Thread: Lid seperation

I've used three methods. Bandsaw with the Resaw King, spiral cutter on the router and the Freud thin kerf blade on the TS. I absolutely get the very best results on the TS.

First I use blue painter's tape over the cut line (if the box is wide, another strip towards the bottom), then raise the height of the blade until it's a hair under the thickness of the side and cut around. Finish the cut with the Dozuki or flush cut saw.

Its the hairiest part of the boxmaking process. Always terrified of explosions or a small mistake .... the drum thickness sander has been used occasionally

That's awesome,

Thanks Evanism, do you have details of the Freud thin kerf blade? (so many things to buy) and where is the best place to source one?

Cheers.

How were the results with the bandsaw Evanism? I was half thinking about trying that, but thinking about cutting through the top while it's unsupported scares me, and I haven't sat down to work out whether there is a good way to fix that.

I find the bandsaw the best - using a very fine-cutting tungsten tipped blade. The Lennox triple-chip-grind blades give the smoothest cut but I have also used a tct resaw blade similar to Evanism, though from Lennox. If you use a table saw I have found it is best to use a home-made zero-clearance insert to avoid any unevenness across the blade as can occur if your TS has a large blade clearance insert. When I have used a TS it has tended to cause some burn because I move the box slowly and carefully. There is no burn with the bandsaw. To clean up the cut I use some fabric-backed sandpaper contact cemented to a very flat piece of MDF or melamine coated pice of chipboard. Place the cut edge of the box on the flat sanding surface and gently move it around to get an even, flat surface with minimal wood removal. BUT be careful with how you move the box over the sandpaper, if you are too vigorous or rough the box "rocks" and you get an uneven join line.

Originally Posted by Evanism

raise the height of the blade until it's a hair under the thickness of the side and cut around. Finish the cut with the Dozuki or flush cut saw.

I have found this method most successful too. It is difficult to get a good cut from the band saw, it usually takes a lot of cleaning up. Much more than the table saw.

JIm

Xanthorrhoeas (tough to spell!) is right too. I've used those methods. Box making is one of those jobs where each person has an art that works.

I say this as I've had so many boxes where I've miscut and cursed.

The blade is the Freud Premier Fusion - Freud Tools | 10" Thin Kerf Next Generation Premier Fusion General Purpose Blade (sourced from Amazon.... I can't get out much, so everything is posted to me generally) ... Now, this isn't a perfect blade - its simply the thinnest (2.3mm) I have and the edge is kept minty-fresh and super sharp for detail work. The big 12" Freud is used for all the meat-axe work For xmas Santa brought a new Precision Router Base (this is entirely irrelevant!) from Stewart MacDonald (US luthier supplies dudes) but they included a catalogue and in it they have a super thin kerf blade: Fret Slotting Table Saw Blade | stewmac.com

MAN! If I'd seen that I would have grabbed a couple..... 0.58mm kerf!!!

Not for your everyday work, but just box lids where the grain retention and continuity is needed. Its as thin as a good Dozuki

With the bandsaw, the real hassle I have (its probably just me) is that I struggle to get a neat parallel cut. I'm always out. I'm confused by this as Ive the Laguna SUV14" and Resaw King and it cuts veneers all day long very accurately..... but as soon as I do a box, I get errors. The table saw was used first for a long time, then I went to the router table and a tiny upcut, but the bit sounded like it was working its backside off (howls terribly)... then the bandsaw and now back to the TS. The TS is dead easy, but the kerf is big.

The TS I use two strips of blue tape. One under the line where I'm cutting to stop tear out and the other towards the base to eliminate any angle/tip that might be generated. It might be tiny, but a few cents of tape is cheap (plus my TS leaves marks on timber!!! grrrr!). The tape stops the marks

You can of course use a Dozuki to do the whole job. That's $25 and a bit of practice.... but as much as I try Des Kings (DesK, Shoji) practice methods it eludes me getting perfectly straight cuts.

Again, X is right, the sandpaper trick works. Big rolls from TSPM or HW4CF contact-sprayed onto 18mm MDF make excellent flatteners. I tend to use the thickness sander with 240 grit, an absolute dead-slow tiny-cut pass through and a sure hand pushing down. Always on a 45° angle though. Ive had the back edge catch and tilt boxes up violently..... BAAAADDD!!!!!

A tiny hand chamfered shadow line fixes the last of my incompetence.

Caveat - I've only made about 60 boxes so far, so I'm far from an expert! All this stuff was taken from the wisdom of others... Notably DesK (his Kumiko books), Doug Stowe (box books) and Andrew Crawford (of Smart Hinge fame).

hi Evanism, going by the specs, this Fret Slotting Table Saw Blade is only good for cutting 0.58mm kerf for up to 1/4" timber thickness. Can you please confirm?

Originally Posted by Dengue

hi Evanism, going by the specs, this Fret Slotting Table Saw Blade is only good for cutting 0.58mm kerf for up to 1/4" timber thickness. Can you please confirm?

Dengy, looks to me that what they are trying to say is that the width of cut (kerf) gets to its maximum (.58mm) at 1/4" depth of cut, not that the depth of cut is limited to 1/4". Note that they say the teeth are hollow ground. The blade is 6" in diameter so the depth of cut should be around 1" (25mm for Evanism ) on most saws.

Cheers,
David

Yes aldav, metric!

As for depth of kerf, I've no idea. Clearly it's being sold to make kerfs to put finger board frets into a guitar neck, but a cut is a cut.

I hope I wasn't conveying any expertise or recommendation.....I just saw it and thought it looked like a thing to look at. Thin kerf, infrequently used only very carefully.

Makes me wonder if we could con Freud into making a 1mm WC 6" version. I'll write to them.

Makes me wonder if we could con Freud into making a 1mm WC 6" version. I'll write to them.

Better off trying Henry Bros or Iva saws in Australia

Advice from Stewart-McDonald on the suitability of their fret cutting blade for slicing off the lids on boxes up to 1/2" thick:

That blade would not be suitable for cutting material at thick as 1/2". The reason is because the thin portion of the kerf is only about 0.415" tall, at which point the blade gets thicker. So it would only be good for cutting materials thinner than that.

I have not been doing boxes for a while but I should be going back to them soon.

Reading this thread, I think freud or any maker of quality blades could do well to make a special blade for this purpose.

I think about 6 inches (150mm) diameter, say 3 mm thick for the majority of the disk for rigidity but as thin as possible for the outer 13mm would be a hit with the box makers, and there are a lot of us.

It would need to be used with a zero clearance insert, which would mean cutting the slot almost all the way throuhg the insert with a regular 3mm blade then ctting right through with the special blade itself

I think this wiuld solve this issue for all smaller boxes. Once you get to bigger boxes with sides thicker than half an inch thee is more tolerance in the grain matching needs.

I, for one would buy one if someone reputable made it.

Cheers

Doug

OK, I wrote to Freud. Lets see if they see any value in it

for thin kerf, you could use a router slotting cutter

copied from Freud Slot Cutting Router Bit - justfreud.com all bits use a 22mm bearing and cut a slot 9/16" deep

Cat #	Freud #	Bit Dia	Slot width	Bit Shank	Bit Length
2698	63-100	2 "	1/16"	1/4 "	2-3/8"
2699	63-104	2 "	5/64"	1/4 "	2-3/8"
2700	63-106	2 "	3/32"	1/4 "	2-3/8"

Evanism -- sorry about the quoting imperial dimensions