Bandsaw drift this easy to fix?

[Dan Hahr]

I was just checking on getting s Carter riser kit for my older Delta bandsaw and I ran across this video. I have always been real careful about aligning my fence for drift, but after watching this video, i am wondering if I just need to look into some new guides (I have Cool blocks.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w_tv7cm0-VU&feature=player_embedded

Can this really be done with resawing?

Thanks, Dan

[Van Huskey]

Poor guides or setup can add to drift but "real" drift is the blade not the saw. Carter guides are excellent and Laguna guides even better but for narrow blades the solid (in your case cool block) guides are actually better than bearing guides. Depending on the saw you have you may just want to put the money toward a better overall saw. There was a discussion about this very topic a couple of weeks ago.

[glenn bradley]

I don't adjust for drift. I just have my saws aligned and use decent blades; no drift. I have double bearings top and bottom on the larger saw and steel blocks on the smaller saw. Both seem to do their job well enough. Before you throw money at the machine I would confirm it is adjusted as well as possible. Even then I would decide if I was throwing good money after bad by adding a riser to a saw that already won't track well. I'm not trying to be blunt. I am speaking from the pain in my wallet that I could have done without and hope to prevent others from experiencing same ;-)

If you are getting all sorts of odd blade travel; bowed cuts top to bottom, blade getting pulled left or right and so forth there are really only two things that I have found to cause this. Bad blade or bad saw / saw setup. The reason I say 'bad saw' is that some saws may require so much bolt on and upgrade effort that a new saw would be a better answer. Frequently though, folks report wonderful results after studying up a bit and actully taking the time and effort required to properly setup their machine.

I know I certainly had a Eureka moment when I spent a couple hours on my saw and strapped on a decent blade. This led me to realize that the "good enough" effort I had put out on some other machines may have not been "good enough" ;-) A well tuned machine that does what it is supposed to do, realiably and consistently, is a joy to use and well worth the effort to get it in that condition.