On 20 Dec 2003 10:13:14 -0800, (Russell Seaton) wrote:

Ellis Wallentine on the Wood Central forum addressed this question.
What band saw to get for woodturners? And his response makes sense.
He says get an old heavy duty Oliver, Tannewitz, Northfield, etc. band
saw. Old and used and hopefully cheap. You want a big throat depth
and big capacity under the guides and a huge motor. You don't really
care if the tires are worn or the bearings are wobbly as a woodturner
roughing blanks. You want horsepower and capacity to get the blank to
rough shape. You just want your cut to be within a 1/4 inch or so of
ideal. Accuracy isn't terribly important.

These old monster bandsaws come with 3 phase motors. So you would
have to get a rotary phase converter to make 3 phase power or buy a
VFD that takes 1 phase on the input side and produces 3 phase on the
output side to get supply the motor. Not difficult or too costly for
either of these methods. Dealers Electric and Ebay have cheap VFD.

While I agree with Russ on big-iron, I have taken a different route (while waiting on a big-iron deal to appear locally) due to
parts availablity. I have a Reliant DD90 (14" import) that I've made some mods to that has improved the performance immeasurably.
The upper wheel hinge broke, so I made one from a 1/2" thick steel plate using only a sawsall, drill press and angle grinder. It
no longer a weak point in the system. I built a large table to handle big stock. Slides on and off easily (for changing blades
only). I also replaced the burned out 1750 RPM 3/4hp motor with a Delta 3450 RPM 1.5hp motor. Using the existing jackshaft, I was
able to get the speed down a bit. Using a 3/8" 3TPI hook tooth blade running at 4200 SFM, I can cut thru 11" thick green work with
ease. The blade will break before the saw will stall (DAMHIK). This saw can't cut a straight line to save itself, but great for
roughing out blanks. In fact, I just got another DD90 (free) for parts.

Peter Teubel
Milford, MA
http://www.revolutionary-turners.com