Shopsmith Forums

after calming down after using shopsmith version of a dado blade (out of the box 50 thousands out of tune),,i envoked the principles of on the cheap engineering,,,,bought 6 low cost 24 t carbide blades for 1.61 each,, made some heavy paaper washers,,,installed blades ,,, test cuts,,,worked like a charm,,,need is the mother of invention,,,,,ill bet some fine sawdust that the purchasing agent for shopsmith is not a woodworker,,pity,,, indianabob grower of fine weeds and a few hostas

WOW! That far out, someone in QC dropped a stitch.
Are you returning it?

I'm real curious. Where did you manage to purchase Shopsmith dado blades that were priced individually? I have never seen them sold as anything other than a set.

The current offering is made by Amana and sells for $159.00. Mine was manufactured by Freud. Can you tell who manufactured the ones that you have?

dusty wrote:I'm real curious. Where did you manage to purchase Shopsmith dado blades that were priced individually? I have never seen them sold as anything other than a set.

The current offering is made by Amana and sells for $159.00. Mine was manufactured by Freud. Can you tell who manufactured the ones that you have?

I don't believe he said that he bought Shopsmith dado blades (especially at $1.61 each). I just envisioned that he bought 24 tooth contractor blades (likely 7 1/4") and stacked those.
Of course I could be wrong. I was once...

robinson46176 wrote:I don't believe he said that he bought Shopsmith dado blades (especially at $1.61 each). I just envisioned that he bought 24 tooth contractor blades (likely 7 1/4") and stacked those.
Of course I could be wrong. I was once...

My fault, maybe? This is what brought me to that conclusion.

ill bet some fine sawdust that the purchasing agent for shopsmith is not a woodworker,,pity [quote[

If they weren't bought from Shopsmith, indianabob, I don't see why you would have had a reason to need to calm down. Buyer beware applies to those "one time good deals that I just could not pass up".

Now that I have drawn all this conclusions - you can take the next opportunity to "set me straight" - if that need be done.

indianabob wrote:after calming down after .....i invoked the principles of on the cheap engineering,,,,bought 6 low cost 24 t carbide blades for 1.61 each,, made some heavy paaper washers,,,installed blades ,,, test cuts,,,worked like a charm.

I need to make sure I am interpreting this correctly. This is this saying you can stack sawblades and spacers between to make a dado equivalent? If so, are the diameters controlled close enough where you just slap them together and use them or does it require the equivalent of 'dressing' them to work as a set?

i used 6 cheap carbide blades,,adding paper washers,,oaktag ,( ill replace the papere washers whn i find some dado shims bob fm indiana

I still don't have a stacked dado set (just two wobble dados - one that I hate and one that has worked great for me), but I don't know why stacking cheap saw blades together wouldn't work just fine. What would be the potential drawbacks? Would there be a problem with gullets not being deep enough to clear out the wood on deeper cuts? The main problem I can see would be getting a precise width, but that can be worked around quite easily.

Hi,

I'm a little lost here. When you say the dado blade is out of tune by .050" what does that mean? When you are cutting is the width off by that much? I'd like to understand this but right now I'm drawing a blank.

Ed

indianabob wrote:after calming down after using shopsmith version of a dado blade (out of the box 50 thousands out of tune),,i envoked the principles of on the cheap engineering,,,,bought 6 low cost 24 t carbide blades for 1.61 each,, made some heavy paaper washers,,,installed blades ,,, test cuts,,,worked like a charm,,,need is the mother of invention,,,,,ill bet some fine sawdust that the purchasing agent for shopsmith is not a woodworker,,pity,,, indianabob grower of fine weeds and a few hostas

As to dado blades in general I have both the wobble set and a stacked 8" set. I use them for different dado and grooves depending on what I'm doing.

The wobble I have can be adjusted while mounted by loosening the nut and turning the indicator for a narrower or wider cut. It seems to me to be a fast way of getting to where it needs to be. Of course the rounded bottom can be an issue for an exposed joint but since a lot of them are hidden or can be hidden or can be fixed with a clean up cut from a router bit I see no problem in having just that version. And in fact that was all I had for a lot of years.

The stacked dado is normally made up of two outside blades and then chippers for clean out. You might need to tweak the width by using some sort of spacer. I have a set of plastic ones of different thicknesses and a table I did in excel to get pretty close to start with. If I'm wrong I find it easier to remove the arbor and work top side to remove the nut/washer(s) and add or remove the spacers. Since I can check the kerf and determine what needs to be removed or added I normally only have to do this once.

If you are going to do a "do it yourself" version a few things to keep in mind are that the outside blades have the right style of tooth. They need to make a square cut. The blades between need to be set so that the tips never touch, this is a combination of spacers and adjusting the position of the tips so they do not line up. You should also look at how much weight you are now spinning with X number of blades mounted... and I don't know just how wide you might want to go with this setup. I'm also not so sure how easy it will be to fine tune. I would also wonder about how clean the cut will be with cheap blades???

For me I think I would rather have the sets I have then play with stacking a bunch of blades. You can be your own judge after some time with the system and how you use it.

Last point, if you do decide to go to a dado set and Rockler is a place you shop the catalog I got today has this big red 20% off any one item that might help easy the pain. Freud professional dado set with shim set 6" size $84.99 - 17.00 = 67.99 + tax and shipping. I have not been shopping for a set in many years so I'm not sure if that is a good deal or not so make sure you do you duty and shop around.

Ed