I have a mastercraft band saw but it just seems way too fast for steel. I bought a new blade for it but I don't want to put it on till I can slow it down a bit. I picked up a router speed controller from harbour freight yesterday hoping I could slow it down but it didn't work for the saw. Does anyone else use this saw to cut steel?
you won't be able to cut steel unless you can slow down the blade.if your saw has a drive pulley you can swap in a step pulley top and bottom.good luck.
Thanks I fugured that. The drive pulley is already small and there is no room for step pulley and this saw is probably not worth the effort. Welcome to the forum.
There is one other solution... you can use what is called a "friction band". This is a blade that is designed to operate at very high speeds... like up to 20,000 feet per minute. These blades are only available in a couple of sizes. They cut with the heat generated by the friction rather than the actual teeth. They work particularly well for thin guage stainless steel. 16-1914 3/4"W 14tpi .032"T Friction Band 16-2510 1"W 10tpi .035"T Friction Band If you want more info on these... PM me your email address and blade length.
In order to run the friction style blades, you need quite a large bandsaw... usually 20" dia wheels or larger and speeds of 8000+ sf/min and the capacity to take 3/4" or 1" wide blades. For a small saw... you would be best to pick up a 64-1/2" Horizontal/Vertical Saw. These run slow enough to take the 64-1/2" X 1/2" X 10-14 tooth blades that are very common and will cut a wide range of materials. Regardless of the saw you choose... you are going to need a speed range in the neighbourhood of 50-300 sf/min
I may end up at harbor freight this Sat and their 64-1/2" Horizontal/Vertical Saw is on sale so hmm... who knows. I could solve my problem.
Problem solved. I made it out to harbor freight yesterday and picked up a new toy. Here it is. [/IMG] [/IMG] Hopefully in a couple hours I can try it out. I have a couple blades that are ready to be cut out.
I just finished using it an man it works better than my hacksaw. Lol. Definately worth the money. Now I can even cut square tubing easier.
I dont have very much room either but one thing I like about it is that it is not huge. I can use it for smaller stuff when its against the wall and if I have large stuff it is easy to move to where I need it.
Great looking saw!... And when challenged with space... I see it comes with wheels on one side so you can grab the other side to easily reposition!
Boy would i love to have a saw like that. It would be great for everything from roughing blanks and cutting tubing for my own gringer attatchments, to splitting blocks into rough scales. I have lots of blocks i could get two sets of scales out of on a band, but the table saw kerf takes so much I lose a set. Too bad i am nowhere remotely close to a HF.
