Resaw 13” wide cherry

[Thomas Crawford]

Any suggestions on being successful resawing an 8/4 13” wide cherry board by hand? 8 feet long. My 16” jet bandsaw only has about 10.5” of capacity. I have an A3-41 16” wide jointer/planer so I would like to avoid ripping it. These will end up being 4 sides of matching bookshelves.

I don’t have a frame saw, I’m wondering if I cut some kind of kerf with maybe a circular saw and then just manhandle it with my 26” 7 ppi Disston?

Not something I’d normally do but I’d like to do whatever I can to keep it whole.

[Richard Line]

I'm sure you'll get some better advise for others shortly.

This is how I'd make your cut (this is after making a similar cut in well seasoned Doug Fir, with a 6.5 ppi rip Disston). Assuming you have a good guide for your circular saw, I'd first cut a kerf, about 1/8 to a 1/4 deep, all around the board. Then, still using the circular saw, in multiple passes deepen the kerfs on the long sides to 3" or deeper. Next step, go to work with the Disston saw. The kerfs will guide the cut and leave you with only a 7 inch cut.

Of course, you might ask anyone close if they have 4 or 4 1/2 ppi saw. (I now have a 4 1/2 ppi saw, and am glad.)

Enjoy.

[Rob Luter]

I’d find someone local with a bigger saw and barter for some help. Ripping that by hand will be a marathon task, as will truing up the results (if by hand as well).

[Thomas Crawford]

Well here was my process:

1. Cut a kerf with my plow plane
2. Get about 8” into the end of the board, things are going well
3. Give up as I realized it will take hours to do this by hand
4. Trim it up to 10 1/4” and resaw through the bandsaw
5. Be extremely disappointed as I realize that about 25% of the end of the board is punky and unuseable.

The question still stands as I have another board that is almost 15” wide, but I am not using it on this project so I have some time to figure out if I want to go the frame saw route.

[Andrew Hughes]

Why not rip it down the middle. Resaw,Face it,plane it and joint the two part back together.
Is there something wrong with you A3 41. That’s what it’s for

[Thomas Crawford]

Why not rip it down the middle. Resaw,Face it,plane it and joint the two part back together.
Is there something wrong with you A3 41. That’s what it’s for

I was worried once I cut it, lost the kerf, and then re-jointed the edge the grain might not line up well anyway. I decided I'd rather have a 10" continuous piece in the front and try to match up toward the back.

Plus at this point I only got 1 pair of sides out of it anyway because of the punky wood.

[Andrew Hughes]

The grain pattern will change a little. My experience is the if I leave the board long I can remake the grain pattern but the ends will be offset. To me a invisible glue line is the goal.
Its a good approach to have experienced in. 10 wide resawn can cup a lot. I resaw on my bandsaw rarely do I go over 8 inches if I have thick timber I might give a go for fun. But it’s also hard on the blade.
I offer this pic of a 10 inch x 12 ft pine board for proof and a example.
Good Luck

[Derek Cohen]

Any suggestions on being successful resawing an 8/4 13” wide cherry board by hand? 8 feet long. My 16” jet bandsaw only has about 10.5” of capacity. I have an A3-41 16” wide jointer/planer so I would like to avoid ripping it. These will end up being 4 sides of matching bookshelves.

I don’t have a frame saw, I’m wondering if I cut some kind of kerf with maybe a circular saw and then just manhandle it with my 26” 7 ppi Disston?

Not something I’d normally do but I’d like to do whatever I can to keep it whole.

Hi Thomas

How wide are the bookshelves? A few observations:

1. If you need all 13", then you need to resaw the board.

2. If you need less than 13", then trim it down to a little over that dimension first.

3. If you need more than 13", you are going to need to book match boards. In fact, you could aim to do that now with narrower boards (i.e. rip the 13" into 2 x 6 1/2", resaw these, and glue back as a book matched panel).

4. If these panels are intended for shelves, will it make a difference anyway. We usually place objects on shelves, which obscures the wood.

Regards from Perth

Derek

[William Fretwell]

I like Derek’s #3. Have done that before. Even after planing the edges for joining the joint is barely visible in normal figured wood. If a large board is cupped I flip the pieces to flatten it and save wood.

[chris carter]

I would plane a halfway decent reference face and edge and then run a pass on each edge through the table saw and cut as deep as the saw will go. Or, I guess if you use a circular saw you would only need a halfway decent reference face. Depending upon the size of the blade, that would leave anywhere from 5 to 8 inches or so left the do with the hand saw. Still would be a lot of work with a 7tpi rip saw, but doable. 5 would be a lot easier. Of course, a giant Roubo fame saw would tackle the whole thing on it’s own in less time other than a giant band saw.

[Ed Mitchell]

Since you say you want to keep it whole, that means resaw, and 7 ppi is going to be a train wreck. A frame saw at 2-3 ppi, or just buy someone a 6-pack in exchange for having them resaw it on their bandsaw or borrow their framesaw. There are many lumber mills that do milling, ask them how much for a simple resaw on a single board. If you don't want to buy a framesaw, a handsaw at 4 ppi would do OK, but sharpen it up and take it slow, maybe kerf with something finer if you really want to preserve as much as possible.

Of course you can use this as an excuse to upgrade your bandsaw....

[Tom M King]

I once took the table and upper guide assembly off my 24" Centauro to do a resaw more than the saws normal capacity. Of course, on that saw with a 1" blade the guides don't do a whole lot anyway. I cobbled up a "fence", used roller supports, and went really slowly. It did it with no trouble.

[Ben Ellenberger]

I’m another vote for ripping narrower then book matching the panels, rather than trying to resaw a 13” wide panel by hand. My rip saw is 26” and 5-6 ppi, and I’d consider 6-7” about as wide as I want to resaw with it. Even that will be a lot of work if these are tall bookcases.

[Reed Gray]

Like Andrew said, I would rip it down the middle and then resaw the individual boards. If you have a good glue joint, it wouldn't be noticeable to anyone other than another fine furniture maker, and even then, they would have to look closely....

robo hippy

[Prashun Patel]

You may also lose some unaccounted for width if you have any tension in that board.

More impressive than width for width's sake is intentional matching of grain. You can slip match the joint or book match it as suggested below. While it makes it easier to process as 2 boards, I've also ripped boards into 3rds if it puts the rip line along straighter grain. This is easier to hide or match to neighboring boards.