Resaw King experience

[Susumu Mori]

Hi all,

I wonder if you could share your experience with RK blades. I have a 1-inch blade. It cuts very clean with thin kerf.
I love it,,,, most of the time.

The issue I have is, when I resaw poplar and maple with more than 10-inch width, it builds pitch quickly and it burns the wood. Actually, it still cuts and the burn mark to the wood is not that bad (a vertical brown streak in every few inches). However, I get a pile of brown saw dusts and burning smell make me feel uneasy.

The blade has almost no set. It has 3 TPI. I can see the clearance of the chips would be a potential issue.
However, I read "it cuts like butter" often. Yes, it cuts like butter as long as the stock is narrow.
As the width of the boards exceed 8-10 inches, mine starts to choke.

What I want to know is,

> Is it what we expect from this blade?
> It should perform better? Does your cut (resaw) 10-inch board like butter?
> Am I cutting too slow or fast (I get brown saw dust no matter what the feed speed it seems).
> I have used it about a year with not-so-heavy use, but maybe the time to re-sharpen(I remember the pitch was not building this fast in the beginning)?
> Something wrong with my bandsaw (FB510)?

Your experience with RK would be much appreciated here.

[Max Neu]

I have a couple of RK's for my 24" Laguna,I don't use them.They make very nice cut's for a bandsaw,almost like glass.The reason I don't like them is because they cut way too slow for my liking,I don't have that kind of patience.I prefer to just use a 1/2" 3 TPI,over cut a little bit,then run them through the widebelt.If you are cutting some really expensive exotic wood and wanted maximum yield,then I think they would be more beneficial.That is just my opinion of them,I am sure you will get others as well.

[glenn bradley]

Like Max, in wider stock I go to a 2-3 vari tooth blade; wider kerf but, the chips get easily cleared and the feed rate can be increased. At the same rate that finer set blades will allow, the quality is not that far off. I talked with Torben at a show about 10 years ago. He demonstrated the RK on one of his saws with some 10" stock. His feed rate was about 1" every 2 seconds or so; quite slow. This was in some birds-eye maple and at that feed rate the cut was very clean with no burning.

[David Ragan]

I run a 1 1/4" RK on a MM-16.

While I am not a professional user, and has been some time since I have resawed anything, the RK has worked better for me (smoother surface) than any other brands, and I tried a few.

YEs, the burning smell would make me nervous. You are talking central DC, right? Maybe go with something more peripheral, shop vac till you get it figured out.

[Jeff Duncan]

Good blades that feed too slowly for me as well. The smell is just the burning maple, not a big deal…..except…..it means there's excessive heat building up which is not good for your carbide tips. If you keep running it like that it will dull the carbide.

good luck,
JeffD

[peter gagliardi]

Sounds like the gullets are filling and packing before exit on cut, and blade speed is too high. You will not be able to overcome basic design deficiency for that width, even if you could slow the blade. Time to find a blade designed for your application.

[Susumu Mori]

Thank you all for the feedback.

I burned poplar once and then it started to burn frequently. I have to clean it each time after resawing a wide board. I guess I dulled the carbides, based on what I hear from you.

RK has a wonderfully thin kerf and smooth surface, but I wonder if its small sets are prone to clogging.
Maybe it is a good time for me to test a blade with wider sets.

I would appreciate any suggestions for alternative resaw blades here.

thanks,

[Andrew Hughes]

My take on the Resaw King is its a good blade for resawing very dry expensive boards,Highly figured Claro walnut would be one.Since the blades have no set if you get into woods that have too much moisture or pitch,they can dull fast.
Dont get me wrong I'm not dirting the Rk its a good blade I haven't bought one for a couple years now.So I'm mostly going from memory.

[Wade Lippman]

I used to have a 3/4". It was marvelous; did 10" stock with no burning. Maybe it is your saw. I don't do enough resawing to justify the price with my new BS.

Of course, I have never seen any pitch on maple from anything. I thought it was just a feature of softwoods.

[ian maybury]

I don't have experience of the RK, but some thoughts based on other blades.

+1 that it's possible that the gullets are filling on the RK once it reaches a certain depth of cut - it doesn't seem to have a whole lot of gullet volume. The FB 510 is probably running the blade quite fast (as all larger bandsaws will tend to do), which may make it more prone to heating in that situation. It probably also has the power to accept a heavy feed without straining. A lighter saw running less blade tension might well run into drift problems once the gullets start to clog, but the heavy saw could be masking the effect.

Wonder if perhaps heating is contributing to the resin issue?

I'm guessing S that some combination of slower feeding and regular blade cleaning (a right PIA) may be your best bet. Either that or a blade with a deeper gullet….?

While no doubt some cope better than others, it's clear that pitch/resin (judging by its effect on table saw blades) can be a real problem. It's hard to predict or deal with. I've had cheap but not obviously resinous eastern 18mm plywood which caused a subtle build up of brown/yellow resin (or maybe degraded adhesive?) on the teeth of even a freshly sharpened universal blade - leading after only a few panel cuts to a noticeable increase in the feed force, more tear out, and a need to frequently clean the blade. It wasn't a heavy coating, and was quite soft - it washed off so easily with an oven cleaner (not reckoned to be good for blade coatings) or degreaser that it's hard to think that it can have such an effect.

I've not had it happen on a bandsaw blade, but regular washing may be the only way out if the wood is that way inclined. Wonder if there's any preventive treatment that works, maybe one of the spray on dry PTFE coatings? (could be a bit of a gimmick)

I guess that bandsaw blade designers like everybody else have to balance requirements, and the RK may sacrifice a little speed/depth of cut and ability to handle less than favourable woods in favour of delivering a fine surface finish. The Woodmaster CT has a much deeper gullet and a 1.5tpi pitch, but may not be so smooth cutting.

Minimal set is probably another requirement for a smooth cut. Tipped teeth can be ground so that the side of the tooth 'planes' the cut surface, and are probably (with the precision brought by grinding) the main reason why this type of blade gives such a good finish. The price may be that there's little room for surplus sawdust to escape once the gullet is filled - a steel blade with a heavy set probably 'leaks' a lot more.

[Scott T Smith]

I run 1-1/4" RK's to make sawn veneer on a dedicated horizontal resaw with no problems resawing up to 16" wide. A slow feedrate is important though because the gullets on the RK's are fairly small, so there is not much room for sawdust storage during the cut.

The only time that I encounter burning is in the last cut, if the blade exits the cut in any locations. Other than that it is a great band.

[John Coloccia]

I wood never say it cuts "like butter". It uses a heavy feed pressure and ssllloooow feed rate. I WOULD say it "cuts like glass", though. I usually can't tell if a piece came straight off the saw or my planer.

Now the Woodslicer blade cuts like butter, but it dulls quickly.

[Davis Young]

I find 3 or 2-3 tpi to be too many for large format resawing. The Lenox Woodmaster CT I use has 1.3 tpi and it doesn't slow down my feed rate at all. Finish is quite good. Also with fewer teeth it is less expensive. Downside is a wider kerf, about .01" compared to the Resaw King.

[john lawson]

My experience is buy a Lenox Trimaster carbide blade. I know, I know, they cost a lot. And even they will wear out faster than you want to admit, but the resaw king I had wore out very quickly.

[ian maybury]

I guess that ultimately it may be a case of matching blades to requirements - that there's a definite trade off between quality of finish and permissible feed speed once the depth of cut starts to get near the limit of the ability of the blade gullets to clear the sawdust as suggested above.

Wonder if the variable pitch of the Trimaster might bring some advantage in terms of avoiding vibrations that might spoil the finish with fixed pitch blades?