Sawblade Question

bondoboat · Post by **bondoboat** » Sat Nov 29, 2008 7:42 am

Hi all,
I am a new member that just purchased a used "Goldie" with a scroll saw, belt sander and jointer. The sawblade that came with it is beat, and I know I need to pick up a couple of different blades. My question is this....Do I stick with the larger arbor and buy Shopsmith blades or do I get the 5/8 arbor to use standard blades. Any drawbacks to the smaller arbor? Thanks in advance.....BB

dusty · Post by **dusty** » Sat Nov 29, 2008 8:56 am

In my opinion, this question can only be answered my you. What do you have and what do you want? If you want to go buy blades at Home Depot, you need a 5/8" arbor. If you want to use Shopsmith blades with the 1 1/4" hole you need to use the standard Shopsmith arbor.

I have both and switch back and forth at will.

What you need to realize in making this decision is that if you use the "nonstandard" (5/8" arbor) and any blade with a 5/8" arbor hole, you need to take care that the blade lines up properly with the insert. This is no real problem, just adjust location with the quill.

8iowa · Post by **8iowa** » Sat Nov 29, 2008 9:23 am

bondoboat:

If your "goldie" has a 3/4 HP motor it will be important for you to use thin kerf blades. The three Shopsmith thin kerf carbide blades, combination, rip, and crosscut, will do a great job for you with 90% of your cutting needs. I'll also recommend new 1 1/4" arbors (505511) as they seem to offer greater stiffness than some of the older arbors that I've seen.

That said, I also have a Freud thin kerf 80T, ATB crosscut blade for cutting fine plywood and laminates. The 5/8" arbor (555321) in this instance, would also work well for you.

With a 3/4 HP headstock, better cuts without bogging down the saw, will be obtained by using the proper blade; ie: rip blade for ripping, crosscut blade for crosscuts.

a1gutterman · Post by **a1gutterman** » Sat Nov 29, 2008 1:19 pm

bondoboat wrote:Hi all,
I am a new member that just purchased a used "Goldie" with a scroll saw, belt sander and jointer. The sawblade that came with it is beat, and I know I need to pick up a couple of different blades. My question is this....Do I stick with the larger arbor and buy Shopsmith blades or do I get the 5/8 arbor to use standard blades. Any drawbacks to the smaller arbor? Thanks in advance.....BB

bondoboat,
As you can see from the responses that you have already gotten, there are, and will always be, many opinions concerning this question. In reality, there is no single answer for your question. It all depends on your equipment, what you are going to be cutting, and how often you are going to be doing certain cutting operations, etc. Keeping in mind what others have already told you about the 3/4H motor and thin kerf blades, if you are going to jump right in and do a lot of different saw cutting operations, you will probably want a different blade for each operation. If you are going to do a limited amount of saw cutting, a combination blade might be all you need. It all depends. There are many threads on these forums addressing just that subject. You can spend some time searching them out. You can buy the SS set of blades. You can buy one or two expensive blades (for either size arbor). Regardless of which blades you buy, I wood suggest that you buy carbide tipped ones.

bondoboat · Post by **bondoboat** » Sat Nov 29, 2008 6:11 pm

Thanks for the responses. I have the larger motor. I have done some table saw work furnishing a cabin of ours and now want to step it up a notch and see what I can do. I am limited on space and probably won't spend every night working on wood so I think the shopsmith is a good fit. I think I got a pretty good machine at a good price but can see how the bill will grow as I do. I'll probably pull the thing apart and check everything out and restore it this winter. This forum looks like the place to be for guidance. Thanks again.
BB

JPG · Post by **JPG** » Thu Dec 11, 2008 11:35 am

AH! Another "Goldie" owner. I purchased mine NEW. You can figure out the age. Enough of this, the real reason I am responding is to caution you about potential problems IF you have the table with an additional blade slot near the left edge.

1. Don't use it unless ABSOLUTELY necessary. (bevel cuts on wide stock)

2. The closeness of the mitre gauge slot to the blade allows the blade to
start slicing the mitre guage if pushed into the blade. (easier to do than
you can imagine)

3. The slot was designed for a 9" (NINE) blade. A 10" (TEN) blade will start
slicing through the table if lowered too low. (ALMOST bottomed out)

Other than these and the power issue, the new 10" blades will do just fine.

P.S. The original motor in Goldies was 1 1/8 HP.

JPG · Post by **JPG** » Thu Dec 11, 2008 11:43 am

Also when purchasing 1 1/4" arbors, make sure you are getting one for model 5/V 500. The arbor is longer on 510/520's. This insures the slot lines up with blade when pushing carriage against headstock/spacer. I am assuming you are using ORIGINAL goldie (MARK 5) table.

GOOD LUCK!!!