the danger of the breaker being to high amperage is to your band saw.
If you have the space in the breaker box it is not real hard to ad a 220 circuit. it's getting the know how that will be most of the work.
using a 1o gauge extension chord would also work if you can figure out how to wire it for the difference from the dryer to the band saw. basically use the two hot wires. (the red and black) and hook the ground to something. and ignore the white one but this still leaves you with the overload problem burning up your band saw motor. this woudl only happen if you jamb up the blade or something. it could also happen by cutting something that the saw is having to work to hard at. and then you may not notice until the smoke impares your vision.
If it where me I would look around the net for how to install a 220 circuit. I sa a place just the other day. I will see if I can find it again. and post a link.
but here are my direction. open your breaker panel.turn ll the breakers off then flip the 100 amp breaker that should be at the top of all the switches. this kills the power to all the breakers. but it does not kill the power to the two very large wires that you will be seeing in a minute.
remove the screws from the cover of the breakers and remove it. you will now be looking at what should be a very neat rats nest. behind the breakers at the very top center of the box you should see two very large wires. these are the power feeds and are still hot. each of these wires are connected to a metal bar. and the breakers are conected to these bars. if you connect a breaker to only one bar you have 110 volts. if you connect a double breaker to both of them you have 220 volts. the breaker will simply snap onto these bars but you have to make sure you are on both of them. you can get the breaker installed where both sides of the double breaker are actually on the smae bar. look at any other duble breaker int eh box to see where the wires go. but in short. you will want at least 12/3 WG wire. and maybe even 10/3-WG what this means is 3 wires 12 gauge with a ground or bare copper wire. you will hook the black wire to one side of the breaker. the red or other colored wire to the other side of the breaker. then connect the white wire to the bar where all the other white wires are connected. and the bare coper wire to the bar where all the other bare copper wires are running. in the case of yoru band saw you will most likely not be using the white wire at the other end.
run the wire to where you want the outlet. you should not have to worry about wire size unless you are using more than 100 feet. as far as knowing if you have the right wire gauge. your dryer would run on 10 gauge. an electric oven would do fine with 12 gauge. the rest of the house is running on 14 gauge. for a 15 amp 220 curcuit 12 gauge is enough and much easier to work with. runing the wire through conduit is probably the easiest. but keep in mind the normal "Romex" wire cannot be ran through conduit. that's the white or yellow plastic covered wire. if you have to run a short piece through conduit. say from the ceiling down to the outlet. simply strip the plastic cover off it.(NOT THE INSULATION FOR EACH WIRE)but the thin cover that keeps all the individual wires together. it would be best to simply ask the hardware guy if the wire is safe for conduit. the problem yo are trying to avoid is the wires overheating when confined to the conduit. It is illegal to just have the wire hanging out in the air where it can be damaged. you can just run it along unprotected as long as it is in the crawl space, walls or abov ethe ceiling where normal activity would not be going on. but as soon as it interes living space the wire must be protected. sure nobody is going to come arrest you if you do it anyway. but it will void your homeowners, or renters insurance. even if it was not the cause of a fire.
other than that the best rule I can give you. is keep the work looking neat. cut the wires itn he breaker box to the right lenght so they run nice and neat with all the others. don't let the wire coil and flop all over in the rafter space or crawl space. and pay the few extra bucks for a box at the outlet end. actually mount it solidly. etc. as a mome remodeler ther is nothing worse than the feeling when you open an electrical box and the first thing you see is wiring that you know was not done by a pro. I have walked off jobs because of it. a wire in the wrong place can get you killed. once it is all wired up and you think you are ready. put the breaker panel back together. then flip ont he 100 amp breaker. nothign will happen at this point as all the other breakers shoudl still be on. flip each one on one at at time. nothign shoudl happen here either except everythign that went off when you flipped them the first time should come back on. if it any time one of these breakers flips right back off. you have crossed some wires with all your fiddling in the breaker box. very unlikely. but if it happens the problem is in the breaker box. lastly turn on the new breaker. if you did not get it right this will be either very drematic and the breaker will flip right back off. or nothign will happen at all. go see if the saw works. if it doesn't you didn't get the wires hooked up right at some point. you should only have connections at teh panel, the outlet and the saw. spend your time checking these. i don't care how hard you had to pull on the wire you did not break it. so best bet is something didn't get hooked up right. remember the black and red wires are the incoming power. the white wire is just the one that runs back to complete the circuit. I really don't expect you will have any problems as long as you hooked up the new breaker like the other double breakers are hooked up.
now al little info because you are working with a band saw. if the motor is liek the one on my nephews air compressor. you will not need 3 wires you will only need 2 and a ground wire. so this woudl be 12/2-WG.
this will give you a black wire and a white wire as well as the bare copper wire. problem with explaining this wireing is I am not sure how it goes at the breaker box. black woudl still go where the balck went before. the bare whire woudl still go where it went before. but I think the white wire woudl go where the red whire went in the explaination. or to the other half of the double breaker. and nothing would go to the bar withthe white wires. but I am not at all certain about that white wire. I wire stoves, dryers, hot tubs, and electric heaters. I have always used the 3 wire configuration. anybody able to fill this in with certainty?
and one final warning. never, never, even by the grandest of accidents, never contact those two large wires at the top of the breaker box. there si a very good chance that the only people that know you did are the ones that find your body. they are live and connected to the big power on the pole out back. the only way to avoid that risk is to have the power company disconnect your meter. then there is no power near you at all. they woudl also most likely not want you doing your electrical work either but they could verify that you got it right and alot of places don't charge for doing so. the disconnect or the inspection after you are done.
