Quote:
Originally Posted by Ducay
You're probably overthinking the blades and the impact they'll have. 99% of the efficacy and vibration in a cut is based on how you're holding it, how the piece is held/tensioned, and your own movements during the cut. The blade brand and material is going to be less impactful than you think. Stick to a decent brand (all the ones at HD are fine) and worry about carbide tipped when you're cutting through metal.
The kit you linked is good, but just from a value perspective, not a "you need those specific blades" perspective. I buy blades based on value since they're disposable items. If I have a unique/important cut that might need a specialized blade, then I might fuss over it, otherwise I'll just grab a blade that meets the job from my drawer.
And to clarify, the "metal" blades aren't going to cut through other non-metal items like butter. Blades are generally used for different purposes based on 2 main characteristics (simplifying and ignoring blade shape/length): - TPI (teeth per inch) and blade material.
Metal blades will have insane high TPI since it only makes it through metal by taking tiny nibbles out (lots of little teeth) and generally more likely to be carbide tipped to resist wear and deal with hardened metals. Wood blades will have low TPI (large teeth to take rougher chunks out of the softer wood) and may or may not be carbide tipped (generally demo blades will be for any nails that get in the way that you may not know the composition of). So metal blades are indeed better at cutting harder things, but with its tiny teeth, when cutting wood, metal blades can get jammed up with sawdust and lose efficacy - you want the big teeth as they'll better expel the cut material from the kerf. Metal blades will be slower than molasses
Long story short, metal blades are good for metal, wood for wood, etc. Going for carbide tipped for a blade that you're going to do tree pruning with is unnecessary. The blade will get worn and potentially bent long before the teeth benefit from the carbide tip. Save the carbide for a demo blade and maybe a metal blade to keep handy for when you might run up against a really hard metal.
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Good points. For the butter comment, I meant more that the typical DIY job would be completed in no time at all vs a hack saw or hand saw for typical household applications I'd be trying to saw down. Kinda like going from a hand screw driver to power drill. I presumed that discussions on cutting would be generally be about properly fastened/clamped down etc. items, otherwise it's dangerous as F so for the vibration comments I read it would be someone trying to cut off something that's really damn hard. I muddled up the communication about that though. My bad.
I don't disagree with your comments about the jamming/gumming up of the blades and you're probably right that the blades would be bent long before the carbide kicked in. A value kit worth of blades would probably be my primary blades for several years so spending up to 50% more is worth considering for me. I grew up around farms/farmers so I watched quite a few of them do basic repairs and have a gist of the idea. I'm not going to pretend I'm not a newb at DIY though, so your reminder and explanation was highly appreciated.
https://www.homedepot.ca/product/mil...ce-/1000838673
This is basically the comparable value blade kit from Milwaukee. I don't know the difference between metal cutting and metal demo blades, but some of what I researched mentioned that having a demo blade was worth it. The Diablo set is cheaper and has the extra blade type plus a case. A single demo blade is $7 on the HD website. I think I better understand why some of what I read suggested to go with Diablo vs Milwaukee blades.