“"Create a worksheet that uses guided notes, vocabulary, and scaffolding" with fill-in prompts and organizers using the attached document and you tube video. Search in video [Music] I'd like to talk to you a little bit about bandsaw safety. And I want to begin with, of all things, dust collection. Dust collection on most band saws is not so great. And band saws certainly make a whole lot of fine dust, which is the worst kind of all. Of course, the simplest way to protect yourself is just to wear a dust mask. But if I put this on, then you won't be able to hear anything. I'm going to say. So, let me show you what I've done to my band saw to improve its dust collection. This is the normal port that comes off a D band saw. Connects to a pretty small diameter hose. It works kind of so so. So, you can see what I've done here is just to tape the darn thing up. And instead, I installed a plastic port down here, a 4-in diameter port, larger diameter, more dust collection, and hooked that up to a long hose that goes to my central dust collector. And that's about as good as dust collection you as you can get. But there's still going to be some dust that comes over the top wheel. And your best protection is a mask. I'm going to walk you through sawing this leg and show you some safety tips along the way. First of all, we have to get the guard down to the right height. But before you make any adjustments to the guard, please unplug your saw. Anytime you're fooling around the adjustments around the blade, the guides, anything like that, have the power for sure off. Okay. So, what you want to do with the guard each time is to loosen the handle back here, lower the post until it's a/4 inch or so above the workpiece, and then tighten this thing back up. Okay, now we can plug the saw in and get to work. But before I make any cuts, I want to show you how I hold my fingers near the end of a cut, which is really important. The most hazardous part of cutting something usually is when you near the end. Because if your fingers are in harm's way, in other words, if they're in the path of the cut or even close to it, you're pushing right along, you can suddenly come across a weaker part of the board or anything like that, and suddenly the piece can just move farther forward, faster than you ever thought possible, and your fingers, ooh, boy, bad things can happen. So, I always put my hands out of harm's way by doing this. One hand is if it has to be anywhere at all, it's going to be ahead of the blade where any push forward can't do any harm. The other hand is wrapped around the end of the board like this. My fingers that is. And I'm going to hold my fingers in a particular way. They're going to grip the corner in a kind of a triangle like this. So, I'm going to put my thumb on the end that's doing the pushing. then put my two other fingers right next to my thumb like this, forming a rigid triangle that I can engage the corner of the board with. Now, my fingers can't slide accidentally side to side into the path of the cut. They're just locked right here out of harm's way. So, let me turn the saw on and then I'm going to uh do all the cuts on this leg. I'm going to begin with this rip cut right here. And I'm going to guide that with my finger placed way right over here like a [Music] fence. Then if you're careful, it's just fine to back right out of a cut. As long as it's not, if it's a straight cut, it's easy to do. Next, I'm going to make a relief [Music] cut like that. And now in a curve like this, I'll always begin at the top of the curve, holding my fingers around here like a triangle. [Music] [Applause] Now, the way I've got my hand right here obviously is bad when you get to the end of the cut, but on a band saw, it's totally fine to just stop where you are. Change your hand position. There's no chance that the work piece is going to come back at you. So, from here to [Music] here, stop. Put your hand here. On this cut, I always begin here on the thin spot and end up at these spots. [Music] [Music] [Applause] something like this. You want to keep your hands on the waist side of the board. Stop the cut. Here's where I'm going to wrap my fingers right around this corner like this. [Music] [Applause] And when you're done cutting, you have to do the 10 test, which is, do I have all 10 fingers left? Uh, oh yeah, they're all still here. A band saw is generally a very safe tool to use because unlike a table saw, there's no kickback. The blade isn't coming at you all the time. So, a workpiece can't be thrown back at you. All the pressure of the blade is going downwards, not at you. But still, things can go wrong. And uh in your hurry or something like that, you can make some bad choices as well. Let me show you one of them. Cutting a piece like this, for instance, that has this crazy overhang on it is don't even go there. This is not safe. If you lead in with a cut like this, the downward pressure of the blade can lead the whole piece to jerk out of your hand and tip upwards like that. So, this would be just think about what your piece is like before you start cutting it. You want everything to be on the table, all the downward pressure at all points of the cut. So, sure, you could cut this piece right down the middle if you wanted to. You just got to flip it over so that all support is on the table. And similarly, and this is comes as a surprise unfortunately to lots of folks, uh, cutting off a large dowel or a dowel of any kind like this, just doing a cross cut can lead to the same cantalievered unsupported cut problem that I just showed you with that block of maple. If you start to lead this into the blade, it can easily grab the piece and rotate it before you know it. slamming your fingers into the blade or into the table or doing who knows what kind of bad news to yourself. But fortunately with round stock, cross cutting round stock that is there is a simple solution. If you make a cradle like this on the table saw, just by tipping your blade over 45 degrees and nesting your round stock in the cradle like this, you can easily make a cross cut, either using a miter gauge for super accurate cut or just doing it freehand. And you can even make a rip cut if you want. And you can cut right through the cradle. It's just a temporary device. And the larger diameter round stock you use though, the larger the cradle has to be. So this one is too small for that, but just fine for this large dowel. Here's another variation on the unsupported cut problem. Let's say I'd like to rip this board down the middle and uh for whatever reason I need to support it on the ends like this. Well, you can see I've got a problem. the blade is there's support right when you start the cut, but as you go along, there's really no steady support as you go. And when you get to the end of the cut, well, once again, you've got trouble. So, this would work fine on a short piece that's supported all on the table. But what I need here is a larger table. And fortunately, I've got one of those right behind me. Just place a piece of plywood on here like this. This piece of plywood has a bar on the bottom of it that sits in the miter bar slot. Voila. I now have this gigantic table and cutting a piece like this. Plenty of support all the way along the cut. I use a band saw quite a lot for ripping wood that is not particularly well suited for cutting on the table saw because it's not very flat. I mean, my rule on the table saw is that one face of a board has to be flat. It can't be a wibbly wobbly piece of construction lumber like this, cupped, twisted, all that kind of stuff. Ripping that on a table saw, not very safe. ripping on a band saw, no problem. Because all the force is down, there's no danger of it kicking back at you, which is the problem on the table saw. So, I can cut this much any way I want on the band saw and feel perfectly safe doing it. Here are a couple of tips to help you when you're sawing out a piece like this. First of all, you're often going to end up with a whole bunch of loose pieces on the table as you're cutting. The best thing to do to get them out of your way, because sometimes you feel like they're just annoying to be there, is to push them out of the way with a stick. Not your finger. A stick. Especially when you're going to go push them from the front. It's okay to walk around to the far side of the saw. Stop. Grab them. Pull them out of the way. But if you're going to push them out of the way, just flick them out of the way like that. Another tip I want to pass on to you is what to do when a sliver of wood gets stuck between the throat plate and the blade. And that often happens when a throat plate like this one starts to widen up. There's a pretty big gap in there. And triangular tapered shaped pieces often do get stuck in there. And when they do, then you can't make any more forward motion cutting anything. So you got to get that piece of wood out of there. Well, I want you to resist the temptation to pull that piece out with your fingers while the blade is running. I know that sounds like, who would the heck would do that? But we're all capable of making some silly mistakes when we're in a hurry. No. The right thing to do when a piece gets stuck like that, stop. Just stop everything. Hit the stop button on the saw. Wait for that blade to stop all together. Not slow down, just stop. Then you can reach in here from the backside as safe and withdraw that piece. And that's pretty much what you have to go through when something gets stuck stuck like that. So the best solution if you're cutting off little pieces that have a tendency to get stuck like this is to put either a new throat plate in there that has a zero clearance curve in it or put a board on top of your saw with just a one narrow little slot in it. The smaller that gap is between the blade and the throat plate or this uh extra board, the less chance you'll have of getting something stuck and having to go through all this start and stop business. When you're res-sawing, that is using a fence, putting a board on edge, and cutting it into thinner pieces. The most hazardous part of the cut is right at the end. You certainly don't want your hand right here nearing the end of the cut. Again, it can travel right into that blade. Bad things can happen. So, instead, you just need something to push the board all the way through the cut. Either a second board that you can put right here. And by the way, when you're cutting on a bandsaw like this, in order to readjust your hand position or pick up that pusher board, you can just stop everything. Just push the board along, let it sit right here. it won't be thrown back at you. Again, unlike a table saw, it doesn't have a kickback problem. Grab that other board and push it all the way through. On the other hand, you could always use a device like this, a push block that has feet on it. These drop right like that. And when you turn it on its side, they provide a little push block on the end. And as long as that doesn't go into the path of the blade, just hold the board like this. It also is a very safe way to hold the board tight against the fence and then you can go all the way through the cut. I love to use my bandsaw for cutting long uneven boards. Something I wouldn't do on my table saw because there's always a danger of kickback. But of course with a long board you always run into the problem of how to hold it down when you get to the end of the cut. And for that you need a stand that's at least as tall as your table bandsaw's table. So now when I rip this board, when I get this far, I've got plenty of support out there and I can just cruise right through the rest of the cut without worrying about holding down the weight of the board. Let's talk about blades a little bit. You know, when a bandsaw blade breaks on your saw, I know some people fret about that, but don't worry about it. It does happen. What generally goes on is that the weld separates and what will happen is the blade will just stop going around the wheels. It won't come flying back at you or anything like that. Anyway, obviously that's time to change blades. But more commonly, you'll need to change blades when you cut curves of different radiuses. When you pull a blade out of a box, it's going to be coiled up like this. And I want to show you how to uncoil it and then how to coil it back again. First thing, wear gloves. These teeth on a bandsaw blade can be awfully sharp and uh do you some damage if you're not careful. Uncoiling it is not pretty, but this is the safest way to do it, believe it or not. What I'm going to do is to open it up gradually and then I'm going to toss it on the ground in front of me and away from me and just let it open up by itself. The wrong thing to do is to think that you can just hold the blade in your gloved hands and just kind of wait for the thing to kind of uncoil itself in front of you. And it can move in unpredictable ways. So, the best thing to do is just to set it on the ground and do it. So, here's how that works. I'm going to start to unwind it like this until you can feel it kind of wanting to open up the rest of the way by itself. Not too far. And then just throw it like that in front of you. That should be pretty safe. So, how do you get it back into that coil? Well, it's pretty darn simple, actually. Put your foot on the bottom of the blade like this, and your two hands palm outwards on either side of the blade like that. And you give one hand a twist like that, the other hand a twist like that. Let's run through that again. Hands outward, palms outward. That is grab, grab, rotate, rotate, and the blade will just force go back into that coil all by itself. And you're all set. Then the best thing to do with a blade for storage is to wrap a wire or something around it uh to keep it from uncoiling. I love my band saw and uh use it quite a lot and I hope you have a safe time using yours too. But don't forget band saws are used in butcher shops for cutting up meat and you just never want to be the beef yourself. So take care. the truth is most Band Saw problems are blade related problems and this whole thing about blade drift is really a symptom of using the wrong blade or using a dull one here's the thing about blades you don't want to use a blade that has any more than 3 teth per inch no matter what size the blade is or what task you're using it for if the blade is too fine the gullets will pack with chips the blade will start to resist the cut and twist sideways that's blade drift and this problem also happens or even gets worse if the blade is dull so if you've been delaying changing your band saw blade let's do that right now you're going to be amazed at how well the band saw will cut okay start by unplugging the saw now you need to retract all of the blade guides pull away the blocks and dial back that thrust bearing now pull back the whole guide block assembly now raise those guides up to their highest position make make sure you do all the same things with the lower guides too okay now you can remove the throat plate and that little plug in the side of the saw table that keeps the two halves of the table aligned Now open up the doors and turn that tension crank until the blade is completely loose now the blade can come off the wheels you're going to need to make a right turn and thread it out of the slot in the table table take a moment to inspect the band saw tires while you have the chance you want to make sure they're clean and free of any pitch or saw dust that tends to build up there and could interfere with how the blade tracks it's not hard to remove you can do it with a little steel ruler use it as a scraper you really want to stay away from solvents which could damage the tires a quick word about buying blades you don't need to buy expensive ones but they do need to be sharp so buy a few at a time and remember three teeth per inch now you can thread the new blade through the slot and onto the wheels dial up the tension as you turn the upper Wheel by hand you want that blade to be running dead center on the upper wheel so adjust the crank that tilts the upper wheel until the body of the blade is centered on the crown of the tire and tracking perfectly now let's bring the blade up to final tension here's where some Woodworkers make a mistake they use super high tension basically to overcome the fact that they're using the wrong blade or that it's dull that really high tension is only going to groove these tires and damage them you don't need all that crazy high tension the truth is you just need medium tension and a good General way to get there is to look at the settings on the back of your saw but use the setting right below the size of the blade that you have so I'm going to go to 3/8 for this/ in Blade now this isn't an ex exact science you only need medium tension but just to double check that you've got it right here's a great method make sure the guides are totally out of the way and then hold the ruler up to the blade you should be able to move the blade about a/4 in comfortably with one finger that looks good now let me give the wheel one more spin just to make sure that the blade is still tracking nice okay that looks good now here's the fun part the great thing about changing a band saw blade is that it gives you a chance to get your whole Band Saw Set up and dialed in perfectly so let's get it all set up right we'll start by moving the blade guides back into position you want to move them forward until the blocks are just behind the gullets on the blade no farther now we can set the blocks or rollers up against the blade start by moving one of the guide blocks so it's just barely touching the blade but not flexing it sideways hold it there and tighten down the set screw bring the other one up against the blade too with really light pressure you could even take your finger away as you tighten that set screw the final check is to give the wheel a spin by hand on some blades the little welded area sticks out a little bit and you want to make sure that that doesn't get caught on the guides now we just need to adjust this thrust bearing you want to bring it up to within about 11/16th inch of the blade now do the same thing to the lower guides now all you got to do is pop this throat plate back into place and put this little plug back in at the edge of the table now that we know the blade is running where it wants to run we can square up this table and then adjust the rip fence so it's aligned perfectly with the miter slot well that's it if you have a 3 to per inch blade and it's fresh and sharp and it's tract right on that upper wheel it'll never drift and you'll never have to adjust that rip fence again you're going to be surprised at how well your vanand saw will cut”