Keeping bandsaw blade clean?

[Dan Forman]

When cutting green wood into blanks, how do y'all keep your band saw blades from gunking up? I have heard that Pam cooking spray wiped on the blade helps, but I don't find it very effective. Any other suggestions? Thanks,

Dan

[Curtis Myers]

I use PAM or CRC-36 which is a machine surface preserver.
i apply after I clean the blade. One does not seam any better then the other.

I really like your eternity quote.

[Hayes Rutherford]

WD-40 helps, there are probably better things but usually at an increased cost.

[Roger Chandler]

With the saw off [unplugged] I take a synthetic pad dipped into mineral spirits [use glove to protect your skin from the mineral spirits and from the saw teeth] and with my right hand, wrap the wet pad around the blade from the back side, trying to let a gap remain so the teeth pass between my thumb and finger, then I spin the wheel with my left hand several times. {just as a warning- NEVER, EVER, NEVER do this with the saw running/powered!!! :eek:}

When I get back to the original place I started on the blade, I dip the pad again in the mineral spirits, to clean the pad, and start over again.......most of the time this does a good job on the blade. For cleaning the wheels, I always take the blade off the saw and spin them with a small brush held against the wheel with the mineral spirits, and wipe them down very good before putting the blade back on.

I have done this for years and had very good success with my blades lasting and the saw has never had a problem.

[Dick Strauss]

Bandsaws with roller guides on the sides tend to pack down the wet sawdust onto the blade IME. I prefer the old standard block guides or cool blocks on the sides with wet wood that actually help scrape the sawdust material off the blade if the gap is set properly. I have also found that the little brushes when placed properly do help prevent buildup. It is also a good idea to make sure you clean off the tires every so often as well.

I have unplugged the BS and scraped the packed gunk off the blade with an old sharp chisel for a buddy that has roller guides. I place the chisel as flat as I can get it on the BS table just behind the blade gullet and slowly move the blade by hand by turning the wheel. Do the same to both blade sides and you will probably be back in business.

They also make blade lubricating sticks that are supposed to help prevent buildup but I have never tried them.

[John Keeton]

I don't get much gumming on my blades as I use mostly dry wood. However, I would think the best method would be to remove the blade, coil it back into a compact coil and soak it (teeth down) in a shallow pan with some cleaner such as Simple Green. I imagine there are other cleaners that might work, as well.

[John K Jordan]

...how do y'all keep your band saw blades from gunking up?...

Do you have good, stiff brushes mounted inside the saw to knock off the junk before it gets compacted by the wheels and guides? I had to make a bracket for one of my saws to mount a section I cut from a stiff scrubbing brush.

Maybe the brushes help. I don't lube or treat the blades and don't get buildup when cutting green wood, and I process a lot of turning blanks.

Or maybe it's the species - do you have problems with any specific types of wood? I cut what grows around here: cherry, maple, walnut, dogwood, persimmon, sassafras, elm, eastern red birch, sycamore, bradford pear, cedar, etc. - never any buildup. I do get gunk on my Woodmizer sawmill blade but only when cutting Virginia Pine which I clean off while running with a tool.

Also, what kind of blade do you use? I used to use 3/4" to 1" 3-tpi but eventually went to thinner 1/2" 3-tpi blades made from Lenox stock by a local company.

JKJ

[Michael Mills]

I use the compressor for guides/rollers. I keep a section (about 1' length) of dry 4X4 and cut a slice off after cutting wet wood. It works for me in keeping the blade clean.

[Dan Forman]

Thanks for al of the replies. I am using a Rikon 14" 10-325 with a Lenox Di-master 3 TPI 1/2" blade. It does have the roller guides, and has a stiff brush on the far side of the bottom wheel (left side if facing the saw). It doesn't touch the bade, just the wheel. The buildup collects on both sides of the blade. Most of the wood I find is elm or maple, sometimes walnut. I feed a little dry wood through from time to time in hopes that it will abrade some of the gunk away before it hardens up. When the build up starts to effect the cut, I will remove it with a card scraper, but due to the geometry of the the teeth, it is a very tedious process. Needless to say anything past the gullet line is done with the saw turned off. The buildup will go right out the the points of the teeth.

John Jordan- Do your brushes contact the blade, or just the wheel? Do you have roller guides or blocks? I see that all of my woods are included in your list.

Thanks, Dan

[allen thunem]

I find soaking the coiled blades in lacquer thinner works as well as anything
dissolves the gunk right off without having to do much scrubbing

[Brian Kent]

When I processed 74 freshly cut Fern Pine blanks, I had to clean the blade several times. Each time took an hour or so. There was a yellow resin that bonded to the blade. I used up a whole lot of Simple Green and a whole lot of sanding sponges.

Things that did not work: everything else. Incidentally, I was using the identical blade that Don Forman used.

[Dan Forman]

Well, I think I may be on to what the difficulty is - a poorly thought out design for the Rikon's dust collection, at least as far as green wood is concerned. Here is a pic of the Rikon (Black wheel) 338220 , (click to enlarge) then my MiniMax MM16 (White wheel). 338221 note how the dust is channeled away from the blade in the MM, the blade (which is missing) goes through a slot in an angled piece of plywood, and the dust port is above where the blade would contact the wheel.

The Rikon, however, has the dust port below the wheel, that little semi circle near the floor of the chamber, and there is nothing to keep the wet dust from settling between the tire and the blade. I just cut some apple blanks spindle blanks, and after just one rip there was significant buildup on the blade, mostly on the left side where it is pressed to the blade by the tire. There is a good stiff brush in the upper left corner, but the wet dust has already been packed on the blade by then.

I don't know how other brands handle this, would appreciate any feedback as to how this compares to other brands, and whether there is a way to fix this saw. It doesn't seem to be so much of a problem with dry wood.

Thanks,
Dan

[Hayes Rutherford]

Dan, I think you could add a brush and a dust port. A bracket would need to be fabricated for the brush, and a hole saw could possibly drill through on the side or back of the saw in an area just below the blade guides.

[John K Jordan]

...there is nothing to keep the wet dust from settling between the tire and the blade.

I suspect you are right.

My 18" Rikon, which does not collect gunk on the blade, has dust collection a bit like the MinMax with a small chamber under the lower guides with an angled 4" port. The bladed goes through a slot in the angled steel bottom which is made narrow with two rubber pieces contacting the blade. The lower cabinet also has a second 4" port at the very bottom of the lower cabinet. All this has worked fairly well but I improved it considerably by building a shroud around the lower guides to pull even more dust down. I connect both of these ports to a 6" duct (along with an additional 4" flexible hose I position on top the table where needed with a magnet.)

I suspect adding a second port under the lower guides would help a lot. Sure wouldn't hurt!

JKJ

[Dan Forman]

I will look into moving or adding a dust port up above the wheel and see what can be done about channeling the dust away from the wheel. And advice about creating a 4" hole in the steel housing?

Dan

[Enrico Caruso]

Dan, perhaps you can get a clue on revising the dust port from looking at the new Rikon 10-326 dust port, which is supposedly redesigned for improved dust collection. You can see it in the Rikon video on the 10-326 which describes the model design features.

Rick

[Ron Rutter]

[QUOTE=Dan Forman;2569514]I will look into moving or adding a dust port up above the wheel and see what can be done about channeling the dust away from the wheel. And advice about creating a 4" hole in the steel housing?

A 4" hole saw will work but it is a slow noisy process! For cleaning the blades off the saw just set them in a dish with powdered dish soap & hot water. Soak for 20-30 minutes then swipe with a soft brush. I sure wouldn't use lacquer thinner!

[Paul Gilbert]

To remove sap - gunk - anything originating from wood I use turpentine. It is distilled from Pine trees you know.

[Dan Forman]

I looked at the video of the new 10-326, and they made some nice improvements, but not anything that would help with this particular problem. There is still nothing to prevent the dust from falling onto the wheel and getting caught between it and the blade. They need to move the dust port up so that it catches the dust before it can reach the wheel, and come up with some sort of a zero clearance insert above the wheel like the MM16 has.

I wouldn't mind cleaning the blade after each cutting session, but as it is, I need to clean it after couple of passes with the apple wood.

[Jamie Straw]

I haven't read through the replies so apologies if this has already been suggested, but you might want to try a dry silicone spray. I was drilling Forstner bit holes in some pitch burl the other day (display for wine stoppers), and the first hole just killed the bit -- pitch which hardened in just a minute. After I cleaned the bit, I sprayed some dry silicone lube on it and let it dry, then drilled 3 holes before needing to clean it again, and it was easier to clean. However, this won't help much with keeping any long curlies you get from cutting with the grain (log standing up).

[Dan Forman]

I did have better luck yesterday, I put the narrow attachment on my shop vac to concentrate the suction, and wedged it in place under the saw table, right next to the blade on the left hand side to hopefully pick up most of the debris before it could reach the wheel, and made a zero clearance insert for the table to limit what would fall through. Between the two measures I was able to saw quite a bit of elm and maple into spindle blanks before significant buildup occurred on the teeth of the blade. Unlike yesterday, there was very little stuck to the band portion of the blade, so my efforts paid off to some degree. I still need to clean the blade before using it again, but at least I was able to get a good amount of work done before that became necessary. Next step is to find a way to mount brushes on either side of the blade above the wheel to see if that will prevent buildup on the teeth.

Jamie - I have been thinking of trying either silicon or teflon on the blade, though not sure how long it would stay on due to the abrasiveness of wood. Probably worth a shot.

Dan

[John K Jordan]

Dan, I hesitated to suggest this since some forum safety cop might think it dangerous, but I don't. A random reader can use it or not at his discretion.

On one saw when I got some residue when cutting particularly resinous pine with a wide blade I cleaned it off the sides while the blade was running. I used a length of thin, 1/4" square brass tubing and held it flat on the table and pushed it against the side of the blade (not the teeth). The brass is soft so it cannot accidentally damage the blade even if you run it into the teeth. The tubing was fairly long so my fingers were well away from the blade. The sharp end of the square tubing quickly cleaned up the gunk on side of the blade and let me get back to sawing.

JKJ

[Jeffrey J Smith]

Dan - on my GriZzley 14" saw there was enough room to add a plastic doc port under the table up next to the blade. With a doc splitter that adds a 2-1/2" port and a short length of flexible tubing it collects a lot of the noodles before they get into the lower cabinet. Works pretty well, gets a lot of it, but I still have to clean out after several blanks.

[Jamie Straw]

Hmph! Tried "Reply with Quote, but it doesn't seem to be working. Dan: Sure, it's worth a shot, the stuff I used was CRC Heavy Duty Silicone. Also, check out Reed's BAND SAW DUST PORTS DO NOT SUCK!!! video if you haven't seen it yet: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nLuRgku_F0w Very impressive, indeed, the improvement after his modifications.