Increasing Bandsaw Throat Size

[forrestb]

For the hall table I am making, I have managed to flatten an 8 inch wide cherry board that will form the table top.

I wanted to have a 12 inch wide top made of two 6 inch boards joined. My standard SS bandsaw would only handle approximately 5 ¾ - 5 ⅞ inch boards in re-saw with a Carter Upper Guide installed.

Someone had mentioned an SS Online video of how to widen that throat. I watched it (Drew Ackerman did the video) but it only gained a little bit - not enough for my needs. So I looked at my bandsaw and what Drew did to his and concluded (correctly, I hope) the he was being very conservative on his cuts.

So in the interest of the old Press On Regardless rally, I removed more material from my Upper Guide Bracket than did Drew in https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2muM2mgnSZM.

Upper Guide Bracket Cut 01.jpg (337.31 KiB) Viewed 2503 times

Upper Guide Bracket Cut 03.jpg (444.29 KiB) Viewed 2503 times

As Drew mentioned, more clearance would be available if you modified the Height Lock Handle. I had removed far more material from my Guide Bracket so I decided to cut away the Main Frame Assembly for more room.

Housing Cut.jpg (400.49 KiB) Viewed 2503 times

Time to check new throat clearance.

With the Carter Guides:

Throat Size Carter Guides.jpg (399.86 KiB) Viewed 2503 times

6 ⅛ inches was a good improvement, but not enough to allow final milling the boards to 6 inches. So I replaced the upper Carter Guide with the original SS Guide (with Cool Blocks) and got:

Throat Size SS Guides.jpg (288.64 KiB) Viewed 2503 times

I think that 6 ⅜ + inches will be good.

And to take Chuck's advice and SS advice I will clamp the Cool Blocks down on the blade.

Time to go cut some wood. I will test this first and report later on how things worked out on the hall table.

Forrest

[forrestb]

Best board wide I could get under the SS Upper Guide was 6 ¼ inches.

6 Board.jpg (498.65 KiB) Viewed 2486 times

With that 6 ¼ inch board against a 90 degree fence set parallel to the blade - no drift compensation - the cut was as good as I expected. The ½ thick cutoff was very nice and straight end to end.

6 Board Cut.jpg (441.78 KiB) Viewed 2486 times

I think I'll keep this setup and prepare the 8 inch board down to 6 ¼.

Forrest

[rpd]

Great work, thanks for sharing.

This link shows a different mod, ie filing the table mounting pads, that could get you an additional 1/4".

Bandsaw Mod

He actually went even further on his by making a whole new table to get his resaw capacity up to 6 3/4".