Today I found out........

[mcbryde]

I can't cut a square pen blank to save my life! I tried to saw down some of the stuff that Scott and I cut up yesterday and I have a few problems:

1. I have a cheap a$$ bandsaw that pisses me off.

2. I have a cheap a$$ table saw that I am deathly afraid of now since my accident. It has a fence on it that didn't come with it, and evidentely leans so I don't get a good square cut, this pissing me off even more.

3. The more I try to cut a square blank and the more of this beautiful wood I screw up the more and more pissed off I get!

How do ya'll cut your blanks square? Table saw? Damnit, I might as well be out there in the garage with the damn Dremel tool trying to cut pen blanks straight as bad as these look. I need some help.

E

[sdb777]

Any chance you have two of those compression clamps?
Trash the fence and clamp a straight 2by to the top of the table saw, use it as a fence....

Your band saw is really good for trimming down those pine cones and such, but I thought those 2" thick(or larger) slabs of black walnut and oak might have been too big for that small blade.



Scott (I'm done for the weekend....ouchy) B

[TDHofstetter]

Stick with the table saw for cutting up your blanks. Make the time to tune it as well as you reasonably can, then rethink the fence situation. You CAN trick that sucker into cutting square & nice.

[Ruffnek]

Why do you need them square? Set the fence...either band saw or table saw app. 3/4" from the blade and push them through. If you end up with a parallelogram or something close, so what.

Personally, I usually cut them on the band saw. With a decently sharp blade you won't get much drift on a 2" thick board. Run the board through, take the small cut piece, turn it 90 degrees and run it hthrough again...you should have a somewhat square piece of 3/4" stock. Cut it to length and you're done.

[sachbvn]

Blanks don't need to be square - the more square the better, but we turn antler too.... that ain't even close to square for nothing.

The BS will eat up less wood and less chance of kickback for un-square things..... that'd be me effort unless you have a really really bad, underpowered BS..... a TS would work fine too.


Zac

[mcbryde]

The problem that i was having with the bandsaw is that I might have a blank that I started out cutting it at 7/8" and the blade bends and gets down to 3/4" then back up. I don't want to be selling something like that, you know what I mean?

E

[Doug B]

A cheap Band Saw is just a pain to have to use. Period. I've done that and am glad I finally upgraded. And I'd still like to upgrade the BS again.

But, like Cody said, why do you feel the need to make your blanks be perfectly square? I use all kinds of small pieces of wood for pens and I really don't care if they are all that square. Sure it is easier to drill a square pen blank, but it is not that hard to use something that is just big enough to drill a hole in and put on the lathe and turn into a pen. If you think about it, making the blank perfectly square is really wasted effort because you turn all the wood off anyway.

I'd use (even a crappy) BS to cut pen blanks instead of a table saw any day. A nice square pen blank sure looks good, but it is really not necessary.

In my thinking, there are 3 tools that are extremely helpful for pen turning. A band saw, a miter saw, and a drill press. And, of course, a lathe. But with those tools anything you want to turn on the lathe can be easily accomplished. But don't try to use a cheap BS, and use a good BS blade like a Timberwolf. It will save you lots of frustration.

[boodrow]

Most of the blanks Ive bought in the pass were not square at all when I got um , just remember ur goin to make um round anyway and it dont matter. Doug hit the nail on the head of tools to use.
Remember the person is goin to be turning off the square anyway.
Boodrow