pto powered bandsaw ?

[Western]

I would come off of the tractor's PTO with a pully/belt system.

This would accomplish two things:
1. ability to set proper band-blade speed.
2. reduce shock loads, nto worried about the tractor PTO, more the band-blade which might be more subject to fatigue and breakage if driven directly.

You would have to stationary mount the blade power assembly, and use a guiderail or roller assembly carraige to move the wood through the blade.

You can see one like this in Branson Missouri at Silver Dollar City. Very effecient. pto drive belt to larger pully, then shaft to blade on fixed rails, rollers the log slides on and you got boards!..and they are using an old steam powered tractor.

 

[Western]

I would come off of the tractor's PTO with a pully/belt system.

This would accomplish two things:
1. ability to set proper band-blade speed.
2. reduce shock loads, nto worried about the tractor PTO, more the band-blade which might be more subject to fatigue and breakage if driven directly.

You would have to stationary mount the blade power assembly, and use a guiderail or roller assembly carraige to move the wood through the blade.

You can see one like this in Branson Missouri at Silver Dollar City. Very effecient. pto drive belt to larger pully, then shaft to blade on fixed rails, rollers the log slides on and you got boards!..and they are using an old steam powered tractor. Last I "saw" it it had a fixed rotory blade,,a biggun too

 

[Paddy]

dfkrug,

Yes, I used the pully as the wheel with the cut to fit belt as the "tire". Most band saws use a very rigid wheel with a thin rubber band of sorts. The auto tire would be very wide. The 18" wide by 3" wide pullys were just ordered out of a catalog of industrial pullys. With luck, I supose you could find them at a major scrap yard. My blade was mostly 1-1/4" wide. Can't recall the tooth count, but very few per inch! Most industrial suply shops weld blades to order and they are cheep. Just the other day I was at Fastenal, Industrial and Construction Supply, and they had a display for band saw blades, cut and welded to your spec.

I was 22 years old when I built it so my welding skills were not so good. But the basic frame was an unsidedown "U". The tract was 4" angle weld on an old axel. I used flat vice thread to make the the adjustable tables at each end. Each turn was 1/8".

Patrick T

 

[Renze]

I think i should decide either way: use the 7.5 hp electrical motor on a short frame and keep the log stationary, or:

Go big time, and use 40 PTO hp and put the log on a roller table, to roll ut under the stationary saw head.

The method based on the rolling collar shaft, or the variant i described with pallet truck rollers on a square shaft, will be much more expensive and require a precision balanced, perfectly straight square tube driveshaft. Too expensive.

To yank a log through a 40 hp powered saw, wont be easy when using car wheels and standard bearings, as band saw guides. in other words, there is an extra investment to beef up and professionalise the saw head, before the 40 hp will come to use.

Somebody said that the weight of the motor kept the saw head in place, and prevented vibrations. Using the 7.5 hp electrical motor as sawhead ballast as well as using rubber car tires, will be the most efficient solution, cost vs. output.

WoodMizer offers a pneumatic saw band tension kit: Using the rubber car tires will achieve the same thing




Does anyone have ideas about how to figure out the sawhead feed ? Will this require another electrical motor, or can the saw head motor, also pulls itself along on a cable, using a dog clutch to engage the steel cable pulley ?
Then i could still use multiple pulleys to achieve several cutting speeds, and tension the steel cable by a spring, to even out the different diameters of the pulleys.

I am not thinking of a winch that winds up all the cable on a drum, but something like a flat, wide pulley: It just makes 1 or 2 loops over the pulley (enough loops to get the required traction) but its only attached to the frame, at the front and rear of the frame.
The silage block cutting spades they sold over here in the 70's, had a spade movement based on the same principle.

I think i have most required materials for the frame, sawband guides and motor in house. As soon as i built the new frame for the road sweep, the band saw is next.

Please share your ideas !

 

[Donman]

Renze, where do you get the tree logs to cut into boards? I didn't know Holland had that many trees. I have never been there but my ancesters came from there.

 

[Renze]

Renze, where do you get the tree logs to cut into boards? I didn't know Holland had that many trees. I have never been there but my ancesters came from there.

Holland has a very diverse landscape. The province of Limburg is a tip inbetween Belgium and Germany, where the higest hill is are up to 320 meter high. There is a major calcium mine there, for a cement factory. traveling from the highest elevation of said province into the northwest, the elevation will gradually drop. The landscape will vary from river delta clay, to forests and heather fields, into the bottom of a former sea tongue enclosed in the land (minus 5 meter below sea level the famous polder) into a peat area of drained lakes in the mid west, into a sand dune row along the coast, which is higher than the middle part, with its riverdelta clay, and lakes and enclosed sea tongues that have been pumped dry.
That's why we say Nederland, and abroad they say Holland: when you make a section view of our country, its hollow: the hills of Germany and Belgium drop to below sea level, and rise again at the coast where the sea current has sedimented sand dunes thousands of years ago.

I live in the east, where there is very cheap dusty dry sand soil. Locally our ancestors have planted pines on the poorest soils, and fence rows along pastures are full of oaks that farmers grew for firewood.
Its a waste to burn all the mighty oaks in our stoves and meantime import expensive bangkirai from Indonesia. Oak is as good as any other tropical wood. Because farmers dont need the oaks for firewood anymore, many of these have grown much taller than desired for their original purpose (as a wind screen between pastures) which makes them excellent for lumber.

 

[Donman]

Thanks for the excellent geography lesson!

 

[Renze]

Donman, if you ever drop by, i'll give you a free tour around here !!

 

[Knotbored]

Someday I would also like to build a bandsaw but I was thinking far less power, perhaps one of those cheap 6.5HP from Harborfreight.
My initial idea is to use a burned-out house trailer frame with pipe welded (shimmed level first) for rails, and pullys for wheels supporting the log.
Using auto tires to support the sawblade (maybe those undersized spare tires with little tread.)
I see damaged or outdated trailers free or cheap often in Craiglist and the local newspaper.
I hope this message thread continues with other suggestions and comments-its very interesting.

 

[Renze]

YouTube - Sawmillin' Upstate NY - Homemade Band Sawmill
this is a very basic, but working variant: The rollers arent car tires, but just some cast iron trash bin wheels with rubber tire volcanised around it.

YouTube - 'Necessity being the mother of all invention'
this is an even more basic, and not really working variant, using a chainsaw: i'd define this as a last solution against boredom...