Cutting Thin wood question.

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cschimmel

cschimmel

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I would like to try to do some segmented and finer work but I dont know how to cut really thin wood. Are there any tips or suggestions? What kind of saw and blade or anything would be helpful. Thanks for you advise.
 
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I'm no expert, but when in a pinch, I set up a fence on my band saw, make sure the table is perpendicular to the blade and the fence is parallel to the blade. I set the fence the same thickness as the kerf of the blade. I use a 1/4", 10T blade. Seems to work good. The thickest wood I cut is 3/4".
 
Some use a band saw, but I find the cut kind of rough. I use my table saw. I tweaked the $%&* out of it to be sure it is accurate and have a very smooth cutting blade (Forrest woodworker II). A sled is highly recomended - which you can make yourself. Do a search and you'll find good examples here on the site.

Other options are a thickness sander. Or even a planer with a sled - but I've never tried this as I'm afraid wood too thin wont hold up to the stress of planing.

You can also buy veneers. Just dont get the paper backed kind.
 
I use a 10 inch miter saw with a thin kerf 80 tooth blade...a diablo blade I think. In use a zero clearance fence as outlined in an article by my good friend Ron McIntire. Here is a link to an article he wrote in how he makes his segmented pens. Maybe you can use some of his techniques.
http://content.penturners.org/articles/2006/segpenblanks.pdf
Do a good turn daily!
Don

cschimmel said:
I would like to try to do some segmented and finer work but I dont know how to cut really thin wood. Are there any tips or suggestions? What kind of saw and blade or anything would be helpful. Thanks for you advise.
Click to expand...
 
Most woods don't hold together when they are planed to less than 1/8 of an inch. the coarser the grain the more apt to explode. Bamboo is easy to plane to extremely thin pieces. I use a tablesaw and cut thin pieces off of larger boards. I draw a line on the table to mark the thickness of the piece. You will need a 0 clearance insert to keep the pieces from dropping into the saw. I also use veneers they are very uniform in thickness and fairly cheap.
 
When I cut veneer type wood for segmenting I use an exacto knife, sometimes a good sisssors works better for bias and cross cuts, but don't use a sissors for cutting with the grain.
 
Try cutting them on your tablesaw but not like you normally do. If you setup your saw with the fence on the right side, set it up so that the veneer you are cutting comes off the left side of the blade.

I saw the tip in Wood Magazine once. They even have jigs so that you can get the same sized strip each time. I will see if I can find the article online and post if I can.
 
We will do the ruff cut with the band saw. From there I will run it through the drum sander. The great thing about the drum sander is getting many pieces the same thickness. So far I have been able to get it down to .031 I would imagine I could go thinner but have no application I would need for it.
 
David Reed Smith published this back in 2004.

http://www.davidreedsmith.com/Articles/VacuumRipFence/VacuumRipFence.htm

Shop vac powered vacuum holds the veneer strip in place on the fence until the saw blade is off and it can be removed.

As I remember, Eagle used a similar jig with a small thin blade to get his veneers.

about 8 1/4 Diablo blade -- but could have been the 7 1/4 one mounted in a table saw with a zero clearance fence. (Works just fine in a 10 inch saw).
 
I just can't do it. Im afraid to try and cut something real thin. That's why I buy the veneers from the pool cue place. I use them to border the larger pieces I cut in segmented blanks.
 
+1 on the 80 kerf blade. But you need to make a sled and put an Incra Jig on it so you can repeat your cuts to be the same width.

I posted pics of the sled I use for my segmenting work on a thread on this forum somewhere, but I've forgotten where it appears. :mad:

Let me see if I can find it or the pix and post them for you. Some of the guys said they didn't like it but it holds the thin piece in place after the cut so it doesn't kick out AND keeps your fingers well away from the blade while doing it.
 
KenV said:
David Reed Smith published this back in 2004.

http://www.davidreedsmith.com/Articles/VacuumRipFence/VacuumRipFence.htm

Shop vac powered vacuum holds the veneer strip in place on the fence until the saw blade is off and it can be removed.

As I remember, Eagle used a similar jig with a small thin blade to get his veneers.

about 8 1/4 Diablo blade -- but could have been the 7 1/4 one mounted in a table saw with a zero clearance fence. (Works just fine in a 10 inch saw).
Click to expand...




I used this as a guide to make a vacumm fence similar to this one, it works really well and is SAFE to use for those very thin cuts. Not really sure how thin I could cut with it but 1/16th inch is very easy to do and could do smaller if needed.
 
Here you go: http://www.penturners.org/forum/showthread.php?t=63131

Of course, a bunch of other forum members piled on with their opinions of it and their own designs, which you can read about. However, I do not like any of their designs better than the one used to make mine. Repeatable cuts are important to me when I want the same thickness from four or five types of materials. Here's what I mean....
 

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Parson,

You pens are awesome!

I rememeber your sled thread from a while back, and just revisted it. I just don't quite get how you use it. You have that big nob on top, but I dont see how it would tighten into anything. Your results speak volumes, so could you please elaborate on the use of your sled?

The fence also seems to be like an L with a little platform at the bottom, but the blank in the pic is not on the platform.

Thanks
 
I put the material on the sled, adjust the thickness, put a piece of sacrifice wood on top of the material, pop the hinged bit with the knob over it, press down hard, and make the cut.

One of the pics shows the hinged wood brace with the knob on it directly on the material, but I do not use it this way. Sorry for the confusion. There's always a 1 x 2 x 6 between the hinged brace and the material.

The sacrifice wood takes the very top of the blade (1/8 inch or less) and holds both pieces in place through the cut.

I set up blocks on the right side and screw them down when I need to cut angles, but I rarely do this. I cut straight pieces and then use my drum sander to get the right angle of the edge. Doing second cuts of thin material at angles seems to chip out material too much.

I'm really considering how I can find the $$$ for that byrnes table saw. It would really make my segmenting work a lot easier, create far less waste, and probably be safer than using a full sized table saw for such small pieces.
 
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Thanks for all the great advise guys. This will keep me busy for a while. I"m going to go back and reread all those posts and put a sled together. Thanks
 
I second the recommendation on the Byrnes table saw. Based on reviews and recommendations from other IAP members, I bought one about a year ago. What a sweet little machine! You can consistently slice wood thin enough to use as veneer, but it's no toy saw either. It easily handles very hard 3/4 inch wood or even TruStone blanks with no problems at all. No affilitation with Brynes, just a very happy customer.

Jim Smith
 
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