A few novice questions on hand saws.

[Sean H]

Hey everyone and thanks for reading this. I'm a bit of a novice with hand tool joinery, and also on a very limited budget. What I am having to do is gather the tools that give me the widest range of uses and get more specialized down the road. My most recent delema has to do with getting one or two new hand saws that will let me do cross and rip cuts, and also let me continue to practice dovetails and tenons. I work with mostly exotic hardwoods but also dabble in figured maple, koa and cherry. The cut that I have the biggest problem with is, well... what ever its called when ya cut a 2x6 into two 1x6's or a 1" plank into 3 planks at 5/16", (is that still a rip cut or is it considered resawing?). I only have about 100 bucks to spend on hand saws and would really like to cover all my needs.

Would a cross cut saw be able to serve as a dovetail and tenon shoulder saw?

Would it be possible to use one saw for rip cuts / resawing and tenon cheeks?

Thanks for your advice.

(I gotta Block Plane Jones!)

[Bob Rozaieski]

I think you can get by with two saws, but you will have to make some compromises. For cross cutting tasks, a 20-22" panel saw filed about 9-11 PPI is really all you need. The rip cuts are the ones that go better with different saws, especially the cuts you are talking about. You can cut tenon cheeks with a regular rip saw. In fact many historical references describe this method. Dovetails can be done with a rip saw, but if you try to use a saw with teeth sized for general ripping on dovetails in the 5/16" thick stock you speak of you will not have an easy time. As for resawing, that is a fairly specialized task with hand saws and really requires a dedicated saw with very large aggressive teeth if you plan to do it with hand saws more than just a few times. I can resaw boards up to about 5-6" wide with my 5-1/2 point rip saw but it's slow going. I have a very large frame saw for big resawing jobs.

If you can swing two rip saws I'd recommend getting a 5-6 point rip saw for general ripping and resawing. For your tenon cheeks, you'll have an easier time with a 14-16" backsaw with about 10-12 points per inch. You can also use this backsaw for dovetails with good results. If you get a few old saws and learn to file yourself, there's no reason you can't get all three plus the files needed to sharpen them for $100.

[Sean H]

Thanks for the great information! That pretty much covers all of my hand saw concerns, although I'm a bit hesitant to try sharpening my own saws. I guess if I can learn to sharpen my skews and gouges, saws shouldn't be too scary.

So far I've been using a cheap flexible 'japanese style' saw from Ace Hardware for all of my needs, but its not worth sharpening, or even buying a replacement blade for that matter. Luckily, I already have a decent selection of high quality chisels, but getting the right saws should be all I need to get nicely fitting joints and smooth cuts.

Thanks again for the help!

(I gotta Block Plane Jones!)

[Mark Reuten]

I would suggest you get a decent quality japanese ryoba saw (rip pattern and cross cut pattern on opposite sides of the same blade) with about an 18-20 tpi on the cross cut pattern to use for your basic cross cut and joinery needs and then, as Bob suggests, look at acquiring and refurbishing some older western saws. Sharpening them is quite easy and most sharpening companies will punch you a new set of teeth on one for about ten to twenty bucks. From there you just need to keep them in tune.

[kaiser]

Lee Valley carries the veritas dovetail (14 ppi) and crosscut 16 (ppi) and they also have a small dovetail (20 ppi) for about $159.00 for all three. These are damn good saws for the money once you get used to them. I think you can buy a combination of 2 of them for about $100.00. Good luck with finding what fits your needs, and if you have the chance to actually touch and try the saws that will be a big plus.

KAISER OUT!!!