Band saw - Meat to wood?
Marvin
garage sale and nearly died. There were at least 5 or 6 bandsaws in there.
The biggest one larger than 20". Turned out, after my initial shock, that
this guy bought out restaurant equipment. They were all meat saws.
Has anyone ever converted a meat saw to cut wood? Are they powerful enough?
Marvin
Kevin Singleton
Good luck.
Kevin
--
"Deal me another hand, Lord. This one's very hard."
http://homepages.msn.com/hobbyct/kevindsingleton
Marvin wrote in message ...
Rog
convert it. I would shy away for it, unless you can get one near to free,
then expect to do a lot to get it up for a decent wood cutter.
rog
Dave Mundt
this might be an interesting project. However, the meat saws I
have seen have, typically, been of somewhat lighter construction than
the ones for woodworking. Having said that, I don't think there is
any way that a 20" saw CAN be made much lighter, and, still work, so,
it might simply be a matter of putting a stronger motor on it, and,
perhaps, changing the drive pullies to get the blade speed to about 2k
ft/minute.
If you can get it for low money, I agree, it would be worth
trying. Beyound that, I would have to look at the machine itself.
Regards
Dave Mundt
"Marvin" <nik...@ecn.mb.ca> wrote:
>I have been shopping for a band saw for a while. Stopped in at a local
>garage sale and nearly died. There were at least 5 or 6 bandsaws in there.
>The biggest one larger than 20". Turned out, after my initial shock, that
>this guy bought out restaurant equipment. They were all meat saws.
>
>Has anyone ever converted a meat saw to cut wood? Are they powerful enough?
>
>Marvin
>
>
Remove the "REMOVE_THIS_" from my email address to get to me...
I hate Cullers who gather from newsgroups
Visit my home page at http://www.esper.com/xvart/index.html
David F. Eisan
The meat cutting band saws I have seen have a larger fixed (non tilt)
work surface than a standard ww'ing band saw and have a chrome or
stainless steel pan (to catch the blood, which may or may not be
helpful, depending on how clumsy you are) that you cut in rather than on
a cast iron table. Butchers don't often have the need to make pukey
ducks, but they do resaw whole cows, so I would check on the max/min
blade width. I would also check the speed of the blade, I don't know
what speed you use on meat and bone, but it may be different than what
you should use on wood.
Thanks,
David.
May you live in Interesting Times - Ancient Chinese Curse.
Newbies, please read this newsgroups FAQ.
rec.ww FAQ http://www.robson.org/woodfaq/
Archives http://x29.deja.com/home_ps.shtml
crowbar FAQ http://www.concentric.net/~Odeen/oldtools/crowbar.shtml
Paul T. Radovanic
A lot depends on the brand. Most meat saws are 2HP to 3HP (so they
can cut frozen meat and bone), which is plenty strong enough for wood.
Watch out for 3-phase motors. Also watch out for badly rusted legs
and tables. Meat rooms are typically hosed down on a daily basis,
sometimes with caustic detergent. (This also means that the wheels
may be rusted solid to the shafts). Finally, check the blade size --
it's probably an odd size, so you would be limited to whatever kerfs
the mfr supplies in that size.
In addition, meat saws have no tires on the wheels, so tracking is a
problem. Plus, the table doesn't tilt, so you don't get the full
benefit of a BS designed for wood.
They do have a sliding table, which seems cool at first -- but doesn't
really have much benefit for wooddorking -- not on a BS anyway.
If you can get it for $100 or less, it might tide you over until you
can get a real band saw. But the seller can get more than that from
any mom-n-pop meat market, if the saw is in halfway decent shape.
Paul Rad
Jeff LaCoss
I'd think that a meat bandsaw would work pretty well, if you
can live with the blade speed. I don't know how much the speed
can be changed, but it's gotta be low to start with - you don't
want to cook the edges of a piece of meat you're sawing. Perhaps
the pulleys could be changed to bump the revs.
Think about what these things have to saw through - major bones
are TOUGH. They also have to be able to saw through blocks of
frozen meat. 1/2-steer-size blocks, so resaw capacity is good.
(Beef veneer... now what to use for finish...)
Most of these saws have pretty wide blades, and when I've seen
them used, the butcher is really jamming the work to speed the
cut. (Time is money, eh?) Saw's gotta have a lot of power to do
that.
If you can get the thing cheap enough, go for it.
Jeff
sto...@storm.ca
>are TOUGH. They also have to be able to saw through blocks of
>frozen meat. 1/2-steer-size blocks, so resaw capacity is good.
>(Beef veneer... now what to use for finish...)
I'm not much for veneer though, I prefer my beef about
5/4..............
Andy Dingley
>Has anyone ever converted a meat saw to cut wood?
No. After looking at one, and realising how inadequate the blade
guides would be for accurate woodworking, I decided against trying it.
I guess butchers don't do much resawing.....
gary Huff
board and it cut OK. Don't look for great accuracy here as the blade
guides are little more than slits in a guide bar but for a hundred bucks
or so I think you might get a machine shop to reto a set of after market
guides to it. I got mine as a freeBe so it is alot better than NO BS.
John Harpur
"Andy Dingley" <din...@codesmiths.com> wrote in message
news:k25mis44q3o8g8fci...@4ax.com...
> "Marvin" <nik...@ecn.mb.ca> a écrit :
>
> >Has anyone ever converted a meat saw to cut wood?
>
> guides would be for accurate woodworking, I decided against trying it.
>
> I guess butchers don't do much resawing.....
>
career as a butcher but subsequently discovered he was a better
wood carver than butcher. All blanks are cut on his old meat saw.
He operates from his old butcher's premises, cutting and carving
wood behind the counter. Worth a visit if you ever get this far.
Verne H. Bohlender
bandsaw blades and tires for the wheels and used it for a while but it
just hasn't got the proper feel for wood as per meat. The depth of
cut is much higher but so is the blad sway. I bought a King bandsaw
and am quite happy I did. Actually got the price I paid for the old
meat saw though. Have fun cutting wood!
Verne
http://www3.sympatico.ca/verneb