MowryJournal.com   Life's Passions

I was in the garage workshop, and it was work. Sweat was involved. Work.

But then, when you’re cutting 10′ hard maple planks that weigh about 50 pounds, you, uh, work.

Here’s the table saw ready to do a crosscut on a hard maple plank.

I was ripping 2″ thick hard maple and black walnut, which means I was cutting the boards lengthwise. For this operation, my table saw is underpowered … I’ve got a good home-use saw, but this is a demanding cut into very hard lumber.

And I had been making them for a while.

The secret to making good cuts is going slow and steady. Too slow, and the blade may burn the wood. Too fast, and you stress the saw motor until it stops. That could be bad. Very bad.

I was going slow and steady, but the blade still stopped. I quickly turned off the saw so I could carefully back the board away from the blade. I assumed the knot in the end of the board was pinching the blade (when a board has uneven grain, such as around a knot, it can squeeze the blade and stress the motor). So, I flipped the board end for end and began the rip again.

This time, the blade quickly seized AND the saw tripped the breaker on the power circuit. Big trouble.

And that’s when it hit me. I was working too hard. Why wasn’t the saw doing the work? Could it be the blade was dull?

I pulled the sharpened blade I had waiting on the shelf. I use the Forrest Woodworker II 3/32″ Thin Kerf blade.

TMI?

I’ve got 2 blades that I rotate. When one gets dull, it goes out to be sharpened. When I get it back, it sits on the shelf until the cycle repeats. The blade on the shelf had been mailed back to me January 2012. That tells me 2 things:

• I’m not doing enough woodworking.
• The blade in the saw should be dull after 2 years … especially as I enter round 3 of the routed bowl affair.

So back to the question. Why was I working so hard?

I installed the newly sharpened blade, and tried to cut the 2″ thick hard maple again. How did it cut?

Like butter.

I need to remember to not work so hard.

Here is the largest variety of hardwood I’ve ever had in the shop. From left, there is black walnut, hard maple, canarywood, mahogany, padauk (the orange one), purpleheart (you figure it out), African teak, cherry and poplar. But I’m not going to work hard.