A few weeks back I was asking about steel to use in making a hand saw. Instead of starting from scratch, I decided instead to find an old saw in bad enough shape that I wouldn't feel bad about bungling it too badly.
I didn't pay much for this one (well much less than buying the 1095 spring steel anyway). The seller was a professed (and non-apologetic) saw painter, and even showed some examples of his debauchery performed on other saws. I figured anything I would do to the poor thing would be more dignified than painting, and it had a 28" plate so I would have plenty of material to work with, so I bought it. The seller identified it as a C.E. Jennings.
The medallion is indeed marked "C.E. JENNINGS & CO. NEW YORK". Once I cleaned the plate up a bit, I could actually see the etch, and it is marked as "HENRY DISSTON & SONS" though the etch is very faint and washed out so can't make out any more. I'm guessing this is a No. 7 28" rip saw that has had the saw nuts and medallion replaced with ones from a Jennings?
It arrived smelling heavily of rancid pig fat, so either someone smeared it with lard or tallow or bacon or used it to butcher a hog.
It is toothed at ~4-1/2 TPI and is a bit pitted. It has something of "reverse breasting" (concave instead of convex). I'm guessing this is just a result of a number of sharpenings without jointing?
My plan was to just joint and keep it at 4-1/2 TPI and make a new handle.
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Originally Posted by Jim Koepke
