Band Saw Wheels / Tires

[Hal H]

All types of wheels are used on band saws, both horizontal and vertical saws.
They use all styles of faces on the wheels.
Some have flat faces ,or a border rib machined into the back edge of the wheel acting as a stop. Other wheels have a clearance groove machined into the front edge of the wheel to protect the teeth on the saw blade.
Another style of wheels have a crown machined into the face to aid in blade tracking.
The different face styles are ways to adjust tracking of the blade or to protect the blade's teeth.

Several saw brands recommend setting the blade tracking so that the teeth of the blade extend past the front edge of the wheels.

What is the purpose of the rubber tires on band saw wheels ?
Are the rubber tires used to protect the teeth, by raising the teeth above face of the wheel.

Someone said the rubber tire they installed, was thicker in the middle adding a crown to the band saw wheel when installed.

 

[Dave Paine]

I am familiar with wood cutting band saws rather than metal, but likely some aspects are the same. Modern wood cutting bandsaws have urethane tires on the wheels. Likely this material holds up better than rubber, or is less expensive than rubber. The tires are typically crowned, so thicker in the middle. This is to help the blade track better. The blade will ride up the crown and sit on the top.

For wood cutting some folks recommend the blade to be adjusted to ride at the top of the crown in the middle of the blade width. Others recommend adjusting so the back of the gullet rides on the top of the crown.

Not sure about metal, the gullets will be shallower than for wood.

 

[Downunder Bob]

I have a small bandsaw, it's a5x5 A hafco supposedly made in Taiwan. Hafco is the house name of the Australian importer. but my question is probably more generic anyway. i see some talk about rubber tires, but my bandsaw doe not have rubber tires just an all metal wheel. The machine works quite well and I'm happy with it for what it is..

The thing I have discovered is that if I use a coolant, a commercial soluble oil mixed as per instructions on bottle, I find that the blade will run off the wheels every so often usually under heavy cutting or at the end of a cut, just at the blade breaks through. yet when I run it dry it almost never runs off the wheel. I was using the coolant in an attempt to prolong the life of the blade. Any thoughts, please.

Bob.

 

[cathead]

A few years ago I acquired a Walker-Turner 14 inch wood cutting band saw. It had rubber tires that were perfectly flat.
The blade would not stay on at all. I finally glued the rubber tires to the wheel and milled a crown on the tires. The blade has
not come off since. Also, having built a metal cutting band saw, I found that a beveled wheel is helpful to keep the blade where
it belongs since the blade can ride up against the bevel. Also, automobile tires with a crown are quite effective in building
a wood cutting band saw mill as the blade gravitates to the top of the crown. Hopefully, someone finds this information
useful, my 2 cents...

 

[Hanke777]

Hello,
I am new to this and just bought a Walker Tuner (Kearney-Trecker) 14" model ban saw that I want to use mostly to cut metal.
My first project is to cut 3"x 0.060" to 0.090" 304 stainless steel exhaust tubing.

It could use new tires but I am not sure which style would be best to buy?

Not sure which blade would be best for stainless and which would be best for mild steel?
It came with what looks to be a 95"-96" 14-15 teeth per inch x 3/8" wide.

What would be the best RPM?

The motor was just rebuilt and is the original 1/2hp X 1725 rpm.
The lower motor pulley is 2.45" outside diameter and the upper pulley is a 6.50" OD.

The drive V belt is a Dyaco 4L500.

I would like to change the pulleys, tires and blade if possible.

Maybe down the road if possible add the gearing and pulleys from a model 3220?

Would sure appropriate any advice on how best to accomplish this.

Thanks,
Mike

 

[Downunder Bob]

Hello,
I am new to this and just bought a Walker Tuner (Kearney-Trecker) 14" model ban saw that I want to use mostly to cut metal.
My first project is to cut 3"x 0.060" to 0.090" 304 stainless steel exhaust tubing.

It could use new tires but I am not sure which style would be best to buy?

Not sure which blade would be best for stainless and which would be best for mild steel?
It came with what looks to be a 95"-96" 14-15 teeth per inch x 3/8" wide.

What would be the best RPM?

The motor was just rebuilt and is the original 1/2hp X 1725 rpm.
The lower motor pulley is 2.45" outside diameter and the upper pulley is a 6.50" OD.

The drive V belt is a Dyaco 4L500.

I would like to change the pulleys, tires and blade if possible.

Maybe down the road if possible add the gearing and pulleys from a model 3220?

Would sure appropriate any advice on how best to accomplish this.

Thanks,
Mike

G'day Mike, 0.060" and 0.090" is basically sheet metal. The general recomendation for band saw blades is to have at least 3 teeth in contact with the work at all times, thus you would need a blade of 50 TPI I've never heard of a blade this fine. In fact the finest I've come across is half that at 24TPI. I've used a 24TPI blade to cut MS this thin and it works ok as long as you don't force the feed.

Bear in mind that SS is a lot harder than MS and I would recomend that you keeep the feed low, just enough to keep it cutting And use the hardest blade you can get, preferably HSS sometimes called Bi metal. Talk to your local blade supplier for a blade recomendation and speed and feed.

Your question for best RPM, comes back to blade speed work it out in FPM same as for lathe or mill work. I'm not familiar with that machine, but assuming 14" is the wheel dia. I'd suggest a speed for MS at about 25RPM and roughly half that for SS.

 

[Downunder Bob]

G'day Mike, 0.060" and 0.090" is basically sheet metal. The general recomendation for band saw blades is to have at least 3 teeth in contact with the work at all times, thus you would need a blade of 50 TPI I've never heard of a blade this fine. In fact the finest I've come across is half that at 24TPI. I've used a 24TPI blade to cut MS this thin and it works ok as long as you don't force the feed.

Bear in mind that SS is a lot harder than MS and I would recomend that you keeep the feed low, just enough to keep it cutting And use the hardest blade you can get, preferably HSS sometimes called Bi metal. Talk to your local blade supplier for a blade recomendation and speed and feed.

Your question for best RPM, comes back to blade speed work it out in FPM same as for lathe or mill work. I'm not familiar with that machine, but assuming 14" is the wheel dia. I'd suggest a speed for MS at about 25RPM and roughly half that for SS.

Having thought about this, I'm wondering how many of these parts do you have to cut? Because I'm thinking that a bandsaw is probably not the best tool for this job.

 

[Eddyde]

What is the purpose of the rubber tires on band saw wheels ?
Are the rubber tires used to protect the teeth, by raising the teeth above face of the wheel.

The tires provide traction to drive the blade and protection for the wheels from being chewed up by the teeth of the blade and the teeth form being damaged by the wheel.

 

[Eddyde]

Hello,
I am new to this and just bought a Walker Tuner (Kearney-Trecker) 14" model ban saw that I want to use mostly to cut metal.
My first project is to cut 3"x 0.060" to 0.090" 304 stainless steel exhaust tubing.

It could use new tires but I am not sure which style would be best to buy?

Not sure which blade would be best for stainless and which would be best for mild steel?
It came with what looks to be a 95"-96" 14-15 teeth per inch x 3/8" wide.

What would be the best RPM?

The motor was just rebuilt and is the original 1/2hp X 1725 rpm.
The lower motor pulley is 2.45" outside diameter and the upper pulley is a 6.50" OD.

The drive V belt is a Dyaco 4L500.

I would like to change the pulleys, tires and blade if possible.

Maybe down the road if possible add the gearing and pulleys from a model 3220?

Would sure appropriate any advice on how best to accomplish this.

Thanks,
Mike

Polyurethane tires are reputed to be the best, look on eBay or Amazon.

Unfortunately, you cannot reduce the speed low enough to cut metal by a simple pulley change, you need a gear reducer or countershaft.
As Bob mentioned, bandsaw speed is measured in FPM (feet per minute) steel is in the 50-300 FPM range, aluminum around 1000 FPM, and wood 2000-4000 FPM
Here's a link to my recent speed reducer build:https://www.hobby-machinist.com/threads/bandsaw-speed-reducer-build.65462/#post-553488
There are other similar builds here as well.