Help Me Straighten Up (Literally) My Bandsaw

[Ty Williams]

I caught a sale a Woodcraft early last summer and bought myself a Laguna LT14SUV bandsaw. Though I used my father's bandsaw a lot as a kid, this is my first "real" bandsaw that I've been responsible for anything beyond pushing the on/off buttons. I set the thing up as best I could and got results that satisfied me at the time. I did think it was a little odd that the drift angle was pretty much at the limit of what the stock fence could accommodate. However, I then managed to add the DriftMaster fence a little later on. With that longer fence blade, it was more evident just how extreme the drift angle actually is. At the time, I couldn't figure out why it was like that, so I just left it along. Well, the other day, I happened to be behind the bandsaw and looked at it just right and was shocked to see what the problem is.

The upper guide blocks are rotated probably 30* to the outside in the plane parallel to the table. In other words, if you were to stand on a ladder and look straight down the blade onto the table from above the saw, you'd see that the guide blocks were rotated about 30* to the left. This is causing the blade to twist as it passes through the guide blocks (Laguna ceramic guides) so that, when it passes through the work on the table, it's about 30* skewed relative to the table itself. That's obviously what's producing the tremendous drift angle since the guides themselves are presenting the blade to the work at a huge angle. Obviously, I need to figure out why the upper guides are twisted like that and straighten them up.

Before I start tearing into the bandsaw without having any clue what I'm doing, is there an actual adjustment for getting the guides parallel to the rest of the saw body, or is this evidence of something being truly wrong with the saw?

[Steve Rost]

I have an older model Laguna 16HD. Mine has a rack and pinion drive to raise and lower the guides. At the back it looks like there is one allen head screw that could be loosened and and slightly adjust the alignment, at the rear behind the guides. When I got mine I was disappionted at how MUCH I had to adjust and align everything EXCEPT the guide alignment. You have a brand new saw, I would call Laguna. They were next to worthless 7 years ago hopefully they can help, and maybe they are better now. Adjusting any saw, tablesaw mitersaw jointer ect there is a set up procedure. Step by step, skip a step and it can affect performance. They should know their saw better than anyone else.

[Nick Lazz]

Echo what Steve said. I can't imagine there isn't an adjustment for that. I have the Laguna 14SE...

Anyway, one thing to note, your guides shouldn't be touching the blade when they are adjusted properly (sides or back)... something to keep in mind. Someone posted a link here on how to adjust your band saw. Here it is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wGbZqWac0jU

Although his machines are smaller than ours the same principles apply and have worked well for me.

[Roger Rayburn]

If your manual doesn't show the adjustment, call Laguna. And, do watch the video above.

[Chris Fite]

Laguna has the owner's manuals on line. These go through all the adjustment procedures for each aspect of the bandsaws.

Chris

[Ty Williams]

This misalignment isn't mentioned anywhere in the manual.

[Myk Rian]

What blade are you using? If it's the stock blade that came with the saw, get a new one.

[Ty Williams]

What blade are you using? If it's the stock blade that came with the saw, get a new one.

Why on earth would the blade affect the angle the guides sit at? That makes no sense!

[John Coloccia]

Where do you live, Ty? Maybe there's a creeker in your area that is nearby and can drop over to help.

[Ty Williams]

Delaware County, Ohio. Not horribly far from the border with Franklin and Union counties.

[Jim Andrew]

Ty, my bandsaw is a MM 16, but when I put on a new blade, I move the guides out so they don't touch the blade, tension the blade, and adjust it to where on the wheels I want it to run, and then adjust the guides to it. Can you do that? Works for me.

[Ty Williams]

The fundamental problem isn't the relationship between the guides and the blade. The main problem is that the guides themselves are twisted out of square to the frame of the saw itself.

[Phil Thien]

Post a picture.

[Alan Lightstone]

Yes. Post a picture. I have a LT14SUV. Perhaps I can take a picture of the same part on mine and look for differences in orientation.

[Mike Leung]

Ty, I have a Laguna LT14-SE and I had to adjust the post that hold the top ceramic black assembly. It was a real pain to adjust. On mine, there are 2 allen screws that controls the axial rotation angle and 1 allen screw that controls the angle front and back. After adjusting it a few years ago, I never had to readjust it again. I love the bandsaw but this procedure sucks.

[Ty Williams]

Ty, I have a Laguna LT14-SE and I had to adjust the post that hold the top ceramic black assembly. It was a real pain to adjust. On mine, there are 2 allen screws that controls the axial rotation angle and 1 allen screw that controls the angle front and back. After adjusting it a few years ago, I never had to readjust it again. I love the bandsaw but this procedure sucks.

OK, good to know that it is possible on this bandsaw. My plan is to tackle it tomorrow afternoon and set aside the rest of the day to do so. At least now I know that I'm not chasing something impossible! I did figure this was something that I'd only have to adjust once and then it'd never need touched again.

[Mike Leung]

Laguna bandsaws can provide great cuts but making micro adjustments is really crude. Even the castings are not the cleanest when you look close. I was tuning my Sawstop and it is the opposite. Everything is well designed and thought out. As for my Laguna, I just keep my 1" Resaw-King on mine for resaw and tenons. It cuts very well. Good luck tuning it tomorrow. Let us know how it goes.

[Ty Williams]

Yeah this LT14SUV is solely for resawing. It gets set up to make straight cuts and isn't going to be used for anything else. My pipe dream is to get it set up so that the drift is suitably parallel to the t-slots in the table to allow for crosscuts on shorter pieces (I don't have a table saw). However, I'd settle for making very good resaw cuts. My first hint that the extreme drift angle might be a bad thing rather than just a weird thing was the first time I tried to resaw 12" wide hickory. The cut was not at all the same top to bottom. I now realize it was due to the fact that the blade spiraled ever so slightly through the cut do to the upper guide being twisted. On thinner stuff, it never showed up as a defect.

[Mike Leung]

From my experience, if the blade is sitting on the wheel properly I get no drift whatsoever. Both my bandsaws cut parallel to the miter slot. I just set my fences parallel as well. I would highly recommend a resaw king for your setup. It leaves extremely smooth and straight cuts. I get perfect tenons in my laguna.

[Ty Williams]

From my experience, if the blade is sitting on the wheel properly I get no drift whatsoever. Both my bandsaws cut parallel to the miter slot. I just set my fences parallel as well. I would highly recommend a resaw king for your setup. It leaves extremely smooth and straight cuts. I get perfect tenons in my laguna.

Yeah, the Resaw King blade and the mobility kit came as part of the sale when I bought it. I have been very impressed with the quality of cuts in wood under 4-5" thick, regardless of how hard the wood is. I'm hoping getting everything straightened out tomorrow will lead to extending that quality up to wider boards.



ETA: Do track the blade centerline on the wheel centerline (traditional) or the teeth on the centerline of the wheel (Carter style)?

[Mike Leung]

The teeth on mine overhang slightly over the front edge of the wheel. Good luck.

[Myk Rian]

Why on earth would the blade affect the angle the guides sit at? That makes no sense!
Because you're talking about the drift angle, that's why.

[Ty Williams]

Because you're talking about the drift angle, that's why.
No, I'm talking about the guides being misaligned to the saw, which I first noticed when it manifested as an extreme drift angle.

[Ty Williams]

OK, took me longer to get around to it than I expected and the whole process spiraled out of control. I'll be writing more to explain what's still going wrong with it, but to answer my own question from the beginning of this:

Yes, there is an adjustment for angle of the blade guides to line them up with the miter slot and getting them aligned results in 0 drift angle. The lower guides are self-explanatory for how to adjust their angle. The upper one is a little less obvious. If you drop the upper guides a bit and then remove the yellow blade guard, you'll see that there's a maybe 1" diameter steel rod with the rack for the height adjustment cut into the back of it. On the bottom of this rod is a steel cylinder about 2" in diameter and 3" tall that actually holds the fixture for the guides. The chunky cylinder and the rack rod are not one piece of metal. The chunky cylinder has a large set screw in it that's facing the outside edge of the table. If you loosen this set screw, you'll be able to rotate the cylinder relative to the rod. By rotating the cylinder, you obviously change the angle of the guides relative to the miter slots. I used an engineer's square to square up the guides to the table and it worked out quite well.

However, due to how hard it is to work with the lower door on the LT14SUV once you install the Driftmaster, I messed up the blade. I've got some significant cut problems now, and I can't work out if they're due to the blade or to some setup problem with the saw. The cut is barreled from top to bottom and the slice is always wider than the distance between the fence and the blade. The first 1/2" or so of cut is the correct width, but then it tapers to about 1/16" or a little more wider and stays that way for the rest of the cut. The cut quality also ranges between really quite good and absolutely HORRIBLE. During the places where the cut quality is terrible, the saw makes a hell of a lot of noise while working there.

Any ideas what I need to check next?

[Clint Baxter]

If you say that the blade was messed up, as in damaged/dulled, first thing to try is a sharp blade. Your symptoms all sound like those from a dull blade.

Clint

[Ty Williams]

If you say that the blade was messed up, as in damaged/dulled, first thing to try is a sharp blade. Your symptoms all sound like those from a dull blade.

Clint
That's my thought too, but Oi! the price!

[Bill ThompsonNM]

But you can get the resaw king resharpened!