Band Saw Resawing Secrets

Almost all problems that occur with resawing after you have tuned up your saw is due to the wrong blade being used. A dull blade is nothing but trouble! You should use the widest blade that your saw can handle. Select a blade with three or four teeth per inch and a 5 to 10 degree hook. The hook tooth design is an aggressive blade that has deeper gullets for better sawdust removal and it also reduces the feed pressure that you have to make. You will find that most 3/4” blades are .025 in thickness which is too heavy for a 14” bandsaw, so use a 1/2” blade.

If you are very fortunate, your band saw will track perfectly and resawing will be a great experience, but if are like 99% of us it will not. The fence is the first thing that needs modification. The fence needs to be as high as the piece being sawn. If the fence is too low, when feeding the board through the saw the bottom of the board will tend to move away from the fence. The face of the fence MUST be 90-degrees to the table. Even if the fence is out of square by only a 1/2-degree, the finished boards resawn from a wide board will have a taper.

You may have to adjust the fence for lead or drift. Setting the fence at the right drift angle is critical to resawing. Start by cutting on a piece of scrap. Stop about half the length of the board and trace the angle of the board onto the bandsaw table with a pencil line. Clamp the board to the table and set up the fence along the joined edge of the board. Now the fence is parallel to the cut, and the blade will have no drift. Be sure to join both edges and one face. Run the joined face against the fence.

When you re-saw keep both hands on the piece. Put our right hand on the end grain, pushing the board through the saw. Keep the left hand low and spread your fingers to press the piece against the fence across a wide area. Slow constant feed pressure is the key to success. If you stop sawing for a moment, the blade will bite a bit deeper.