I am starting this thread in the hopes that i dont ruin my machines and other forum members are informed.
I found two things about teak today based on reading
1.) Its a pain in the ars* hardwood. In such a way that it dulls knives real good and the oil in the wood does something funny too. It has silica. Imagine, silica used to be the traditional sandpaper....
2.) secondly , it is considered toxic. Highly allergy inducing stuff. Silixa has something to do with this too. Silica has a slight toxicity.
The closest thing to silica that we can compare to is the horsetail plant. A perennial bog/swamp plant that looks like mini bamboos. It is very common in Plant shops. If you touch the stems (which are actually leaves i think) its semi rough. I used some to sand before just to test the "trivia" of it being a sandpaper 🙂
I am hoping some other folks can contribute to this as well, (Guad, you've worked in teak na diba?)
I will be changing my 100 teeth blade in my TS to 40 teeth just so i dont bog the motor and burn the wood 🙂
Re: working with teak
crosscut a teak with a cms, felt like any other wood... well.. its only crosscutting.
Will rip joint one tomorrow... now that i re-installed the splitter, guard and readjusted the fence and shimmed the zero clearance insert. Not to mention cut a notch in the zci to allow for the splitter to slide in and grinded the ears on the splitter to fit in the zci
Re: working with teak
Guad, you've worked in teak na diba?
Haven't used teak yet. Though I am looking for gmelina (a.k.a. white teak) in small quantities not truckloads.
If teak dulls blades, I wonder which does so faster, teak or MDF.
Re: working with teak
ohhhh mdf dulls as well? never knew that. Well my CS did take a harder effort than usual to pass through mdf
Re: working with teak
surprised to read that mdf dulls carbides? my makita 5806B went tru a lot of mdf cutting very recently..about 8 sheets in all and very recently, needed to cut a whole sheet into 3 and 2cm strips but still the edges of these strips remain crisp..touched the edges of the carbides as well and they are sharp as before..im sure since i bought the cs, it never crossed any salvaged lumber with embedded nails.
or the kind of mdf? i am using the locally available 8mm and 18mm malaysia made.
should it be true then its another point to consider when charging commissioned works.
The devil will find work for idle hands to do.-Morrissey
Re: working with teak
that is a fact that MDF dulls carbide blades faster than reg wood. it is due to the chemicals in the MDF that do this. that is a good reason to get CS and ts blades for MDF and laminates...
click my signature and it will take you there........
Re: working with teak
been joint ripping a teak on my TS since the Jimmy Jig is now fully working
I was using a 40 tooth blade that came with the TS. Take note the blade was almost never used and was only installed in the saw since I didnt want my 100 tooth blade ripping hardwood.
It was sloooooooow ripping a 2 inch thick teak. I as i fed the stock i felt the lack of power and/or struggle of the TS.
I ripped timberco lauan also .. it was no problem.
I will be getting new blades tomorrow since i also suspect that the carbide tip has dulled a little since it did scrape the splitter knife for a few seconds a week ago.
but comparing it to ripping lauan .. it was really tough.
Oh, its also of no surprise, the wood is noticeably oilyish. So at least i know i got real teak 🙂
Re: working with teak
try cleaning the blades first Ben...
click my signature and it will take you there........
Re: working with teak
ahh yes.. I will do that.
I dont have anything i can use except thinner. and WD40.Would that be sufficient?
