I have been showing resawn panels and 1/8-inch veneers cut by resawing spalted maple boards. This prompted several questions about HOW I do it, to get consistent thickness. Unlike other woodworkers, I don’t have a power feeder for my band saw; as a result, I had to improvise, as I show below.

Edit, to add the following items on tuning / adjusting the band saw: I always recommend you tune your band saw, to get the best results possible. David Marks, of Woodworks fame, has a systematic procedure, found here. Things I have done to get good results when resawing a board (and one item to do after finishing) are based on David Marks’ procedure:

• Adjust the blade to track in the center of the wheels – it might require installing new wheel tires; they are available in more than one material, but it seems that the urethane tires are best.
• Use the best blade guide system you can get, and change it as needed – the better the blade is supported, the better resawing results you will get.
• For a new blade: Use a blade tuning stone to remove the hard edges from the back edges of the blade.
• Balance the wheels, as needed. Use small pieces of wire.
• Adjust the angle of the fence to correct for blade drift; with the 3/4-inch resaw blade I use (below), this correction is 2°.
• Always release the tension on the blade when finished using the bandsaw.

My band saw is a 17-inch G0513 Grizzly (it is available through The Sandal Woods Store – buying here is one way to help support this blog):

Grizzly G0513 17″ Bandsaw – 2 HP

One other choice that is said to perform very well, but is not available in my Store, is the 14-inch Rikon band saw. It may not save you much over the Grizzly I have, but it might be worth looking at it, too. I will stick with the Grizzly, though.

The blade I use is a 3/4-inch, 3 TPI (teeth per inch) Timber Wolf blade. I use the “flutter” method to adjust the blade tension, which works well for me. When I received it, this band saw had Euro-style disc blade guides. These performed well for normal band saw use; but I was not totally happy with them when I used the saw for resawing operations. After a while I swapped the Euro guides for the Carter Guides, and have not looked back. Today I feel I made the right decision, as the Carter guides (also available at The Sandal Woods Store) give me much better performance in resawing operations; they provide better blade support, while allowing the blade to run cool. In the photos below I show the following (left-to-right, and top-to-bottom for the photos below):

1. Photo (1): The original Euro-style disc guides.
2. Photo (2): Rear photo of the upper Carter guide, highlighting the groove in the bearing; the bottom guide, below the table, is identical in configuration. Notice I had to cut the blade guard, to allow the new guide to fit properly.
3. Photo (3): Photo of the upper Carter guide, head-on.
4. Photo (4): My resawing setup, with the home-made resaw fence and the upper guide retracted to allow resawing a 10-inch board.
5. Photo (5): This shows the rear of the fence; The vertical ribs are a must, to hold the fence at a true 90°, and to keep it from deflecting as pressure is applied on the front of the fence during resawing.

I recommend the use of the screw clamps to hold the huge “featherboard” in place. I don’t even bother cutting fingers on this board, as I prefer to have full support from the 5-inch wide red oak board against the fence. This helps to get nice, even-thickness resawn panels and veneers.

Let me know if you need additional information. Thanks for your questions – keep them coming!