On 2012-09-14, Bruce L. Bergman (munged human readable) wrote:
On Thu, 13 Sep 2012 14:25:30 -0700 (PDT), whit3rd
wrote:

On Monday, September 10, 2012 7:06:49 PM UTC-7, Tom Gardner wrote:
I have a 7.5 hp 36" Tannewitz vertical band saw [for wood]
Could I put a VFD on it to cut metal?

Yes, but to set a VFD to 1/10 speed (about what the steel-cutting

[ ... ]

If you can make it fit, you are far better to get a gearmotor that
drops into that location with the right shaft diameter and length.
Then the motor stays at it's native 3450 or 1725 and you get the right
FPM on the bandsaw blade.

That makes sense.

It would be lovely if they made one big bandsaw design with a
car-style 4-speed transmission, then you just shift it to the right
speed range and put on the right band. If it's heavy and rigid
enough for steel, wood would be cake.

Close enough was one which we had at work. It had a pair of
variable-speed belt pulleys to give a fairly wide range of speeds, and
(after opening the bottom blade guard) a push-pull knob which switched a
gearbox in the back to switch in a second speed range, where the top end
of the low range matches the bottom end of the high range. It lest you
puck pretty much any speed needed for various metals and woods. IIRC,
it would go fast enough to handle friction sawing as well -- but I did
not know about that a the time, so I never tried it.

IIRC, it was a DoAll -- and also had the blade welder in the
column. The only thing that I did not like about it was the blade
guides, which were something like Bakelite instead of ball bearings.

Enjoy,
DoN.

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