Alan DuBoff
12-03-2008, 3:57 PM
Ok, this is not directly related to woodworking, but there has been a lot of discussion about building handsaws and a Foley retoother is your friend in that regard. This equipment is very funky, in design, the architect must have had his head on sideways or something...
Essentially you have a carrier, which is a bar that has some cross plates which the blade is attached to, and a ratchet is attached to the opposite side of the bar, which gets ratcheted by the Foley equipment.
Most all of the Foley handsaw equipment uses these carriers and ratchets. The ratchets will do more than one size in some cases, and you adjust the knob to dial in the amount of teeth you would like it to advance. This allows you to use these ratchets interchangeably to cut any size tooth from about 4 ppi up to 16 ppi (16 ppi is the smallest teeth the Foley supports but Mike Wenzloff has reported that someone has done 17 ppi before with a custom ratchet). With a proper gear cutting machine you could make the ratchets, but I'm not going down that rat hole, I have a complete set of ratchets that I have gathered off ebay, along with a few retoothers.
EDIT: you need multiple ratchets, there's about 9 or 10 in total.
The retoother is the most valuable machine of all the Foley equipment, I see little value for most folks in the filer and/or power setters. Although, there is merit to the power setter if you set a LOT of saws at once. Also, the filer is rumored not to work well on smaller teeth.
Here's some pics.
From left to right,
1) How the gages and blade attach to the carrier. EDIT: in the picture I am showing a blade that has been toothed already, but it is the flat side on top which will get stamped as it goes through the foley.
2) How the ratchet attaches to the opposite side of the carrier. You can see the gages next to the carrier, they clip on the carrier bar to adjust the saw plate.
3) The ratchet advance on the retoother.
4) The results. EDIT: this is how the blade comes out of the Foley, with the cut teeth on top.
I have galleries of each of these "So you always wanted to build handsaws..." threads I've been posting, but want to keep some of it intact on SMC for the future.
Essentially you have a carrier, which is a bar that has some cross plates which the blade is attached to, and a ratchet is attached to the opposite side of the bar, which gets ratcheted by the Foley equipment.
Most all of the Foley handsaw equipment uses these carriers and ratchets. The ratchets will do more than one size in some cases, and you adjust the knob to dial in the amount of teeth you would like it to advance. This allows you to use these ratchets interchangeably to cut any size tooth from about 4 ppi up to 16 ppi (16 ppi is the smallest teeth the Foley supports but Mike Wenzloff has reported that someone has done 17 ppi before with a custom ratchet). With a proper gear cutting machine you could make the ratchets, but I'm not going down that rat hole, I have a complete set of ratchets that I have gathered off ebay, along with a few retoothers.
EDIT: you need multiple ratchets, there's about 9 or 10 in total.
The retoother is the most valuable machine of all the Foley equipment, I see little value for most folks in the filer and/or power setters. Although, there is merit to the power setter if you set a LOT of saws at once. Also, the filer is rumored not to work well on smaller teeth.
Here's some pics.
From left to right,
1) How the gages and blade attach to the carrier. EDIT: in the picture I am showing a blade that has been toothed already, but it is the flat side on top which will get stamped as it goes through the foley.
2) How the ratchet attaches to the opposite side of the carrier. You can see the gages next to the carrier, they clip on the carrier bar to adjust the saw plate.
3) The ratchet advance on the retoother.
4) The results. EDIT: this is how the blade comes out of the Foley, with the cut teeth on top.
I have galleries of each of these "So you always wanted to build handsaws..." threads I've been posting, but want to keep some of it intact on SMC for the future.