Checking back in on a couple of projects. The first is my band saw mods, and I have determined that the UHMW plastic is not a suitable guide block for this size band saw blade. I have a 3/8″ blade (I think?) in my saw now and this does not have enough flat area on the sides behind the teeth for the plastic to effectively hold it, and the set of the teeth is cutting in:

This blade has a very pronounced tendency to cut to the left, as seen in the lower guide block above.

The plastic is excellent on my big saw, with the 3/4″ blade there is a lot of flat area behind the teeth, but I’ll need to come up with a better solution for this one (and for my upcoming wooden 12″ band saw).

I have used the saw moderately after the mods were finished, and today I checked the dust build up in the motor compartment for the first time since then:

The accumulation in the motor compartment is within reason, but could be better. As shown, there is a fair amount of dust in the collection box as well.

As an experiment, I “optimized” the impeller chamber by adding the block at the start/end to reduce the gap, and used 1/4″ plywood to smooth out the rest of the housing:

I replaced everything and ran it for about a minute without cutting. Looking in the motor compartment, I see that a little more of the dust has been pulled out, but not a lot. Overall the change to the impeller housing made only a slight difference to the amount of suction.

The next change that I might try is to make a larger diameter impeller, and a slightly different design. Also, turning the impeller around to face the other way would eliminate the inlet ducting and improve airflow even more – might be worth a try.

While painting my new miter saw stand, I took the opportunity to paint my lathe stand as well:

I still don’t have a good location for it in my shop yet, but I’m planning a big clean up soon, and with that some reorganisation.

Here’s a project that I’ve been working on (the design, at least) for some time now:

It’s a wall mounted cabinet for drill press accessories. It will have four shallow drawers in the bottom for various small things, like odd drill bits, etc. An open shelf above the drawers for vises and the front panel opens for storage of my drill press table inside. This has been an ongoing problem: where to put the table when I take it off the drill press. To the left of this, some cubbyhole storage for hole saws, mandrels and sanding drums.

The front panel is recessed and is a slatwall concept. Holders for various things, like drill bit indexes, can be made with a hanging cleat on the back and just slide into place on the panel. Easily moved for best use of the space.
The design for this in nearly complete, with just some small details to work out.

In a previous blog entry, I went over the various ways I tried to make a simple but reliable router lift. I left out another way to do the 90 degree power transfer, and that is with crossed gears:

Crossed gears (also known as skew gears) are helical gears, and for 90 degree power transfer, are cut at 45 degrees.

I’m experimenting with the idea, more for use on another project, rather than another router lift. Cutting them on the table saw seems to be the only way – I tried it on the band saw, but it was too difficult to get a good quality cut. The plan is to work out the method with wood, then cut the actual gears from plastic, possibly the UHMW plastic.

So, that’s all the news that’s fit to print, for now.
For those that haven’t noticed, I added a comment section to these blog entries. This is a trial run to determine if it’s a good idea.