spring steel

[Noah Wagener]

hi,

I am attempting to make a saw for ripping logs called a maebiki lumberjocks.com/projects/60536 I bought some steel that was 1/32" thick as someone on another forum said that was the kerf of their Maebiki but i have come to find they are typically almost a tenth of an inch. The piece i bought was seven feet and i was wondering if i could laminate 2 halves of it to make one piece 1/16". Any thoughts?
Also, i have found some O1 tool steel that is roughly the size i am looking for. Are there places in metro areas (Minneapolis, MN specifically) that can harden and temper steel and if so where would i look in yellow pages? And why is steel so expensive? It seems to cost more than tools made of it.

thanks, noah

[Ken Luning]

I don't believe you will be able to successfully laminate two sheets of steel for what your wanting to do.
It would leave a void in the middle and due to expansion will eventually seperate as there is no real mechanical bond between the two halves.

I would do an internet search on saw blade steel to see if there is a supplier for this type of steel. I suspect that this type of steel is a specialty item.

[David Weaver]

No lamination. I would make sure you know you are going to use this maebiki noko-giri a lot, and that you're going to be successful because 1095 spring steel (the only thing you'll want) in that thickness (0.1) will cost you a mint. And if it is not a superb example, it will likely be immediately worth less than the cost of materials once you've made it. I don't know if the originals were tensioned, tapered or ground hollow, but these are things you will not be able to do well.

I personally, if I wanted to use one, would wait until one with patina (and not springing leaves of rust all over it) showed up on ebay without any broken teeth, take my lumps paying for it, and see if I could tolerate using it. The videos I've seen of them being used suggest that you will spend days using one to cut a few boards, even the vintage boards where people are using them out of necessity and not out of experimentation.

[Chris Vandiver]

No lamination. I would make sure you know you are going to use this maebiki noko-giri a lot, and that you're going to be successful because 1095 spring steel (the only thing you'll want) in that thickness (0.1) will cost you a mint. And if it is not a superb example, it will likely be immediately worth less than the cost of materials once you've made it. I don't know if the originals were tensioned, tapered or ground hollow, but these are things you will not be able to do well.

I personally, if I wanted to use one, would wait until one with patina (and not springing leaves of rust all over it) showed up on ebay without any broken teeth, take my lumps paying for it, and see if I could tolerate using it. The videos I've seen of them being used suggest that you will spend days using one to cut a few boards, even the vintage boards where people are using them out of necessity and not out of experimentation.

David is right, don't waste your time re-inventing the wheel, especially an inferior one. A vintage Maebiki is indeed hand forged, tempered and hollow ground(using a sen). It is also hammer tensioned. I believe there is a modern day blacksmith still making these saws in Japan. I believe he charges several hundred dollors for a small and basic maebiki. You could probably pick up a used one that was in usable condition, at a pretty good price if you keep your eyes peeled. Mostly they are of interest to collectors, for obvious reasons.

[ray hampton]

do you intend to use this saw in a saw pit ?

[Ryan Baker]

I admit that I know nothing about this type of saw, but I cannot fathom trying to rip logs with a blade a tenth of an inch thick. That just sounds like insanity, and completely unnecessary.

[george wilson]

I was going to advise you that 1/16" X 6'' to 7" wide large bandsaw blades can usually be had at sawmills that use bandsaws. They get damaged or to narrow to sharpen,but still just fine for your purposes,and are free for the asking. You could make your own saw from one of those. I still think you are incredibly BETTER OFF just buying a 1 man log saw off of Ebay. I have noticed a few,and even saw a Japanese log saw a while back on Ebay.

I would not go 1/10" thick. You will work VERY hard using such a thick saw because of the width of wood you will remove with it.

Even I would not want to try hardening and tempering a saw plate made of 01-or any other steel for that matter. It would require special facilities to do,or many years of saw making from SCRATCH using annealed steels.

[David Weaver]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y9L7IFWb-28

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c4o_z...eature=related

Historically interesting, but not something I'd want to do. If the saw wasn't specifically set up for the type of wood you were cutting, I can imagine it'd either be slow (if you used a saw set up for hardwoods on softwoods) or really grabby (setup and wood the other way around).

Last time someone brought this up, there were two relatively good looking saws on ebay, though. (and in fact, there is a big one supposedly made of white steel on there now - one that will need considerable attention to the teeth, but which is probably a better saw than you could ever make even with its age showing).

[David Weaver]

Tool steel is up in general lately, by the way.

If you see tools being sold for less than it costs you to buy spring steel, you'll have to guess that they generally are not made of steel of similar quality. You do not want to go to the trouble of making a saw on your own while using inferior goods..that's for sure.

[ray hampton]

I would check the yellow pages for tool& die shops or machine shops and ask them where they sent their steel to get it harder

[Zach Dillinger]

Tool steel is up in general lately, by the way.

If you see tools being sold for less than it costs you to buy spring steel, you'll have to guess that they generally are not made of steel of similar quality. You do not want to go to the trouble of making a saw on your own while using inferior goods..that's for sure.

That is a concern, but remember that many toolmakers buy in large quantities, so they can probably get a better price per unit that any of us can for the same material.

[David Weaver]

They can get a little bit better price, but unless they grind to size themselves, they are also buying precision ground stock. As rob lee would probably tell us, it's still expensive. It's just not a big enough market to warrant high volume low cost goods.

[george wilson]

I was also going to remind you(before we reached the word limit) that even if you sawed the planks out,it would be at the LEAST 1 year drying if they are 1" thick. I would also recommend SEVERAL MONTHS more drying time INSIDE a heated shop.

You could work at a job and make money to buy wood faster than you can hand saw up the logs. The whole idea is impractical. It is the sort of idea that young men get into their heads,and I was no exception,that is just much more trouble than it is worth.

[David Posey]

Part of the reason David is saying you only want to use 1095 is because you wouldn't have to do any heat treating to it. It already comes at the desired hardness. If you did need it heat treated, not just anyone could do it. It would be very difficult not to warp it.

[David Weaver]

Right, it's prehardened, it's tough, and it's at a good hardness for durability but can still be filed. You can get unlucky with it sometimes and get some that's really at the upper end and really hard on files, but I think all of the good quality saws now are made of it.

Maybe a decent large saw could be made out of 1080, I don't know where that actually ends up in carbon content when all's said and done, but the old disstons I've seen sampled ended up with 0.7-0.8% carbon.