying their famous parent company, Sagar of Halifax. Again in the 1950s Bursgreen were the innovators making modern concepts such as sheet metal framed machines with cast iron tops, low-cost "lightweight "machines (e.g. the Wadkin AGS saw), etc. to the market. I think the problem was, though, that Wadkin had become complacent by the late 1960s/early 1970s and took their eye off the ball to allow the Italians into their markets both in the USA and the UK, so much so that by the early 1980s they were visibly in decline (I visited Green Lane in 1983 and was suprised about how much empty space there was, possibkly as a result of the sell-off of their machine tools division). They were finally killed off as a result of the ill-judged and ill-fated Thomas Robinson Group debacle. A sad end to a once fine company.

Scrit

[Scrit]

lynx said:

Scrit, Number Unavailable

Sorry about that. That's the number in my Rolodex....... The other number I have is:

0161 430 2647

Scrit

[wadkin1]

Thats the baby would not be parted from it now having used a lot of so called industrial bandsaws over the years.

Is there a good time to give you a call tomorrow i would be keen to give the blade a go. I have tried most other things over the years. Its very good of you to offer obtaining one for me. I had brief look around various forums earlier and some people mention the Lennox CT woodmaster, i believe the finish is not quite as good but the kerf is tighter and the gullets bigger. Have you tried this one?

I gave up on a local company for bands many years ago, if they do not stock it they do not want to know about it.

Always interested to here some machinery history, the machine in question came via Dalton's which i must confess had some very impressive kit there when i last visited. As i heard the story Wadkins were something of a bully boy in the industry taking over and adapting designs and absorbing lots of smaller companies along the way. I take the point regards their innovation though, testament to them being found the world over both then and now.

Its just a job to fit it all in. I would love one of their EKAs

[Scrit]

wadkin1 said:

As I heard the story Wadkins were something of a bully boy in the industry taking over and adapting designs and absorbing lots of smaller companies along the way. I take the point regards their innovation though, testament to them being found the world over both then and now.

Wadkin's best move was to buy out Sagar of Halifax in 1956, a move which gave then the then innovative firm of Bursgreen. At a stroke Wadkin became the largest and most productive of the British manufacturers easily eclipsing the other big players, Thomas Robinson (Rochdale) and White's of Paisley (part of the Coates textile group). Wadkin shut down Sagar at Halifax fairly quickly and a few Sagar designs were transferred to Bursgreen at Houghton-le-Spring in Co. Durham (e.g. the UO range of thicknessers), but very few designs survived simply because Wadkin's range mirrored a lot of what Sagar made (although in some areas it wasn't as good). I reckon that the Bursgreen drawing office had been very busy before the take-over simply because of the volume of new machine designs which appeared around that time or just after. Wadkin quickly shut down Halifax and the last of the Sagar machines seem to have been made there around 1959 or 1960 (again if anyone knows better please contact me). Apart from the moulders, which were always a Leicester product, many of the more modern and lighter designs came out of Bursgreen at Durham and Colne (Trawden). In fact the business expanded with a new bandsaw at Scarborough in the 1970s and the take-over of Evenwood, a maker of lightweight woodworking machines in Cleveland in the same period. All the while Robinson, White, Wilsons of Leeds and Pickles of Hebden Bridge were in decline. their export markets were slipping away and in the main they had few modern designs to offer. Pickles was bought by Broadbent Machine Tools in the early 1970s and asset stripped. The rest would have only a few years to wait....

That brings us up to the Rudd (Thomas Robinson Group) era. What happened was that Robinson's, by then a real sunset business, was bought out at a time when their assets were long written down (mainly a huge site in Rochdale) and their order book was fairly empty. It was then used as a springboard to raise money for other acquisitions by dint of "selling off the silver" (Robinson's had a world-renowned flour milling division at the time - sold to the Japanese), then using this financial clout to buy Wadkin. After that TRG asset stripped Robinson's (selling the site which is now an industrial estate) before embarking on a buying spree which saw them take over almost everyone else left standing: Dominion, Fell, Ryburn, Calder Woodworking Machinery (dealer and producer of integrated sawmill lines), Brookman, etc. As firms were taken over products were "rationalised" and production was centralised in the main Wadkin factories. In reality one of the few designs to survive this process was the BCC spindle moulder, originally a Dominion design later sold as a Wadkin. The firms they didn't get included Wilson Brothers (in terminal decline), Startrite (part of the then ailing 600 Group - sold off to Record), Sedgwick (who reputedly refused to sell out), Cooksley (already gone), Multico (who subsequently folded in the early 1990s), White (down to a rapidly diminishing wide belt sander firm building Timesaver sanders at Cleckheaton by the late 1980s) and Stennor of Tiverton. OK, so there were a few others like Dodds and Modern, but they were hardly significant.

But the writing was on the wall. Wadkin appear by the 1990s to have acquired a senior management team who knew next to nothing about the industry (a common complaint from Wadkin insiders at the time). They'd sold off the machine tools division at Leicester, yet insufficient money was going in developing the types of products required - CNC point-to-point routers, automated lines, 4-sided moulders, etc. All the while they were still trying to produce a full range of "classic" machines where other firms in other countries had already decided that survival was down to producing one type of specialist machine to survive, e.g. Vertongen in Belgium who specialised in CNC single-end tenoners (and are still around) - and the Italians had decimated their traditional export markets in places like the USA. Something had to give. And in 1991 they went under. Insolvency practitioners stripped the business selling off Trawden (pin and CNC routers), Scarborough (bandsaws), Cleveland (sheet metal pressings, etc) and Houghton-le-Spring (Bursgrenn main factory). That last one may not have the best idea, but the reasoning may have had something to do with the presence of the Mazak "cubes" at Leicester and the huge expense of relocating them. In any event they massively reduced the range of products, lost their range of CNC routers for a while and seemed to falter, so it was no surprise when they went under a second time at the beginning of the millenium. They then lost Green Lane in Leicester and ended up at Coalville - and for a while Dalton's in Nottingham held a controlling interest. Of course they've gone bump again more recently.

Personally I think their days as a major player are long gone. Which is a pity, really, because in their jeyday they made a lot of world class machines.

Scrit

[lynx]

Thanks for the number.

Just ordered a 'RIPPER' blade from Dragon blades, so lets see if it's up to it's name

[jfc]

Ive just ordered from Dragon aswell , very very helpfull people . Lets hope the blades are as good as their customer service

[lynx]

What yah getting??

[nickw]

lynx said:

Just ordered a 'RIPPER' blade from Dragon blades, so lets see if it's up to it's name

I've been vary happy with mine. In fact you can see it 'in action' on page 55 of this month's (April) Goood Woodworking (seeing as it looks like no-one is going to notice my article unless I push it under their noses ;D )

[jfc]

Dunno ;D A 5/8 3 skip to try on my tenons they didnt call it a special name

[tigerturnings]

I think I have one of their RIPPERs too - it's about 1.3TPI and almost as wide as the saw can handle. I've always been impressed with it... gives a fast deep rip in damp wood on an 18" Jet saw.

[Scrit]

tigerturnings said:

I think I have one of their RIPPERs too - it's about 1.3TPI and almost as wide as the saw can handle. I've always been impressed with it... gives a fast deep rip in damp wood on an 18" Jet saw.

To set the record straight-ish on this one, the "Ripper" blade is actually manufactured by Dakin-Flathers in Pontefract, so it's not exclusive to Dragon. The same manufacturer also produce a blade called "Extra Set" (or their reference F3) which is handy for contour cutting. The technical reference sheets detailing their range are here

The biggest difference between firms is probably less the quality of the blade stock (although some stuff is dire), but more the quality of the welds. Cheap, mass produced welds are lumpen things which always tick whilst the machine is running whilst a properly bevelled and lapped join is much, much smoother. That, however, takes time - and time costs money - so there's no such thing as a good, cheap band saw blade......

Scrit

[jfc]

Ahhhhhh ticking , yup my record blades do that ! In fact i think they have Tourette's ;D Dragon have sold me a blade for £14 to do what i want and then once i have thier blade they can help more as they know what thier tooling does . I never mentiond a price they sold me a blade that will do the job i want it to do and to be honest they where more interested in helping with the bandsaw than selling me something .

[jfc]

Well i got mine in the post today and WOW What a differance it makes !!!!!! Perfect cut every time

[onlyme]

scrit said:

To set the record straight-ish on this one, the "Ripper" blade is actually manufactured by Dakin-Flathers in Pontefract, so it's not exclusive to Dragon. The same manufacturer also produce a blade called "Extra Set" (or their reference F3) which is handy for contour cutting. The technical reference sheets detailing their range are here

The biggest difference between firms is probably less the quality of the blade stock (although some stuff is dire), but more the quality of the welds. Cheap, mass produced welds are lumpen things which always tick whilst the machine is running whilst a properly bevelled and lapped join is much, much smoother. That, however, takes time - and time costs money - so there's no such thing as a good, cheap band saw blade......

Scrit

Hi Scrit - Just to put the record a little straighter
We haven't sold the Dakin-Flathers Ripper for a long time as we found a better blade with almost the same specifications but in the tests that we done it out performed the Dakin blade all the time and the feedback from the customers (which is the most important thing) tells us the same as well.
As you've mentioned this blade or the Dakin blade is not exclusive to us but not many other companies will weld them to the sizes that we do as they are generally only available in stock sizes for a couple of machines that they were originally designed for. We don't buy them already welded, we buy them in coils of 250' so that we can weld them to any length.

jfc said:

Dunno ;D A 5/8 3 skip to try on my tenons they didnt call it a special name

Jason - if it makes you happy, we can call your blade 'The Terminator' ;D I hope that this is a butch enough name for you - there might be a slight problem with copyright but not to worry

Good to hear that the blade is cutting ok for you though and that you are happy with it ;D

The email address that Paul listed is wrong as well - correct email address is [e-mail]

Ian (Dragon Saws)

[jfc]

Hi Ian ,
Yup , i am seriously happy with the blade , thanks for all your help and i shall be giving you a call very soon with a bigger order .
It was as i thought a problem with the Record blades . I fitted a new one the day i spoke to you and that started to wander alot after about ten small cuts . I did nothing to the bandsaw other than put in a Dragon blade and it has done perfect cuts on over 100 tenons in the last few days and shows no sign of wanting to wander .

[onlyme]

jfc said:

Hi Ian ,
Yup , i am seriously happy with the blade , thanks for all your help and i shall be giving you a call very soon with a bigger order .
It was as i thought a problem with the Record blades . I fitted a new one the day i spoke to you and that started to wander alot after about ten small cuts . I did nothing to the bandsaw other than put in a Dragon blade and it has done perfect cuts on over 100 tenons in the last few days and shows no sign of wanting to wander .

;D I didn't realise that it was you on the phone - I'm not in the office much so don't get to take that many phone calls (prefer being in the workshop than office!) - Must have had my polite head on that day

Ian