Thread: Progressive pitch/rake handsaws

Originally Posted by FenceFurniture

Chippy, sorry old boy, I reverted to the term "fleam" inadvertently! What I meant was "slope", achieved by that third axis movement of the file as described above.

ah, no worries mate

Originally Posted by pmcgee

Doh ... I keep forgetting!

Sawsets.

What sawset do you guys use?

I think the Eclipse type is pretty cheap and easy to obtain.

RARE BRASS ECLIPSE SAW SET #77 ENGLAND | eBay

RARE SOMEX #250 JAPAN SAW SET | eBay

And maybe?? CS has talked about the Stanley 42X ? (I could be wrong, but might explain the price)

STANLEY NO. 42X Saw Set | eBay

Paul (you can guess which I have )

the eclipse type work, actually they all work really, not i have used every saw set so maybe some dont as well, the eclipse like that brass one you pointed out they made (perhaps still do make them, i am not sure) for years after, just not in brass, they are anodised metal or something now, i have seen them (think i owned some too) in blue or a brass colour (diff colour might denote different hammer size for diff size teeth, i am not sure as i havnt looked at them in a long while)..pretty sure if you keep your eyes peeled at flea markets and such you would come across a much better example of that old brass one though (they are quite common), i wouldnt buy that one pictured on ebay, its too raggerdty for me, if it was in better nick you would see numbers around that circular anvil (i got one of them too), if its that worn around that, then it may have a worn plunger/hammer too which you dont want, better off buying one new or keeping your eyes open for a better example

i have disston sets as well, but i usually use the stanely sets like that one you pointed out (its mainly just the grip that i like, they mostly all work in the same way, i guess), for very small teeth though (e.g dove saws) even though its meant to work fine as is, i have one of those (42x) that i ground down the hammer so its thinner (i keep another without ground down hammer for slightly larger teeth and i have other sets for larger teeth again), just makes it easier for the very small teeth, but if you did that then you would prolly need to buy two which can be pricey by the looks of it!

chippy

Hey Chips, you're going to get RSI in your typing finger at this rate (or bring on a case in mine!)

Originally Posted by ch!ppy

interestingly its the angle of slope that generally isnt employed by people that make and sell saws today .......

Yeah, well, probably 'cos it's not easy to get right. I've got to the stage where I can handle most of the angles required for saws, semi-competently, but when I try for 'slope' in smaller teeth, I end up with fat cows on one side & store cattle on t'other. Keeping both slope & bevel angles absolutely constant when switching sides & directions has so far eluded me! The saws still cut well enough, it just bugs me that they aren't perfect. Not sure if my technique is to blame, or just lack of skill/practise. I need an afternoon with someone like yourself, to get me on the right path (plus a few more hundred saws to file ).

In any case, not sure how necessary slope is on teeth in the 12-15 tpi range, when the other factors like selecting a suitable tpi for the width of the cut, & sharpnesss of teeth are looked-to....?

Originally Posted by ch!ppy

......he removes the saw every few strokes to clear the teeth on the saw..he didnt say but the reason is of course is that the saw teeth, once blocked with saw dust no longer cut effectively.....

.....he could significantly reduce that tedious habit he has of removing the saw every few strokes and brushing away the dust from the teeth with his fingers if he used sloping gullets, or more ppi (or tpi depending on which country your from), or using the full length of the saw when he cuts, or using a longer saw (which i think is is a key point noways when so many ppl are cutting reasonably thick stock to standards of artistry to be seen, that in the past DT where considered just a joint and largely out of sight)..using more tpi isnt really an option for him or people doing fine work in the material that seems to be chosen nowadays because they want the smoother finish but some of the other options are .......

Strewth! that would drive me crazy! I think there are two possible causes for his 'tedious habit'. He may have been cutting a very resinous wood (like slash pine, for e.g.) that doesn't clear itself well no matter what tpi you go for. However, it's quite likely that he was simply using too fine a tpi, as you suggest. I've been rambling on about this business of favouring too fine a pitch for some time, myself. I think the rush to fine teeth is partly to get a smoother cut, as you say, and also because they are easier for inexperienced people to handle. And when you begin to try your hand at saw sharpening, a poor job on fine teeth isn't as disasterous as it is on larger teeth (DAMHIK! ).

WRT the second point, I agree with you that far too much fuss is expended on "show" dovetails. (Though we are probably all guilty of showing off a bit at times... ). You should be able to cut perfectly serviceable joints that you aren't ashamed to let another woodie see, with a "sensible" saw, provided it is sharpened and used properly, I reckon. I like to tell the story of the old cabinetmaker (served his time in the 1920's) who 'coached' me when I was starting out. He saw me weilding a chisel on some tails, one day, & asked me what on earth I thought I was doing!? I said I was just making them fit properly, to which he exploded "Whaddya mean, 'making them fit properly '? Just saw the bl**dy tails straight, mark out the sockets accurately, cut to the line, & they'll bl**dy-well fit properly!" So I followed his 'advice', and after a while, I could usually get my dovetails to go together tightly, right off the saw (unless I'm showing someone else how make 'good' d/ts, of course!). But to illustrate the point, here are some dovetails on a drawer I glued up yesterday. These were sawn, waste chiselled out, & tapped together at glue-up, without any further mucking about. The first shot is of the raw dovetails after glue-up & the second a close-up after cleaning up with a few swipes of a plane. They ain't perfect, but no saw marks are visible, and certainly good enough for all but the most critical inspection (which they are unlikely to get, being at the back of the drawer! )

They were cut with my workhorse 15 tpi d/t saw, which I think gives a good combination of speed with a satisfactorily smooth cut and good sawdust clearance in the sorts of woods I use for standard drawer sides, etc. (But maybe not in thicker, oily woods, as mentioned). If I regularly cut wider than say 20mm, I would probably favour a coarser pitch.

Originally Posted by ch!ppy

...... i like to file some rip saws with rake that goes the other way to the norm, straight 90 deg is common and 8 or so deg back is common too (its easy to start but laborious ripping) but i like an aggressive cut on some of my rip saws......

P'raps it's my technique, again, but I can't get on with anything less than 5 degrees (negative) rake on my 5 tpi 'Spearior'. I inadvertanly let it creep up to near-vertical through careless sharpening, at one stage, but it got far too bitey & rough in dry hardwood, for me. Could it be that you are mostly cutting a lot of construction type wood, which generally has higher moisture content, rather than the bone-dry hardwoods I usually tackle? Or am I just getting old & tired?

Cheers,

Ch!ppy beat me to answering your saw set query, Paul.

"Rare" 77 and Somax is a bit of a chuckle - both are still being made. You can commonly pick up a decent old Eclipse (brass body) for around the $10 mark. These are what I use, and (p'raps in my ignorance!), I am quite happy with the results they give.....

Chips, the blue Somax has the finer 'hammer' for setting finer teeth.

Just to reiterate what has been said eslewhere. It's a common urban myth that the numbers on the anvils of saw sets relate to the number of tpi. This is not true - they are there as a reference, and MAY match how you like to set your teeth in some cases, but that is more coincidence than intention.

Theoretically, a saw is set to a proportion of its plate thickness, so it is obvious that the teeth of a saw with a thick 0.040" plate needs to be pushed over more compared to the same sized tooth on a 0.030" plate. There is also enormous variation in how much set we like on a saw, which is influenced by experience and the wood we mostly cut (wetter, more fibrous woods require more set, etc.).

Cheers,

Originally Posted by IanW

Just to reiterate what has been said eslewhere. It's a common urban myth that the numbers on the anvils of saw sets relate to the number of tpi. This is not true - they are there as a reference, and MAY match how you like to set your teeth in some cases, but that is more coincidence than intention.

Especially with the blue Somax which uses the same numbered anvil as the other one (can't remember its colour)
Cheers,
Jim

Originally Posted by IanW

Hey Chips, you're going to get RSI in your typing finger at this rate (or bring on a case in mine!)

hehe i got a way around that, i change finger every now and again.

it must be an interesting topic (to me), i didnt expect i would ramble on so much about something so trivial, before this thread i didnt give it much thought at all, just sharpened the saws because i got no bloody choice , dam things dont work otherwise lol

Originally Posted by IanW

Yeah, well, probably 'cos it's not easy to get right. I've got to the stage where I can handle most of the angles required for saws, semi-competently, but when I try for 'slope' in smaller teeth, I end up with fat cows on one side & store cattle on t'other. ....

cows and store cattle, cracks me up, i gona have to use that phrase one day, love it!

Originally Posted by IanW

In any case, not sure how necessary slope is on teeth in the 12-15 tpi range, when the other factors like selecting a suitable tpi for the width of the cut, & sharpnesss of teeth are looked-to....?

if it (method) aint broke and all that...those DT in the pic are the proof, a bit of a clean up of the fury edges (end grain) and i could sell that, the customer would be very happy.. they have a different look to machine made DT too which i like

true about choosing the right tpi, with saws being so cheap now (second hand) then its pretty easy to have a range of saws, although one can get by with just a few and do a good job..could be an expensive exercise if wanting each saw to be a new fancy shiny thing though (not that i got anything against pretty saws, they look nice but dont work any better most of time than an old grey haired saw)

Originally Posted by IanW

Strewth! that would drive me crazy! I think there are two possible causes for his 'tedious habit'. He may have been cutting a very resinous wood (like slash pine, for e.g.) that doesn't clear itself well no matter what tpi you go for. However, it's quite likely that he was simply using too fine a tpi, as you suggest. I've been rambling on about this business of favouring too fine a pitch for some time, myself. I think the rush to fine teeth is partly to get a smoother cut, as you say, and also because they are easier for inexperienced people to handle. And when you begin to try your hand at saw sharpening, a poor job on fine teeth isn't as disasterous as it is on larger teeth (DAMHIK! ).

WRT the second point, I agree with you that far too much fuss is expended on "show" dovetails. (Though we are probably all guilty of showing off a bit at times... ). You should be able to cut perfectly serviceable joints that you aren't ashamed to let another woodie see, with a "sensible" saw, provided it is sharpened and used properly, I reckon. I like to tell the story of the old cabinetmaker (served his time in the 1920's) who 'coached' me when I was starting out. He saw me weilding a chisel on some tails, one day, & asked me what on earth I thought I was doing!? I said I was just making them fit properly, to which he exploded "Whaddya mean, 'making them fit properly '? Just saw the bl**dy tails straight, mark out the sockets accurately, cut to the line, & they'll bl**dy-well fit properly!" So I followed his 'advice', and after a while, I could usually get my dovetails to go together tightly, right off the saw (unless I'm showing someone else how make 'good' d/ts, of course!).

hehe, he sounds just like me, i have said the same thing almost word for word, thats the good thing about people and apprentices, they are all a little different which keeps things interesting, some will take to it like a duck to water, some might show no fear but be ruff as guts and need to learn some finn-es, others are too worried about mucking up and take too long or take a long way round to make a nice finish, so you give them some licence to stuff up..my usual practice though is to show someone a method, say ''take your time'' (within reason), ''the speed will come naturally, later on''

stories are good, they take you back, maybe its just what happens when you get old haha...i learnt some things from different ppl, my ol boss of course and some other carpenters, joiners and cabies, and i remember my trade school teacher, my boss didnt have much respect for trade school teachers, he always worried that they might teach me a way that was too slow (hey, he wanted to make money, like everyone else), my ol boss was always one for not wanting to teach everything before he thought it was necessary though, "plenty of time for that" he would say, "just get good at this first" he would repeat, i would hound him for the next thing almost daily, so i used to have great fun and amusement playing him off against what the trade school teachers would say (he hated them lol), i would tell him they said this was the best way he would get so p**ed off he would drop tools or hang back after work and go into great detail showing me the ''right way'' haha

one of my trade school teachers i liked though, even though he gave me a hard time, i gave it right back though rotten bugger would never give 100% even though it was perfect (joint, theory or whatever), even in a math exam once i got 99% but when i looked through i couldnt find one single thing wrong, i fronted him and said hey wheres my 100%, he looked all through the paper again and could not find anything to pick, but handed it back and said ,no-one gets a 100%...some years later i met him out in the trade (teaching was temp change of pace for him) world and we became mates, he used to say nice things about me as a student, it used to make me feel kinda good

Originally Posted by IanW

But to illustrate the point, here are some dovetails on a drawer I glued up yesterday. These were sawn, waste chiselled out, & tapped together at glue-up, without any further mucking about. The first shot is of the raw dovetails after glue-up & the second a close-up after cleaning up with a few swipes of a plane. They ain't perfect, but no saw marks are visible, and certainly good enough for all but the most critical inspection (which they are unlikely to get, being at the back of the drawer! )

yeah, again, they look nice, i can say with honesty, great fit, nice even angles, nothing worse but its pretty common that the angles dont end up the same, average ppl (customers) dont always notice but they stand out to ppl that make them quite a lot

Originally Posted by IanW

They were cut with my workhorse 15 tpi d/t saw, which I think gives a good combination of speed with a satisfactorily smooth cut and good sawdust clearance in the sorts of woods I use for standard drawer sides, etc. (But maybe not in thicker, oily woods, as mentioned). If I regularly cut wider than say 20mm, I would probably favour a coarser pitch.



P'raps it's my technique, again, but I can't get on with anything less than 5 degrees (negative) rake on my 5 tpi 'Spearior'. I inadvertanly let it creep up to near-vertical through careless sharpening, at one stage, but it got far too bitey & rough in dry hardwood, for me. Could it be that you are mostly cutting a lot of construction type wood, which generally has higher moisture content, rather than the bone-dry hardwoods I usually tackle? Or am I just getting old & tired?

Cheers,

moisture content is whole other topic, i was trying to think and condense it but it can be a big topic, think i would get RSI with that, even hardwood has relatively good moisture content though, about the same as softwoods when they come from the mills, some old reclaimed timber can seem drier though, some construction timber if it has been exposed to rain and such can take on extra moisture, i like to cover timber thats exposed on site with plastic immediately to try and keep the MC stable, second fix timber i get indoors asp, furniture grade timber can seem a little dry but usually its about the same in australia from the mills, i think overseas they dry it to a lower MC for freight reasons but it would take on more depending on its environment that it ends up in...it can be a tricky thing and there is a lot science to it but to keep it really simple i often put barrels and buckets of water in my factory i had for furniture and also in my home workshop...the MC of the timber and whats in the air finds an equilibrium, trouble is whats in the air changes with the seasons and your location, hot weather can hold more moisture (as odd as that sounds) and cold wet winter weather less, in theroy you should try and raise the humidity in winter and lower it in summer but in reality it doesnt work out like that, i find here in Adelaide in the very hot summer there isnt much moisture in the air so placing water in the workshops keeps the timber more stable but if the humidity was higher i would remove the water from the room, sometimes i would bring in the water in winter also but it has little effect unless you raise the room temp..so if i was a banana bender i would treat the timber differently to what i do here in crow eater land..

that didn't really answer your question though, but yeah a lot of times the ripping would be in a first fix capacity where i like forward rake (positive i think it is) but not exclusively, in a second fix capacity i dont mind either as i clean up with a plane if need be and the cut is quick, for furniture ripping then i probably only use 90deg rake but that is often because thats what the saw happens to have, i look at it like this, when ripping larger timber sections, say first fix construction or red gum or whatever, its not really an easy thing, it takes a bit of arm work eh, so i like to get through it as quick as possible so i just, hmm, rip into it preferably with an aggressive tooth (positive) forward rake, otherwise its out with the power saws, with smaller lengths and perhaps thinner material its not hard work at all so i don't mind if it takes extra effort, 0 deg rake does the job, i'm not so keen when i use neg rake because i notice the difference more and it can annoy me a bit, but filing by hand can easily introduce some small variances so i dont get too hung up on it, it may well be a deg or so back, i only use my eye but it looks 90 deg to me, its a good reason to flip the saw around and sharpen every second tooth from the other side, even if its a rip saw, makes it more balanced because of slight variance naturally introduced by hand filing


dam, it got long again

chippy

Hi Chippy,

The positive rake question for rip saws always raises eyebrows, there was a book by Holly, (The art of saw filing) where he argued for the increased efficiency of positive rake, and he's right of course, and most circular power saw blades and bandsaws are positive rake, but ( for handsaws) the extra effort required to push the saw through the cut usually means it's better (as in less effort to push) to have zero (90 degrees) or negative a bit.

And as Ian says, it depends a bit on the timber as well.

Regards
Ray

I think there is another terminology issue here.

In saws where the 'standard' rake is to be upright or leant back towards the heel, positive rank is a degree of leaning backwards, so negative rake is a degree of leaning forward (and cutting more aggressively).

The circular saw picture seems to be different ... I was trying to figure out a description recently. Without looking up another source, what I think is the story is that a tooth leaning forward from the vertical - making a more aggressive cut - is called positive rake. Which means that leaning back would be a negative rake.

(I was reading something that was suggesting that in the two cases of a table saw where the work moves and the blade is stationary vs a RAS where the work is still and the blade moves, that a positive rake is best for one and a negative for the other. Not sure which way round.)

Confusing

Paul.

Hi Paul,

It's just convention, nothing more, postive rake is leaning forward more aggressive cutting.. negative rake is what we use mostly on handsaws.

Here's a pdf by Joel Moskovitch, (?sp) with a bit of nomenclature that might dispell some confusion

The only time I've heard of negative rake on circular saw blades is for special aluminium or some other metal cutting blades.. but no reason why not I guess..


Regards
Ray

First - RayG thanks for the pdf!

Scondly, I'm happy to agree that naming convention makes consistent engineering sense ... but ...
in the world of sharpening (western) saws, where most teeth will lie upright or backwards, I haven't come across any reference to a 'normal' degree of rake as being a negative rake. That was what was so jarring to me when I read the article about the motor-driven saws ... really disturbed the grey matter.

I'm not sure either of these is exactly what I was reading, but the same ideas:
Saw Blade Rake: Negative or Positive?
https://www.woodworkforums.com/f11/po...-blades-16669/

Thanks,
Paul.

Can I also point out that RayG has an excellent document on saw terminology here:

Nomenclature

...

and can I also (cheekily) point out that I think it describes rake in the (implied) +ve = leaning back approach.

Cheers,
Paul.

Originally Posted by planemaker

Wonderful saws Ian. Interesting you mention your Blue Somax. Since I have been using mine I have had nothing but problems. The metal on the anvil disk looks like its far too soft to withstand the pressure as the hammer pushes against each saw tooth. V indentations in the metal of the anvil making fine set near impossible. I will need to look at either replacing the disc with something much harder, or file the hammer to suit on my old Stanley 42x and use that.

Stewie.

https://www.woodworkforums.com/f152/c...k-saws-136606/

Good discussion in the above 2011 thread re: blue somax saw set, amount of set and taper grinding backsaws.

Originally Posted by pmcgee

.....and can I also (cheekily) point out that I think it describes rake in the (implied) +ve = leaning back approach.

I can't see the words 'positive' or 'negative' used in Ray's diagram, Paul.

I think this is one more of those situations where logic has to take a back seat to common usage. All my life so far, I have heard the terms used as most people use them. While one usually denotes angles in a clockwise direction as '+' and anti-clockwise as '-', in this case, the 'positive' and 'negative' refer to the cutting ability (i.e., if the tooth bites into the cut ('positive action) or leans away from it ('negative action), rather than the angle per se. And let's face it, it depends which way you choose to hold the saw whether the rake angle is postive or negative in a Euclidean sense.

So you may mount a campaign to have the terminology 'corrected', Paul, but I suspect you will be pushing the proverbial brown matter up the proverbial hill. In my professionl life, I railed against somewhat similar corruptions of what seemed sweet logic, but I'm now gone, & the "incorrect" usage prevails......

Cheers,

These may help Sam Rogers' About Hand Saws page and Positive & Negative Rake