Thread: bandsaw mill overheads

Jake, I operate both a 1500 vertical bandsaw and a Lucas mill. Your question about running costs for a bandsaw is hard to answer as there are many variables. One thing that does increase the cost is inexperience. A new chum will make a lot of expensive mistakes before things come good. Bandsaws are complex at the best of times, they require a well doctored blade and carefull adjustment. As for fuel cost, that depends on the timber and the engine horse power. When they are running sweet they are a joy. Getting them there is the tricky bit.

ta.

Jake

The operating costs are very variable. Fuel cost depends on how much sawing you are doing. Whilst that may be an obvious statement, take the case where you are working by yourself.

You will not be sawing all day long. You have to load the logs, you have to remove the timber from the log, you have to turn the log and you have to re-load the slabs for re-sawing, if you want building timbers. Along the way you will also sharpen the blade or at least change the blade (it probably lasts a tenth of the time of a tungsten tipped circular saw blade before sharpening is required. It also takes longer to sharpen.
You might persevere with a slightly blunt circular blade, although you shouldn't, whereas that is just not an option with a bandsaw.

I used to use about a tank of fuel a day when I was working by myself (8 litre tank I think it is).

I would expect that during the course of the day to sharpen a blade between five and ten times depending on the type and size of the timber being cut. I used to use my blades in batches of five so that tensioning of the blade to ride on the edge of the band wheel was similar. That also meant that I would sharpen five blades at a time. Nowadays because I only saw very casually and infrequently I keep just two blades and sharpen them more frequently.

Sharpening is done on a profiling machine. They are expensive with the manual machines being around $2000. You would have to check that figure as it is a guestimate. If you don't have your own profiler you will need multiple blades which you will have to have sharpened. I have no idea what that costs.

Bandsawing is a tricky business. Good luck.

Regards
Paul