Build a Bucksaw (Competition registration)

[British Red]

1/ Wayland
2/ Falling Rain
3/ Weaver
4/ Rod
5/ Aaron
6/ Stew
7/ Spamel
8/ Demographic
9/ Chrisanson
10/ Aragorn
11/ Old Jimbo
12/ sam acw
13/ John C
14/ OzaawaaMigiziNini
15/ Marts
16/ Pignut
17/ Jon Pickett
18/ Big John
19/ kobalt01
20/ Ice Tigre
21/ Scanker
22/ Woodwalker
23/ Greywolf
24/ ledamni
25/ queeg9000
26/ Singeblister
27/ Loz
28 P@aul
29/ English Herts
30/ Bisamrette
31 / Moduser
32/ g4ghb
33/ Boxy the caffeine freak

P@ul et al. If you feel up to sharing any pictures of the less succesful attempts, I'm sure it will help others.....

I plan to share many failures when I get to mine

Red

 

[OzaawaaMigiziNini]

Be interesting to see if OMN can manage something even more decorated than Grahams "disco ball" firesteel

Red

You're talking about a man who once made a werewolf costume for hallowe'en out of rabbit fur, torn jeans and combat boots... I can make anything work

And Graham, your disco ball is magnificant... but this saw will give me title of "Wow, why on earth did you do that?" Champion!

 

[British Red]

Righto Ladies and Gentlemen

Entries into the "BIG BUSHCRAFT BUCKSAW BUILDOFF" are now closed.

There will be four polls in the first round (assuming everyone enters) of 10 saws per round. They will be put to a vote of a week in duration, with the two highest scores going through to the final. The final will also be one week in duration. Highest vote count wins my little axe!

It would be lovely to see some entries and "work in progress" on this thread. Since we can have up to 10 entries per thread, I will allow up to 7 more entries.

The 33 entrants are entitled to one entry each. The 7 "bonus" entries are available to the first 7 people to publish pictures of a finished saw on this thread. If one of the existing entrant want to enter more than once, thats not a problem, but they will need to get a picture on here before all the "bonus" slots are gone.

Anyone who wishes to play a "wicked wango card" should......

Sorry

Red

 

[British Red]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

1/ Wayland
2/ Falling Rain
3/ Weaver
4/ Rod
5/ Aaron
6/ Stew
7/ Spamel
8/ Demographic
9/ Chrisanson
10/ Aragorn
11/ Old Jimbo
12/ sam acw
13/ John C
14/ OzaawaaMigiziNini
15/ Marts
16/ Pignut
17/ Jon Pickett
18/ Big John
19/ kobalt01
20/ Ice Tigre
21/ Scanker
22/ Woodwalker
23/ Greywolf
24/ ledamni
25/ queeg9000
26/ Singeblister
27/ Loz
28 P@aul
29/ English Herts
30/ Bisamrette
31 / Moduser
32/ g4ghb
33/ Boxy
34/ Bonus 1 (these will be filled as the first pictures are published AFTER this post)
35/ Bonus 2
36/ Bonus 3
37/ Bonus 4
38/ Bonus 5
39/ Bonus 6
40/ Bonus 7

Red

 

[P@ul]

P@ul et al. If you feel up to sharing any pictures of the less succesful attempts, I'm sure it will help others.....

I plan to share many failures when I get to mine

Red

OK, here’s a few of my earlier attempts, my aim was to keep the weight and pack size to a minimum so I wanted to use wood that I could collect at my destination and assemble with only a knife.

Attempt No1 was going to be made from some apple boughs that I had stacked in the garden. Even though I used a slot & peg method to locate the joints before binding I still was not happy with the way the frame twisted when put under tension.


After consulting my Bush craft book I decided to have another go using a triangular configuration for a more rigid construction, still not happy so it was back to the drawing board.


I do believe I have found the answer! Not going to say anymore at this stage, I need to take a few more photos and carry out some field trials.

PS have I used up any of the bonus slots?

 

[British Red]

P@ul,

If that is an entry, yes!

If not, no but you have rep points anyway for sharing!

Red

 

[OldJimbo]

Double curved cross members were the standard solution to wobbliness.

Cross members pegged together in centre.

 

[sargey]

d'oh! horlicks!

is that your 1800 on friday or mine? i'm only nine hours late......



cheers, and.

 

[Spikey DaPikey]

You're talking about a man who once made a werewolf costume for hallowe'en out of rabbit fur, torn jeans and combat boots... I can make anything work

Would love to see a photo of that, new thread perhaps ?

 

[OldJimbo]

is that your 1800 on friday or mine? i'm only nine hours late......

I'm sure Red wouldn't start without you And! We do remember that you already have working models, though...

I hope everyone noticed that the one I showed is just one currently selling on ebay, as even I wasn't around in 1913.. Given the markings on the blade it might well be that old. Unlike Britain and this place - lots of areas of N America are dry and things last forever. Anyway, people did make their own frames in the old days, and obviously made them well. The finer Swiss teeth on the wider blade are for cutting seasoned hardwood.
A point that brings up is that old bucksaws are going for only about $20 even with vintage blades. I've remembered that a friend wanted to sell one, so maybe I'll pick it up and torture test it to see what I can learn. I've got a 24" Trailblazer aluminum on the way to see how rigid that is too.

 

[British Red]

1/ Wayland
2/ Falling Rain
3/ Weaver
4/ Rod
5/ Aaron
6/ Stew
7/ Spamel
8/ Demographic
9/ Chrisanson
10/ Aragorn
11/ Old Jimbo
12/ sam acw
13/ John C
14/ OzaawaaMigiziNini
15/ Marts
16/ Pignut
17/ Jon Pickett
18/ Big John
19/ kobalt01
20/ Ice Tigre
21/ Scanker
22/ Woodwalker
23/ Greywolf
24/ ledamni
25/ queeg9000
26/ Singeblister
27/ Loz
28 P@aul
29/ English Herts
30/ Bisamrette
31 / Moduser
32/ g4ghb
33/ Boxy
34/ Sargey

Red

 

[British Red]

Well,

I promised I would make one too. Here is some progress.

I have set myself a slightly odd challenge, which is to make a robust and stiff frame out of parts that are accessible to all. I'm aiming for under £5 and certainly no more than £10 including the blade

Here are the bits I've got together

I bought two hardwood broom handles (80p each), a length of 8mm threaded rod (about £1.50), a blade (I got a bulk deal recently - so 50p ) a bit of 10mm ally tube (call it a quid though its lying around) and a handful of wing nuts plus two 6mm coach bolts (say another quid). Say about £6 all up - within a tenner even if I bought the blade retail

Now I'm going to use the end of both brooms as the "uprights", one of the off cuts as the cross member, the threaded bar as a tensioner and the two coach bolts to hold the blade. The ally tube will be used to line the holes for the threaded bar. The layout will be something like this

Now assuming I have measured the cross strut to the exact length of the blade (eye to eye). I wrapped some sandpaper around an offcut of the broom and "indented" each end of the cross strut so it will fit tightly against the upright

Like this

This leaves the end of cross member this shape

So the fit comes like this

I'll probably lock the cross member in with a "pin and socket" arrangement using some threaded bar and a hole in the upright. Time will tell

Anyway - thats as far as I have got for now...more another day

Red

 

[Singeblister]

looking good Red , I haven't got the wood yet , I am toying with going out to find some green , or buying some kiln dried stuff. Still thinking at this point

 

[OldJimbo]

It's going to be interesting to see if that one develops some wobble, Red, and if some screws fix that. One thing is for sure, we sure are going to learn about saws!
I remembered to check my mail when I got back into town tonight, and found that my saw jointer had arrived. It's a slick little slotted tool that holds a file and you just run it along the saw blade to make the teeth even in height. I couldn't resist trying it out on an old saw blade. It appears that cheap blades aren't set up too consistently as I had already set the teeth, and that was inconsistent, too. It appears that my memories of old bowsaws cutting far more effectively might have some substance. I'm wondering what I'll find with the raker gauge which should arrive soon...

 

[British Red]

Interesting - any chance of some photos of the dohickies at work mate? I'd love to learn more about setting up saws!

I frear the dreaded wobble, which is why I'm going to use threaded bar, pin joint the cross member and bolt through the blade. If all else fails, I plan to put in a second cross member!

Red

 

[leon-b]

red i like the look of your saw, ium going to town today with some money, exactly what do i need to buy to make a saw like yours
please could you list everything
im not entering the competition i just want to give it a go
thanks leon

 

[British Red]

Leon,

Wait a bit mate,

If it works well, I'll do you a step by step guide and list all the parts, lets see how it is first though

Red

 

[leon-b]

ok thanks
leon

 

[OldJimbo]

It'll take a few days to get good pics as I'm heading off to help my buddy with moving.

But for now..
First you get a saw set or plier like device which can be set to bend saw tooth. To start with you adjust it to one tooth, then go along sqeezing on each of the teeth, to make sure that they all bend out the same amount. Other than finding out that your saw blade isn't consistent at all, it's fun. You don't need the big hammer and anvil type which are used for big two handed saws. These are easily picked up in top shape for a few dollars. On ebay check collectibles, tools, woodworking, saws. Good deal!

Only then do you run this jointer along the blade, to get all the teeth the same height. That's when you look at half of the teeth randomly having flats on top, as they were all different heights... Slick and I paid just a few dollars. A person could just use a long flat file run along the top.

Then you check if the rakers are all the same depth below the teeth with one of these - again just a few bucks. I guess you could use spark plug feeler gauges. I haven't used one of these yet and dread what I will find.

http://www3.telus.net/jimbo/saws/raker_gauge.jpg

So so far tools are cheap and you can get decent ones. The bad news is that clamp on filing jigs are expensive, so i want to see what I can do with chainsaw filing guides. Saw vises are cheap and neat but shipping kills, so I'm going to have to use a slot sawed in a log and tiny wedges.

The thought on most people's minds is that is getting a bit silly in terms of being time consuming. Just sharpening the uneven teeth with a piece of emery wrapped around a piece of broken hacksaw blade will show LOTS of improvement, though. We'll see about consistent tooth set and height set to optimum later. I saw lots of hard wood, so it might be worth it to me.

 

[British Red]

I'll have a look for the tools - wonder if they are available here?