Tag Archives: woodworking
The Three-Tooth Rule
The Three-Tooth Rule, or How the Number of Teeth Work in a Cut. In order to obtain the best TPI (teeth per inch) for the smoothest cut, follow the three-tooth rule. A minimum of three and a maximum of 24 teeth engaged in a cut. If there are too few teeth in a cut, the blade’s teeth can straddle the work piece and cause the teeth to strip. Too many teeth in a cut may cause the gullets to overload due to there not being enough gullet capacity to hold all of the chips. Along with having teeth strip from the saw blade, blade bounce is …
Bandsaw Blade Gullets
Bandsaw blade gullets are the space or curvature between each individual tooth on a saw blade. With each pass of the blade, the material being cut will curl into the gullet, creating a spiral of material called the chip. Too many teeth in the cut will make the gullet full. The teeth become filled with this excess material, and the chip will eventually break away. Use a variable pitch blade since the alternating pitch created increases and then decreases the chip load inside the cut. One reason to pay attention to gullet size is that with coarser pitch blades, the …
