Old saw restoration

Hi all. My father in law had an old table saw in the barn. We are cleaning it up to possibly use to cut fret slots in fingerboards. I believe its an old Delta. Or maybe just the motor is a delta. It used to have a joiner attached to it. but it was removed ad discarded before my Father in law got the saw. I was looking at Stew mac's fretting table saw blade and LMI's blade and stiffeners. Does anyone have any suggestions on which is better? Stew Mac's is about $100. LMI package runs $188 with stiffeners.

Here is a couple photos of the saw. My father in law made the shooting board. But I will probably redo it. Thanks for any suggestions.


Sorry for the sideways and upside down photos. I cant figure why they are facing the wrong direction.

Obviously you must be posting from south of the equator thus the upside-down pix. Probably Australia where as we all know they are upside-down and backwards... I would love to have the SMD fret cutting saw blade, but I blanch at the cost ($100). I'm not saying it is overpriced (much) because it is after-all a specialty tool and there are not much other uses for such a blade thus the premium price. I've always hoped that Santa would put one in my stocking. No luck yet. Nothing but sticks and coal.

Also I don't build enough ukes to justify such a tool. A person can cut an awful lot of fretboard kerfs with a handsaw and unless I was kicking out ukes like a medium small shop or larger, I can't justify the outlay. Still... wouldn't it be nice. Zip, zip, zip.... I've toyed with the idea of grinding down a cheap blade to required kerf width but have rejected the idea as impracticable. The heat alone would probably ruin the temper to say nothing of creating a fire hazard.

I use a 5" blade from Malco:

http://www.malcosaw.com/ecom/category/11/

The part number is JS502312000

My table saw has 2.5" diameter stiffeners, so the unsupported blade width is 1.25" which works fine.

I had the StewMac for years, and recently got the LMI. I already have blade stiffeners, which I use on everything. Both do what they're supposed to; take your pick.

This is one of those things like Foredom Flex Shafts, Knew Concepts Saws, Tusq, Turbine HVLP, buffing wheels, fret press, nut slotting files, fret files, et al. You never wanted to spend the money on it, but once you did, you wonder why it took so long.

My saw has blade stiffeners already, and I've got the StewMac blade. It's cut hundreds of boards and hasn't missed a beat.

saltyri, How did you mount the 1" hole on a tablesaw? Do they have bushings to 5/8"?

I've used the 5" blades for more than 25 years. They almost never wear out making the shallow cuts we make. Available in any good machine shop tool catalog. I use .023, .025, .028, .050,.057, and .063 for a variety of purposes like fret slotting, pearl strip inlay, and making kerfing. You can stack the blades on your tablesaw, with spacers homemade or otherwise, for making kerfing. You could make spacers out of hardwood in necessary. I can get 4 blades on my arbor for making faster kerfing. The blades are thin, so you have to thickness your own reducers. The catalogs have 1" to 5/8" reducers, but they are too thick to use as is. Ace Hardware also has them. You can thin them by poking them down into a piece of wood, into which you have drilled shallow 1" holes. Then just run them slowly through your thickness sander to get what you want. If you use the Sears blade stiffeners, they have a recess that works perfectly, and you can leave the reducers fairly thick.The blade stiffeners that Sears sell work great.

FarmerBill said:

saltyri, How did you mount the 1" hole on a tablesaw? Do they have bushings to 5/8"?

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Very good question. I rechecked to part number that I cited and it is correct. However, the blade I have with that number has a 5/8" hole, which matches my arbor. That number now seems to be associated with a 1/2" hole. I supposed you'd have to contact the company to find out whether they can still supply a 5/8" hole.

Thanks, I'll give them a call.

Bil

FarmerBill said:

Thanks, I'll give them a call.

Bil

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Any luck on your question regarding the hole size FarmerBill?

They have email contact so I used that. They will make an adapter for the 1" blade for $7. I placed an order for the blade and adapter and will give feedback when it comes. They are helpful and easy to deal with.

Bill

gspears said:

Hi all. My father in law had an old table saw in the barn. We are cleaning it up to possibly use to cut fret slots in fingerboards. I believe its an old Delta. Or maybe just the motor is a delta. It used to have a joiner attached to it. but it was removed ad discarded before my Father in law got the saw. I was looking at Stew mac's fretting table saw blade and LMI's blade and stiffeners. Does anyone have any suggestions on which is better? Stew Mac's is about $100. LMI package runs $188 with stiffeners.

Here is a couple photos of the saw. My father in law made the shooting board. But I will probably redo it. Thanks for any suggestions.


Sorry for the sideways and upside down photos. I cant figure why they are facing the wrong direction.

Click to expand...

looks like the old rockwell table saw/jointer combo tool. back before i got into the trades in the early '70s a builder might have this unwieldy tool on a new house project. seem to recall it was an oddball size, 9" table saw and possibly 4" jointer although the jointer might have been a 6". they are great tools and perfect for your use. the fences on them were uniformly miserable for decades and decades and didn't get fixed until the delta unifence. labor was routinely wasted measuring from the fence to the front and back of the blade and then tapping the weakly locking front of the fence one way or the other. there's nostalgia for you.

chuck in ny said:

looks like the old rockwell table saw/jointer combo tool. back before i got into the trades in the early '70s a builder might have this unwieldy tool on a new house project. seem to recall it was an oddball size, 9" table saw and possibly 4" jointer although the jointer might have been a 6". they are great tools and perfect for your use. the fences on them were uniformly miserable for decades and decades and didn't get fixed until the delta unifence. labor was routinely wasted measuring from the fence to the front and back of the blade and then tapping the weakly locking front of the fence one way or the other. there's nostalgia for you.

Click to expand...

Wow. Good info. I'm glad to here some info on this unit. It was a bit off balance at first. Had an old belt that probably should not be holding together. It had a bad pulley on it, so I ordered a new one for $11. The saw was free and kind of a neat looking. We got the blade and fence nice and square. Going to install the new pulley and belt and see how it runs. Hope we can make it run true and give live back to this relic.