Suggested rip blade for thick wood

[Thomas Wilson]

Have you checked your blade and rip fence alignment? Is the wood closing up the kerf at the back of the cut? Multiple passes might help?

i have certainly cut that deep on a far lesser saw. It was slow.

[Frank Pratt]

The Kapex is notoriously under powered, so don't expect too much of it with thick hardwoods.

[Jon Grider]

This may or may not be applicable to your situation, but if you rough rip the thick stock 1/8" or so oversize on your bandsaw and then rip to final size on your TS, the blade you have now will probably be fine.

[Alan Lightstone]

This may or may not be applicable to your situation, but if you rough rip the thick stock 1/8" or so oversize on your bandsaw and then rip to final size on your TS, the blade you have now will probably be fine.

That's an interesting idea, Jon. I could clearly do that easily.

[Jon Grider]

That's an interesting idea, Jon. I could clearly do that easily.

It's worth a try Alan, That technique has worked for me before. The bandsaw cut rids the wood piece of most of the inner stress so taking off just a sliver goes well.

[Dave Cav]

Or you could just head over to the band saw.

[Rob Luter]

Band saw for the win.

[Alan Lightstone]

OK. So I went to Woodcraft today and purchased a Forrest 20 tooth Woodworker II Ripping blade. (15 deg ATBR, 20 deg face hook.)

It cut through the hard maple like butter. Had to flip it, because it was too thick for my SawStop, but made a very clean cut. I was worried about a rough cut with that few teeth, but not at all the case.

I wonder if my Freud Thin Kerf Rip Blade is dull. I may send it in for sharpening. Or it just wasn't up to the task.

Interestingly, while the Kapex really was very underpowered for the crosscuts, and stalled multiple times and flipped a 15 amp breaker a few times, it did make a very clean cut. Now I had an 80 tooth blade on it, so my bad there for having the wrong blade on that to crosscut 3-1/2" hard maple, but the cut did turn out very clean.

I have no doubt that my bandsaw could have cut this with ease, but not as clean a cut, and I would have to plane it afterwards, which I really wasn't in the mood for.

[Jim Becker]

'Glad you had a good experience with that new ripping blade, Alan. It's a "beast" and yea, it looks like it might butcher wood, but it cuts amazingly clean considering the lower number of teeth.