On Wed, 30 Nov 2005 14:38:51 -0800, Grant Erwin
wrote:
I recall Wayne recently posting he had a monster 16" chop saw, worked head arms
and legs better than the 14" ones that are so common these days. Well, today
coincidentally a 16" cutoff saw found its way to me. It's a real beast, 7½ hp 3
phase motor, 3 belts. It has been dropped and has lots of cosmetic damage but
nothing major appears to be hurt. It isn't running, but the seller was told it
ran for a long long time after the damage happened. I got it real cheap. I'm
curious how much Wayne pays for 16" abrasive blades and where he gets them.
To tell you the truth I've not bought any 16" blades for mine. I
priced some years ago just after building it and about croaked from
the price. The reason I have some now is because somebody came in
wanting some pipe sawed on my bandsaw. When he say my chop saw he
stated he had some blades that would work. The next time he came in
for some more sawing he brought me about 5 16" Norton blades. Needless
to say I was more than happy to saw his pipe in my bandsaw for the
trade. :-)
In the meantime I'm going to be looking for a 5hp single phase motor to replace
the 7½hp 3 phase motor that's on it, if anyone anything remotely like local has
one please let me know. I'm hoping 5hp is "enough" power - Wayne's saw has a 3hp
motor on it so maybe 5hp will be OK.
Hmm. Well mine is a 3 HP 3 phase motor which has better torque than
single phase in my experience (I do occasionally wish for more but
that was all I had to put on there at the time). Before that I tried a
5HP cheap compressor motor without luck. Then for years I ran it on a
huge 2HP farm duty TEFC motor that came off a old auger. That was ok
but lacked power for heavy stuff even using the thin 14" chop saw
blades used by the normal chop saws.
I did make a abrasive splitting saw for splitting 1/2" x 1" stock
the hard way. The reason for this is to make one piece spurs. A local
bit and spur maker paid me to make it. I made one for him years ago
which didn't work (I told him that the 2/3HP C faced well motor
wouldn't be strong enough but he wouldn't listen). The second one I
made we used a large frame 5HP farm duty TEFC motor. I had to do some
adjusting of blade speed with the belts in order for it to get enough
torque to cut through the 1" of steel reliably. He did learn that he
had to use a high quality blade. He managed to rip the center out of a
cheap one.
I guess what I'm saying is be careful what kind of 5HP single phase
motor you get. Just looking at it will tell you a lot. It will need to
large and heavy before it'll make you happy when running the saw.
Wayne Cook
Shamrock, TX
http://members.dslextreme.com/users/waynecook/index.htm