Thread: Learn Me About Saws

I have the carcass pair and am very happy with them. Quality saws, a pleasure to use.

Any of the Veritas saws would be a good start, imo. Try to work out what thicknesses of material you'll be cutting, and select tooth pitches accordingly. The recommendations for number of teeth that should be cutting at any point varies a bit, but for a novice, I recommend at least 5 or 6 - e.g., if you have a 6 tpi saw, don't try cutting anything thinner than an inch with it. This is just a rule of thumb, and once you become reasonably adept with saws, you can get away with fewer teeth cutting, without having the saw constantly catching.

Once you get to around 15 tpi, it really doesn't matter if they are crosscut or rip pattern, you will notice only minor differences in the way they perform, and probably no difference in speed of cut. A fine-toothed rip pattern will cut very well across the grain when sharp& set correctly. Crosscut saws of equivalent pitch tend to wobble a bit more when ripping, because of the tooth pattern and usually a slightly coarser set. Rip pattern teeth are far easier to sharpen, so some people recommend sticking with that pattern for finer teeth.

There is a reason to keep the number of teeth cutting to the minimum end of the scale when using any saw - the saw cuts faster. My take is that this is partly because there is more even pressure on the few teeth in contact with the wood (no hand- sharpening is perfect, not even mine! ) and partly because larger gullets hold the waste until it can be ejected when the tooth exits. The corollary is that the teeth wear a little faster, but regular light touch-ups are the solution, & the best way to keep a saw cutting nicely...

I feel there has been a trend towards overly-fine teeth for backsaws, & I'm on a mission to 'correct' that. Fine teeth leave a slightly better surface, but cut slower, especially on wider cuts. I think they are also popular because a poor sharpening job on fine teeth is much less obvious than with coarser teeth (I learnt that early in my hand saw career!). But remember that for 99% of saw cuts, the surface finish is immaterial - you are going to hide it inside a joint, or, in the few cases where it is critical, shoot it clean & square with your expensive new shooting plane, so who cares? The main thing is to have a saw that will cut quickly, & track true, which enable you to cut as close as possible to your scribe line, eliminating or minimising clean-up afterwards.

As to push or pull, I reckon it doesn't really matter much which way you go, there are pros & cons for each, and it's a personal choice. Just choose one type and stick with it until you feel competent. I tried pull saws too late in life, I think, and I just could not get comfy with them. I did try, honest! My only 'reasonable' objection to Japanese saws is that is they are too difficult to sharpen (i.e. the ones that are not impulse-hardened & therefore impossible). I don't like owning any tool I can't sharpen properly myself (ok, ok, I have carbide-tipped circular saw blades -there always has to be an exception! ).

Hand saws are just like any other tool, they require a bit of practice to get the best out of them & a bit of proper maintenance to keep them working properly, but I have to say they are among the most essential tools in my shed - there are very few jobs that don't involve a hand saw or three.....

Cheers,

On the subject of saws...What is the value or purpose of the shark tooth saw, is it just to get a smoother end cut? How are they sharpened? sorry to hijack.

You could sign up to this saw making course and make your own!
https://www.woodworkforums.com/f152/1...th-nov-177153/

Originally Posted by hiroller

You could sign up to this saw making course and make your own!
https://www.woodworkforums.com/f152/1...th-nov-177153/

Originally Posted by hiroller

You could sign up to this saw making course and make your own!
https://www.woodworkforums.com/f152/1...th-nov-177153/

If I was in Melbourne I would & if someone runs one up here in Sydney I will try to get there.
In the meantime I think I will get the Veritas saw pack that Carbatec have on sale at the moment. It has the small crosscut, 20TPI dovetail & the 12TPI rip carcass saws for $229.
I think that these will be suitable for the work I intend to do.

I got the set of Veritas saws & now need to get a larger ripsaw for cutting stock down to thinner boards for box making etc. I have these two saws from the old tools that belonged to my wife's late father & grandfather. The larger one is a Spear & Jackson, sharpened cross cut. The small one has no branding & looks like it was attacked with a file by a drunken blind man. Both are 7TPI.
Would it be worthwhile getting the S & J resharpened to a ripsaw or should I just get a new one? Cutting edge saws in Kirrawee have Lynx brand saws for around $85, are these a reasonable quality saw? Any other suggestions are also welcome.


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If it was me I would get a saw file and have a go at sharpening them my self. Honestly it's not that hard and even if you buy a new one eventually you will need it sharpened. Plenty of resources on the net on how to do it.

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There is nothing sacred about tooth sizes or patterns, so if you don't need or want a crosscut saw, just re-sharpen the larger one with a rip pattern by decreasing the rake to around 5-7 degrees, and filing straight across. As code4pay says, it's not that challenging, once you get down to it. The nice little panel saw is well-used, but I reckon this size could be very useful to you as a crosscut saw for small jobs like box making. I'd reduce the pitch to 8 or 10 tpi, though, which will be better for cutting thinner pieces...

Cheers,

It can be worth going with a modern, cheap saw while you get more towards understanding what you want from a nice, older saw.

I posted a while back about spending a saturday morning traversing the local hardwares - ostensibly on a file survey - but noticing the handsaws also.
Bunnings I think topped out at $20 pretty much, and some of those you could certainly get your money's worth from.
Homesy came here I now remember with a pretty decent modern S&J ... maybe $35??? That's on here too, somewhere.

(Rip)saws of the 70s (say) are almost a penny a piece when you can find them ... the handles aren't good but the metal will be ok and ripsaw filing is dead easy if you aren't changing the pitch, or the rake too much.

I still say an 8pt or 10pt ripsaw will crosscut whatever you like pretty much, but a modern Irwin with japanese-ish teeth can be pretty magic too.

The beauty of setting up your own saw is that when you know what you like you can get just exactly that.

Cheers,
Paul