Are TS blades flat?

[Ron Dunn]

Two things prompted this question:

I've been thinking about a Wixey angle gauge
I read the recent thread from a user having trouble making a cutting boardIf a blade tapers across its width (ie, the body of the blade just below the teeth is thinner than the body of the blade just above the arbour), how do we account for this in blade alignment when using an angle gauge, or a square held against the blade?

[Dale Lesak]

Yes the blades are flat. The teeth of the blade will be just a little wider then the body of the blade other wise the blade would rub on the wood as your cutting it. with the wixey your checking the body of the blade but being that the blade is round your also checking the angle of the teeth. It's just the the saw kerf is just a little wider then the body of the blade.

[Mike Marcade]

Some blades are flatter than others. Some of the cheaper blades are definitely not flat enough.

[Dale Lesak]

Ron, as Mike said some blades are flatter then others. But in regards to the Wixey, they are flat. the only blade I know of that is not flat. (made that way) is a special plywood blade and it has two different thickness. you can see the thinner section up by the teeth and you can only cut wood that is about 1 1/4 thick and thinner. It's gotta have 200 or more teeth on it, it a real fine cutting blade. :)

[Joe Kaufman]

Some blades that have the pronounced tensioning ring can have tooth runout in a different place than the plate face. For example, I have a Freud Fusion 410 blade that has a tensioning ring at 3.13 in. radius. Runout at 3.0 in. radius is less than .002 inch. Runout at the teeth is .007+ inch and in a different location. Is this enough to affect the accuracy of the angle of cut? The only drawback that I notice is there is no such thing as a ZCI after using this blade. As far as I can tell, the blade runs true under dynamic conditions.
Joe

[Dan Forman]

I don't use the Wixey to set my table saw blade to 90*. I did that once, made some cuts, and discovered they weren't true. Now I only use the Starrett combo square for that.

Dan

[glenn bradley]

I love my Wixey. The Beall unit goes to two decimal places which I have decided I wish I had. There is a short learning curve on transitioning the unit from the table to the blade to avoid mis-reads but that is true on both units. I use it on the CMS and to set my DP table angle as well all with good results. One of the best $40 I've ever spent and they're on sale all over the place for $10 off right now.

Blade blanks are thinner than the teeth but I have never had a problem with Freud-or-better blades. I've seen the tensioning ring mentioned and you just need to factor that in to make sure it is right for your saw.

I run TK blades with stabilizers. I have never noticed a problem without the stabilizers but got them free and all my ZCI's etc. are set up for them so I just use them. Remember, we're cutting wood here. Although I strive to get my machines as accurate as possible, a couple thou is going to get taken care of with the first swipe of sandpaper or your plane. Don't make yourself nuts.

[Chris Padilla]

Two things prompted this question:

I've been thinking about a Wixey angle gauge
I read the recent thread from a user having trouble making a cutting boardIf a blade tapers across its width (ie, the body of the blade just below the teeth is thinner than the body of the blade just above the arbour), how do we account for this in blade alignment when using an angle gauge, or a square held against the blade?

Ron, I don't think anyone really answered your question. In that thread that you read about the cutting board issue, I posted about two important tool set-up tools I use all the time in my shop:

http://www.grizzly.com/catalog/2007/Main/298

The Super Bar and the Master Plate. They are spendy but they work extremely well and will fine tune your saw for you. The Master Plate is used in place of a saw blade for that very reason you outline: you can't reliably put a square up against a saw blade because the body is thinner than the teeth so you don't have a good reference. Also, you can always rely on the saw blade being dead flat. The Master Plate is dead flat and is therefore an excellent reference.

If you don't want to spend the money on The Master Plate, you could probably reliably use an appropriatelty sized piece of plexiglass or acrylic or anything else you can find that you feel is flat that you can attach on the arbor of your saw. A chunk of plywood or MDF might work, too.