The buck saws "to be or not to be"..

[big_swede]

Inspired by the buck saw building contest, and, as always, by Mors K:s excellent book, I tried making myself a saw in the field (again for a very long time, used to carry a swede-saw instead of the laplander years ago), from gathered materials (except from the blade, which was carried in a pot).

After the initial swearing and mishaps I have to say that I find myself quite confident in building a saw in less then 15 minutes. I did several tries, to get the speed and the right proportions. My first mistake was to use only a single crosspiece, instead of the two angled ones, recommended by Mors.

So this experience got me thinking. Why bring a ready made foldable buck saw? Are there any good reasons to bring a heavy exotic hardwood foldable saw frame to the woods? Bringing a saw kind of makes it implicit that there is usable wood, what else would you be bringing the saw for in the first place? So the argument about lack of materials isn't really valid.

Time and comfort are of course other aspects. After a long, cold and maybe wet day, it is nice to get a big fire going quickly without the need to build tools. But IMO this is a classical question of the essence of bushcraft. What happened to replacing kit with skill and experience?

Love to hear your opinions abot this..

(come on, this is a invitation to a real battle between the purists and the kit-maniacs!)

 

[British Red]

big swede,

Simple really - because you only want to saw up dead, fallen wood not cut living trees. Many of us live near coppiced hazel so theres no problem, but in a serious stand of hardwood, it may not be allowed to limb oak trees and the dead fallen stuff may not be suitable (large logs and the smaller limbs too soft and wet)

Thats why I would do it!

Red

 

[gregorach]

I couldn't agree more! Personally I can't see the point of carrying a pre-made bucksaw. You'd probably be better off carrying a bowsaw - gotta be lighter for a given blade length. To my mind, the whole point of a bucksaw is that you knock up the frame on-site.

I carry my little Laplander for when I need wood in a hurry. A bucksaw is for when you're settling down in camp for a while...

 

[big_swede]

big swede,

Simple really - because you only want to saw up dead, fallen wood not cut living trees. Many of us live near coppiced hazel so theres no problem, but in a serious stand of hardwood, it may not be allowed to limb oak trees and the dead fallen stuff may not be suitable (large logs and the smaller limbs too soft and wet)

Thats why I would do it!

Red

So you're saying that you can find wood that is suitable for burning but not for building a saw frame? If you can find a limb that is wrist thick, and not completely rotten, I'd say you were there, so I don't really see this as a problem. I used limbs from a storm fallen pine, probably fallen in the autumn.

I think it is more often the opposite, that it's easier to find green wood, suitable for a frame, but not for burning.

 

[Stuart]

Mors carries a 36" bucksaw blade around his waist, inside a belt made of tubular nylon so the blade fits inside it.

the blade itself is wrapped in nylon tape, this both protects the belt from the saw teeth and allows you to unwrap a short length of the blade (say 7 inches) and used the removed length of the tape to double wrap a portion creating a handle.

You then have a 7" hand saw to create your bow saw!

Carrying your bucksaw blade around your waist is a traditional method in Finland.

A 36" blade makes a decent sized bucksaw too:

(I can remember who took the above photograph, so I apologise for not crediting you)

 

[British Red]

So you're saying that you can find wood that is suitable for burning but not for building a saw frame? If you can find a limb that is wrist thick, and not completely rotten, I'd say you were there, so I don't really see this as a problem. I used limbs from a storm fallen pine, probably fallen in the autumn.

I think it is more often the opposite, that it's easier to find green wood, suitable for a frame, but not for burning.

Big_swede,

I may not have made myself clear there. What I'm saying is, I carry a frame so that I don't have to cut green wood to make one. In many locations I can find fallen wood, but most of the thinner stuff is too brittle, or too wet to make a frame. I could easily find green stuff, but I won't cut a living tree just to make a frame. A lot of the larger wood is wet too, but, when split, there is dry wood inside. The smaller stuff is wet all the way through.

I often in my home AO use hazel, which I'm happy to cut green as its coppiced (often actually overdue for a cut), but I won't cut limbs of a full tree just to make a saw . If Its just for me, I carry a pocket saw anyway. For larger camping, a good frame is packable, weighs little and I'm happy to slide it in my pack. If you look at the bucksaw thread, you'll see my "improvised" frame - as you say, its easy enough, but why damage a tree when you don't need too? I'm far from a kit monster, so I demo'd both fabricated and improvised frames. There's a place for both. Cutting living wood because its "bushcrafty" is flat wrong in my book - doing it where its appropriate is fine (e.g. using hazel coppice's) but, if weight is an issue, I just sling a Silky pocket boy in my right hand cargo pocket. It hardly weighs more than a bucksaw blade. Sure I can improvise a frame - but why damage a tree to do it?

(By the way - you asked for a debate so I'm giving you one )

Red