Bandsaw

[chuckbolton]

Re: Bandsaw

dont get in a hurry- i bought mine at a farm sale for $35-- its a sears 12 inch and came with 8 other blades-- none of which were small enough for what i needed so had to buy one of those also-- about $15. my dad had given me a small table top sears band saw and it simply wont do the job for me-- and most of what i carve is in 2 inch stock. and it wouldnt even hardly start on 3 inch stuff.-- get a good bigger saw--

[cats pa]

Re: Bandsaw

It says it is a bandsaw/sander...any clues as to what that means?

Hey, girl.

Some bandsaw mfgr's offer(ed) narrow sanding belts that can be installed around the wheels in place of the blade - not as common as they used to be, since now they want to sell you a separate belt sander too.

I had one once, before I got the Blue Star, and found a couple of drawbacks. 1) You have to be careful when tensioning it up, as a belt will fail long before the tension you'd expect to put on a blade. 2) Since you're standing to the side of the saw, when you apply the workpiece, the belt tends to flex away from you, which can be tolerated in some sanding tasks but not in others. This could be improved by installing a solid vertical platen for the back of the belt to run against (which would have to be removed to do any sawing), or by tensioning the belt more tightly (but see #1).

If it was your only power sander, it could do some work for you, but when you found an affordable stand-alone sander, you'd buy it and keep a blade on the bandsaw.

The above comments are based solely on my experience with the one I had, and somewhere out there, somebody has probly overcome the issues and is merrily sanding away. I just don't know about it.

Parker, speaking only for himself...

[TreeWizard]

Re: Bandsaw

I bought a Jet 12" for just over $200. It has cut everything I needed. It will take up to a 1/2" blade and the only thing I haven't been able to do successfully is rip pieces over 6" thick, but I don't carve anything that large anyway.

[Ron T]

Re: Bandsaw

I just made a deal for a Ryobi scroll sa, one year old, in the box, for $45, on craigslist. There's another one, newer for $25, but it's too far away. The gas would cost me $50.

I'll pick it up Sunday.

I missed a bandsaw yesterday for $25. Old and used but for my infrequent use it would have been okay.