Saw Sharpening Advice - Atkins 93

[MarvW]

Mark,

I have had the misfortune of filing a couple of those type saws. They are in fact meant for double duty, ripping and crosscutting. If all you want is to use it for rough cutting, it will do exactly that. Due to there being way more crosscut teeth than there are rip teeth, the saw will rip pretty much the same as if you were using a crosscut saw. When you crosscut with it, the deep gullets act as if there is a missing tooth every 7th tooth. The gap, along with the two rip teeth it does about the worse job of crosscutting imaginable when sawing anything less than 4/4. I hated the saw and wouldn't recommend it even to someone I don't like.

It might do ok in thicker stock.

[azmica]

In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. But in practice there is. Jan L.A. van de Snepscheut

Virtually the whole of society, believes in what they believe not by direct experience but .... by what they've been told. - Philip Jones Griffiths

The opinion of 10,000 men is of no value if none of them know anything about the subject.

"The irony of the Information Age is that it has given new respectability to uninformed opinion." - John Lawton, speaking to the American Association of Broadcast Journalists in 1995


this is a clear illustration of how misinformation can be spread exponentially by those who, with noble intentions but no practical experience .... would make assumptions based on looking at pictures discovered in a "google" search. this thread will likely now show up in all future web search engines and the information contained herein accepted .... like so much other crap ..... as a reference to the proper fitting of the atkins no. 93 "universal" pattern ....

so this must be corrected

i had written the following on the subject elsewhere - guess it didn't make it to the google search

i will touch on this very briefly.

there is really very little relationship between the disston d-17 and the great american crosscut pattern - the d-17, a uni-directional saw .... was designed to be a combination rip/crosscut pattern - and it was a poor design in my opinion - the rip teeth were the same height as the pegs and tended to hang the saw when crosscutting so they were raked at the same angle as the pegs .... possibly to mitigate this(?) the saw was sorely lacking in it's ability to rip efficiently and the deep 1/16" wide waste gullets were often clogged in use .... also because of this there was very little room for a file to properly maintain this saw. i think that anyone who bought this saw was pretty frustrated with it's performance and maintenance - word must have spread because they are not commonly found. i will modify them by opening the gullets to 1/8" which allows me to rake the rip teeth properly i also pin them down about .010 ... like a raker .... to keep them from hanging. an improvement to be sure ... like most combination tools - it will manage to perform both functions .... but neither as well as it's dedicated counterpart.

now .... a more apt comparison would be in the e.c. atkins no. 93 "improved universal saw" which IS a crown tooth pattern .... it is also intended as a "combination" rip and crosscut and ... unlike a handsaw, it was designed to cut on both the push and pull strokes .... so a handsaw user needed to adjust their technique for it to function as intended. now, unlike the great american crosscut pattern, the long edge of this pattern was filed straight across - without bevel .... as the rip tooth in the pattern. no small consideration, there being only one effective rip tooth per set (in each direction) it was critical that the sawyers technique be adjusted for it to be effective. now, with all points at the same height, the key to what makes this pattern work is in the bevel filed on the "back" of the rip tooth - this profile is near identical to the "atb" or "alternating top bevel" tooth commonly found on the circular crosscut saws.
used properly .... out of the box this was a much more effective pattern than the d-17 .... in my opinion.
of course, maintenance was always a consideration when designing saws for the masses.

but then ..... i am always wrong.

[Blacky's Boy]

[MarvW]

Mark,

The differences in tooth profile between the Disston D-17 and the Atkins No.93 are apparent, however, the extra deep and wide gullets between the rip teeth and the crosscut teeth produce the same rough cut when crosscutting as if the saw has missing teeth. This will be the case no matter how the teeth are filed. I'm sorry to say, my negative opinion is the same for both saws.

The saws are rare because it didn't take the carpenters long to discover they had purchased a lousy cutting saw and they were not as easy to sharpen as regular saws. During the time when handsaws were heavily relied on, most carpenters filed their own saws or had a designated filer who did it for them. The saws in question were not commonly filed with sloped gullets. As is purported by some, being common practice by everyone who filed a saw in those days, so having to spend extra time filing a saw differently that then produced a lousy cut, the popularity of the saw never materialized.

[MarkSLSmith]

Marv,

Thanks for the input. The difference is easy to see.

Indeed, it doesn't look like this one has been filed very many times (I think), making me think the previous owners also had second thoughts.

My interest was more curiosity about a combination saw, as opposed to achieving something with utility. I have enough decent crosscut and rip saws for everyday use. I think I'll ponder my options for a while before making any hasty moves.

Thanks,
Mark

[MarvW]

Mark,

Looking at a picture of the saw in an Atkins catalog dated 1919, shows the teeth full size with the gullets being about 9/32" deep, as close as I can measure with a six inch scale. The verbiage included in the writeup explains that the saw was intended for rough sawing at any angle when doing heavy framing, ship building, and working around mines, etc. So, like I mentioned, it would probably do ok in thicker stock and your saw as apposed to the Disston D-17 probably is a smoother cutting saw.

It might be interesting for you to go ahead and file it just to see what it actually does in practice. I would file those wide gullets to their original depth, being careful to not file the sides of the raker teeth on each side.

The filing instructions are, in each group of three teeth, the middle tooth is filed cross cut with the fleam on opposites sides of the saw from one group to the other. These crosscut teeth are the only teeth that should be set, alternating from group to group. The teeth on each side of the middle tooth, referred to as rakers, are not filed on the gullet side and are not set, but are filed with fleam corresponding to the middle tooth. In effect, each group of teeth has three cutting edges and two rakers. That would be three cutters going forward and three on the back stroke. All the points should be the same height. There is nothing said about the rakers being lower than the middle teeth as the teeth and rakers are on a two man crosscut saw. Rakers on a two man crosscut are not beveled as they are on your Atkins saw. So, in reality, they really aren't true rip teeth because they are beveled same as the middle crosscut teeth are. What you have is basically a crosscut saw with a lot of missing teeth in the form of wide gullets.

Aside from the fact that the saw produced a not so great cut, it was a specialty type saw, hence, fewer were purchased, adding to their rarity.

If you choose to go ahead and file it, come back and let us know the results. We can all learn something here I'm sure.

[azmica]

MarvW said:

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Mark,

Looking at a picture of the saw in an Atkins catalog dated 1919, shows the teeth full size with the gullets being about 9/32" deep, as close as I can measure with a six inch scale. The verbiage included in the writeup explains that the saw was intended for rough sawing at any angle when doing heavy framing, ship building, and working around mines, etc. So, like I mentioned, it would probably do ok in thicker stock and your saw as apposed to the Disston D-17 probably is a smoother cutting saw.

It might be interesting for you to go ahead and file it just to see what it actually does in practice. I would file those wide gullets to their original depth, being careful to not file the sides of the raker teeth on each side.

The filing instructions are, in each group of three teeth, the middle tooth is filed cross cut with the fleam on opposites sides of the saw from one group to the other. These crosscut teeth are the only teeth that should be set, alternating from group to group. The teeth on each side of the middle tooth, referred to as rakers, are not filed on the gullet side and are not set, but are filed with fleam corresponding to the middle tooth. In effect, each group of teeth has three cutting edges and two rakers. That would be three cutters going forward and three on the back stroke. All the points should be the same height. There is nothing said about the rakers being lower than the middle teeth as the teeth and rakers are on a two man crosscut saw. Rakers on a two man crosscut are not beveled as they are on your Atkins saw. So, in reality, they really aren't true rip teeth because they are beveled same as the middle crosscut teeth are. What you have is basically a crosscut saw with a lot of missing teeth in the form of wide gullets.

Aside from the fact that the saw produced a not so great cut, it was a specialty type saw, hence, fewer were purchased, adding to their rarity.

If you choose to go ahead and file it, come back and let us know the results. We can all learn something here I'm sure.

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oh good lord

first, i want to thank marv for that impressive explanation as he is always so gracious in sharing.

unfortunately .... and this is just a simple fact .... so i do not know a way of breaking it gently:

the only accurate advice contained is that .... the points in the crown pattern are all jointed to the same height.
and well .... maybe .... that if you were to file the saw as instructed .... (and by some miracle of God were successful in not completely FUBARing it) ....... you would have the identical opinion as to it's performance.

i feel a little headache coming on here, so i will go through this only very briefly.

second: THERE ARE NO RAKERS IN ANY OF THE PATTERNS ... (NOR THE "M" TOOTH PATTERN, FOR THAT MATTER)

every point in the crown pattern is a bi-directional cutter. (that means 2 way for those who were absent that day) with only the "long edges" facilitating ..... the uni-directional rip function .... which is unique to the atkin's "improved universal" pattern (the conventional great american crosscut pattern is filed with a bevel on the long edge)

third: every single point in the toothline is set .... alternately .... this is necessary to maintain tracking in the kerf - which, i guess .... is not covered in "saw filing - the beginner's primer"

fourth: the "v" gullets between cutters in the crown - are not the typical 60 degree that one would find in a typical hand saw .... it is critical that this relationship be maintained and simply cannot be accomplished with a slim taper saw file if filed straight across (without slope). each edge of the cutters is filed independently, typically using a "cant saw" file.

there is a bit more involved than i have covered here .... which cannot be discerned by simply studying the pictures - mark is welcome to contact me if he cares to learn more.

let's just all be clear about one thing - and this is the case in point - like so many others, this man came here for saw sharpening advice .... trusting that he would receive sage guidance .... what he received instead, was multiple choice answers .... and guesses cloaked in an impressive authoritative context .... all of which were dead wrong in nearly all critical respects.
as a result he will now probably go and ruin the saw ... get frustrated and return with his story ..... at which point he would likely receive more guesses and convincingly worded authoritative sounding advice on how to correct it .... and the beat goes on .... da -dada - dada
it would probably be most appropriate here, to explain ... for those who were not around at the time .... the parables and basic life lessons that could be found in every one of the "mister magoo" cartoons.
but at the moment - i just need to find an excedrin.

[Blacky's Boy]

"i feel a little headache coming on here, so i will go through this only very briefly."

BRIEFLY?

Really?

[MarvW]

Mark,

The filing instructions I gave you that Azmica is disputing is what Atkins includes in their catalog I was quoting from. The word "rakers" is used in the instructions, not my word. I wouldn't refer to them as rakers in the true sense when comparing to a two man crosscut saw, as I explained. The filing of the No.93 is quite odd as explained by Atkins and should not be compared to how we file a regular handsaw.

Please note, anything I say here in this forum regarding the filing of saws is shared based on my experience or instructions I have read and is offered strictly in the spirit of offering whatever might be helpful to those who seek information on the subject. So try to glean what you find useful to you and ignore the rest.

[TobyC]

azmica said:

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