Bow Saw - Build or Buy?

[Robert Engel]

I'd like to learn to use a bow saw.

For you guys who've done it, I'd appreciate some inputs/hindsights on building vs. buying.

If I build one I want to use leather cords like the authentic ones had.

[Jonathan Martell]

If you have access to decent hardwood, I'd build one. If you have to use it every day, you may find a metal one to be a bit nicer to use.

I was planning on building one last summer, but never got around to it. Please post pics if you decide to make one

[Mike Holbrook]

Check out bowsaws at Wood Joy Tools. Glenn makes excellent saws at a bargain price. I have his 400mm saw which I have universal and jigging Japanese Turbo-Cut blades for, allowing me to use it for: XX, rips, turning...Glenn's winding/tensioning system is the best out there and IMHO the winding system is what separates the ok saws from the great ones.

Should you decide you want to build a saw, Glenn also offers parts: blades, handles, strings...for sale.

[Stewie Simpson]

If your going down the track of making your own bowsaw, do a search on parachute cord. It wont stretch like leather does.

Stewie;

[steven c newman]

Or, get the shoe laces from an old work boot, the kind of laces that are leather

There is a Youtube vid out there, from GE HONG, that shows how he makes his saws. Of course, his is more of the Frame Saw kind.

[Pat Barry]

If your going down the track of making your own bowsaw, do a search on parachute cord. It wont stretch like leather does.

Stewie;
+1 - leather may have been original (maybe ??) but the problem is that when it stretches it loses tension. Stewie's idea makes sense because the cord he is talking about will remain elastic

[Brian Holcombe]

I have one from Woodjoy. It's very well worked out and I like the turbo cut blades. My only issue, and this is definitely unique to me, is that the handle absolutely kills my hand.

[Hilton Ralphs]

My Marples Bow Saw just has a turnbuckle to tension the frame. Not particularly romantic but it's easy to adjust and doesn't stretch.

[Marko Milisavljevic]

If you are as clueless as I am, make sure you understand the difference between products marketed as "bow saw" (like from WoodJoy) and "bow saw" (like from Gramercy) so you don't buy the wrong product for the task you are trying to accomplish (like I did). WoodJoy and Highland Woodworking are selling frame saws that use wider-ish blades like bandsaw. Gramercy is selling a turning saw that uses narrow blades like coping saw. You won't get very far cutting sweeping curves with Gramercy, or intricate details with WoodJoy.

[Jim Davis]

Anyone know when these began to be called "bow" saws? Until now, I always read of these being referred to as turning saws. Doesn't really matter I guess. None of the old and ancient books I've looked at mentioned "bow" saws. Bow saws were always those firewood makers with the pipe or tubular frames. Wood-framed saws with turnbuckles were "buck" saws--for bucking small logs to firewood lengths.

Jim--Old and puzzled

[Hilton Ralphs]

Wood-framed saws with turnbuckles were "buck" saws--for bucking small logs to firewood lengths.


This would probably explain why my Bow Saw (not) has that horrible thick blade.

[Mike Holbrook]

"Bowsaws" in the last century or two were a standard tool for cutting most types of wood for trades people in european tradesman internships. I believe Tage Frid and Frank Klaus were both taught to use bowsaws for most hand sawing chores, whether the cuts being made were crosscuts, rips, curves or even tight turns. Here in the US the trend has been more toward the conventional hand saws made by companies like Disston & Atkins. The bowsaw in the US developed more into speciality tools. From what I have read the difference has to do with what apprentice carpenters/woodworkers were taught to use in the different countries.

Glenn at Wood Joy Tools has a uTube video on bowsaws worth watching. He shows an old classic bowsaw, european design I think, that is apparently his model for the saws he makes. The two piece wood tensioning system is demonstrated. The piece of wood that resides between the strings spreads the winding pressure better. The second piece of wood which slides through the piece in the string allows a greater degree of adjustability. Glenn uses a thicker waxed string that does not stretch or kink as much as many strings used for the job.

Brian are you sawing with one hand? I think the saws Glenn makes are better used with two hands. I think Tage & Frank usually used bowsaws with two hands. I prefer a US design hand saw for one hand sawing and the Wood Joy saws for two hand sawing. I often find it easier to make medium to long cuts with two hands.

[Jim Davis]

By way of approaching an answer to my question about when these saws began to be called bow saws, I searched "Woodworking Tools 1600-1900, by

Peter C. Welsh. In the entire article there is not one mention of "bow" saws. Turning saws, at least one mention, but not bow saws, as one word or two.

It seems that using the term "bow saw," (formerly applied only to steel tubing-framed saws used to cut brush, limbs and firewood) to mean what have previously been called turning saws is a recent misuse that is taking hold in the absence of knowledge of tool history. It blurs the meaning, such that even in this thread a buck saw was thought to be a bow saw.

Perhaps only retired editors, such as I, give a hoot. :)

[James Pallas]

I have an interest bow saws at this time also. I had said in another thread that I had watched and had some instruction in their use by a person I thought to be a master of their use. Let me qualify this by saying I was about twenty at the time and he was 70 or close to it. Now I am close to 70 so it was a long time ago. He would come to restoration sites to make all kinds of things stair brackets, railings fret work for cabinets and the like. He had many "bow saws" and referred to them as such just to deferentiate between western saws and his saws. He had frames that he could turn the blades easily and ones that the blade was nearly fixed. He would at times change the frame on the same blade and continue his cut, from a tight reversing turn to a long sweep on the same work. I'm not the expert here at all, I am simply saying and describing what I saw and heard. I would guess that George or some of the Hays shop guys could explain a lot about the ins and outs of this type of saw. He did say that he used reworked band saw blades for most of his blades.
Jim

[Mike Holbrook]

Jim, not trying to contradict what you are finding, just to explain a little further what I wrote and why.

I had the pleasure of taking a few classes from Tage Frid at, what at the time was Highland Hardware now, Highland Woodworking. Tage was a fan of the bowsaw or bow saw. My dictionary defines bowsaw or bow saw the same "a narrow saw stretched like a bow string on a light frame". In his books Tage spells the word bowsaw, as does Glenn Livingston at Wood Joy Tools. Joel at Tools For Working Wood tends to spell bowsaw bow saw and Joel does a good deal of research into woodworking history, maybe bow saw is more correct? So bowsaw is just the spelling I am familiar with and hold a certain nostalgia for.

As my memory serves me there was a sort of dark ages for hand tools when machine/electric tools were "asserting' themselves. As I remember Tage was the first guy I found in woodworking who tried to encourage/revive the use of hand tools, back in the day. Tage, according to the Introduction to Book 1 of his three part series on woodworking "On being an apprentice" section, says he was born in Denmark apprenticing in a cabinetmaker's shop in Coppenhagen when he was very young. Tage in this book on joinery tended to show two ways to make most joints, by machine and by hand. In his classes Tage tended to almost beg his students to just try a bowsaw. He felt it was a much under used tool in the US at that time. Highland started carrying the only bowsaw they could find for sale at that time, largely I think due to Tage's teaching. I bought one of the original saws Highland sold after one of Tage's classes, it was horrible. Tage use to suggest filing bow saw blades just for rip. I think the reason was there were no good bowsaws or bowsaw blades available, so Tage came up with a work around. Tage is the guy I heard the explanation of bowasws vs hand saws from, admittedly it was many years ago and my memory is far from perfect. I think Frank Klaus has had some similar references to bowsaws, having learned in a similar european apprenticeship.

There is an article Tage Frid wrote that is still relatively popular on the internet "Sawing by Hand, bowsaw is best: keep it sharp". I think it was run by Fine Woodworking some years ago, there are other references to his thoughts around too. Some of the info I find uses pictures that are the same as the ones in his book on joinery so I will not link to them in case they are somehow illegally compiled....

At least in my warped mind, Tage may have helped to revive the use of the european version of this saw in the US some 40-50 years ago. Certainly, Tage was the man to peak my interest in the bowsaw and woodworking. So please forgive any misleading information an old man may have erroneously interpreted from another even older classic woodworker whom I may, rightly or wrongly, hold in high regard and fond remembrance.

[Jim Davis]

That is a logical explanation for the origin of the current use of the American term "bow saw." But since the 1940s, in America, the term bow saw has been almost universally used to refer to a metal-tube framed firewood cutting saw.

This has universally been called a bow saw:
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Here's another: http://www.lowes.com/pd_20268-44384-BHBS24_0__?productId=4363243

Before these saw frames were invented, NOTHING was regularly called a bow saw in America, and turning saws had gone out of favor by the time Henry Disston opened for business in 1940.
As for the dictionary definition, it fits either configuration.

It seems,from several sources, that "bow saw" is the older term for turning saws, the first such saws having been made from wood bent to hold a tensioned blade (very like a bow). When more sophisticated mechanisms were developed to hold a blade in tension, they began to be named according to their purpose, such as a "chair maker's saw," "veneer saw" and so on.

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So, I guess my only concern is that the more definitions there are for a given term the less clear its meaning in use.

On this forum, most readers will know that the term "bow saw" means a wood-framed narrow-bladed saw. Anywhere else, the 20% of the population who know a tool from a ghoul would think of the steel-tube framed saw.

I have made much ado about very little. Keep the blades sharp! (I'll keep thinking and saying turning saw. Hope you'll all know what I mean:)

[Chris Friesen]

I don't think it's wrong to call a turning saw a bow saw. As a counterexample to Peter Welsh, http://www.woodworkinghistory.com/glossary_bow_saw.htm shows an excerpt from Holtzapffel's 1846 book, where he cross-references both the continental frame saw and the turning saw as bow saws. The same site also references Moxon's "Mechanick Exercises" which contains on page 102, "The Use of the Hand-Saw marked D, the Frame or Bow-Saw...." while refering to a saw tightened by twisted cord.

If we start with the general category of frame saws, then you could divide that into ones where the blade is tensioned by the frame, and where the blade is tensioned by a cord/rod/thong on the back side.

A traditional buck saw is a large version of one where the blade is tensioned by a cord/rod/thong, and a turning saw is a small version.

A modern swede saw is a large version of a saw with the blade tensioned by the frame, and smaller versions would include the hacksaw, coping saw, and fretsaw.

[Mike Holbrook]

I have read many articles over the last 40+ years about bow saws or bowsaws. Sometimes people call large similar saws frame saws as Chris mentions above. Certainly similar tools are called different things and modified versions become 'the norm" in various locations. Hand saws as made by Disston and many other companies here in the US and produced in very large quantities for many years also have practically disappeared in the form they were once made in, all the original manufacturers gone. It seems hand tool woodworkers are by the nature of the tools we use ensconced in this world of vague and changing terms and spellings. When I type the word saw into the American Heritage (on-line) dictionary the definition includes some 6 pictures of different hand saw types.

I thought the OP was asking about the type of bowsaw sold by Highland Woodworking, WoodJoy, Tools For Making Wood and quite a few custom makers? The advantage of this saw type for many users is in it's adaptability not it's limitations. Turbo-Cut blades are available in rip, cross cut, universal and jigging/turning sizes. The Turbo-Cut jigging/turning blade is larger than the coping saw blades Tools for Working Wood uses in the saws they sell but make more gradual curves well. The ability to easily change the blade in one of these framed saws allows one frame to be used to make many different types of cuts in wood. The blade can be turned in the frame or removed and reattached to the frame with it in a hole drilled in wood as well. Interest from hand tool woodworkers in making/restoring their own hand tools seems to be driving interest in framed saws that can use a range of blades and be made with any type: frame fittings, handles, tensioning system, adjusting devices... the builder may find comfortable or beneficial.

[Jim Davis]

Mike, I think you have the picture well described. Great Neck Tools does, however, still actually make traditional handsaws. They aren't as good as the pre-1950s Disstons, but they are still made.

[Michael Ray Smith]

They're a lot of fun to make. If you buy it, you'll miss out. I've made three, now, I think -- two using the Gramercy hardware and blades and more or less their design. Another with a wide blade -- can't recall where I got it.

The old ones used leather? Huh. Didn't know that. I use hemp twine, and I thought that was being authentic. I take about 6-8 turns with the twine and wax it with beeswax. Tell you the truth, I wouldn't use either leather or paracord (especially 550) because both are too strong. It's easy to take one turn too many with the Spanish windlass, and I want the twine to break before the saw does.

It's also a good idea to make a toggle that can take a half-turn, like this one. Take a half turn with it, then slide it so the other end locks against the stretcher. George said this design is like something called a niddy noddy that's used to wind skeins of yarn. He also mentioned a song, "Niddy noddy, niddy noddy. Two heads, one body." He told me that I'd never be able to use the saw again without thinking of that song. He was right, as he is about most things.

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[Michael Ray Smith]

Oh, yeah, one more thing, at the risk of starting another debate . . . there are two schools of thought about turning saws, bow saws, coping saws, fret saws, pretty much anything with a tensioned blade. One school says the saw should cut on the pull stroke, like Japanese saws. The other school thinks it should cut on the push stroke, like European saws. I'm firmly in the "pull" camp, but reasonable people may differ. (They'll be wrong, but they may differ. :))

[Robert Engel]

Michael - thanks for answering my question!!

Have some left over Hickory think I'll save it for that project.

[Michael Ray Smith]

Hickory is perfect. Post some pics when you're done.

[Hilton Ralphs]

Frame saw or bow saw, what’s the difference?

Here is Paul Sellers take (https://paulsellers.com/2015/06/frame-saw-or-bow-saw-whats-the-difference/) on that.

[Jim Matthews]

I watched a couple years ago when the first attempts to make this were trotted out.
The fine teeth produce an amazing finish.

The example linked is polished by comparison.
Can't argue with the results shown.

[Johan Gustavsson]

Not that I know what he is saying but this Chinese bow saw doesn't look too hard to make. https://youtu.be/Mcxxypa4BQA (https://youtu.be/Mcxxypa4BQA)

[Bradley Hedges]

I made a small (coping blade sized) turning/bow saw last summer, using some oak I split from a piece of firewood. I used some 1/4 inch bolt hardware to mount the blade & handles, and artificial sinew from my muzzleloading/buckskinning days (a long time ago) to tension the blade. I would second the recommendation to use the sliding niddy-noddy device to allow for finer adjustment in the blade tension.

One point I would share is that you must be very careful in aligning the holes in the arms so the blade mounting hardware is pretty close to perfectly aligned. Starting with 4-square stock will help a lot with that. Here is a broad picture with several other tools I've built in the past several months. I'm sorry I can't find any better pictures and/or detail shots, but I'm feeling too lazy to walk out to the shop right now :-) I can take more later today, if you'd like.

Brad316465

[paul cottingham]

I made a bow saw with the Gramercy kit. I didn't put a pile of gorgeous curves on it, it's very utilitarian, but it is a great tool for the money.

[Archie England]

Does my experience count if I watched a friend make two for us both?

We bought the essential parts from TFWW but used our own wood and cord. Chris made the work look easy; but he's more talented than I. My thin blade saw works very well. We used Yew, I think.