I’m trying to figure out the best way to make a pretty specific frame. It’s basically a box with the front open, but it will be 20×30 cm (I always work in metric, but that’s roughly 7×10″), with a series of thin slots on the interior to hold sheets of paper with space between them. The 16 slots need to be no wider than 1mm in order to hold the sheets flat, 3-5mm deep (1/8″ to 1/4″), and about 5mm apart. I haven’t seen any table saw blades that are even remotely thin enough, not surprisingly. I’ve come up with three options for creating this box. I’m hoping y’all can suggest improvements to my current schemes. The box could be made out of acrylic plastic, hardboard, plywood, solid wood, or the like. It would be nice if the walls weren’t more than 1cm (1/2″) thick.
Option #1: Cut a whole bunch of sticks to 5mm by 10mm, put a 1mm x 3mm dado on one edge, and glue them all together to create the slots. Even if I chop the sticks apart after dado-ing to make the sides, top and bottom, that’s still at least 16 thin bits of wood, and a lot of gluing. I haven’t done a lot of glue-up, and I’d have to be careful not to let glue squeeze out into the slots, which seems really tricky.
Option #2: build a miniature table saw using a Dremel-sized saw blade and a long shaft. I’d make the table surface out of hardboard, but the blade needs to be fastened in the middle of the shaft in order to clear the drill or motor or whatever I attach to it to spin it and support it, I think. Maybe I can fasten it to the end? I have some 8″+ straight metal rods to use as the drive shaft. They’re smooth, so they’d take bearings well, but smooth makes it hard to lock the blade in place. Setscrews and rubber washers? Or maybe I cut threads in the end for nuts to hold the blade? The blades are maybe 40mm (1.5″) in diameter, so the table surface would have to be 1/4″ material or thinner.
Option #3: Mount the thin Dremel saw blade at the end of a rotary tool’s flex shaft (which I have), clamp a straight-edge/tool guide to the board, and build a carriage that will hold the flex shaft steady and at the right height to put the blade 3mm into the material to cut, and will ride smoothly against the straightedge. I have to make sure the shaft’s held securely in the carriage, and that I’m really careful to place the clamp straight and at the right distance for every cut. This is the method I’m currently most likely to try first.
I’ve considered using a hand saw (hack saw or japanese saw) but cutting sixteen slots all straight and parallel seems problematic. I have a table router with slot cutters, but the slot cutters are way too wide, and even if I mount the thin saw blades in the router, it won’t reach far enough across the board to cut all the slots. My laser cutter isn’t quite big enough to cut the slots in the top & bottom, and lasers (or at least my laser) aren’t especially good at cutting a clean slot part-way through material.
Any advice? Best material to use? Other schemes for cutting really thin slots? Thanks.
Replies
The Resaw King bandsaw blade has a 44 mil kerf, that is very close to 1 mm.
StewMac.Com is a guitar-making supply website. They have tiny router bits that will fit a Dremel and you can buy a router base for a Dremel from StewMac as well.
So you could assemble a miniature router with a tiny bit.
You could use a scratch stock or the cutter you use to cut grooves for stringing. Mine cuts a groove 0.037 inches wide. You could narrow this easily and it cuts fairly quickly by hand.
Try using a marking knife to get the slots started to a workable depth, and then a handsaw to get the depth. I’ve been using that approach for stepped dados lately.
Veneer saw?
Stair or kerfing saw.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJavA41bmro
Lataxe
If you are open to buying a new toy, check into model maker tablesaws like Proxxon.
You could use a Japanese saw against a straight edge if using wood. Careful though as some other materials will destroy the fine teeth of a japanese crosscut saw.
Thank you all for some really good suggestions.
Gulfstar: In order to get the slots on the side and bottom to line up, I'd prefer to cut the slots in one long piece of stock and then chop them apart into bottom and sides. That means cutting at least a 30" long slot. Rather hard to do on a bandsaw, at least the one I have. :)
MikeInOhio: I am a big fan of routers. Not only do I have a couple of router bases for my Dremel-style tools, but I can drop a 1/8" shank bit into my Bosch 1617 router (which also takes 1/2" bits) because I have a special collet for it. So I was really tempted. But I'd need the 1/32" bits to get the slot as narrow as I want, and it's not clear if I can get as deep as I want with them. The down-spiral bits would probably be best, but that means a $15 carbide bit, and not snapping it right off would be a challenge.
Steambent: I've tried using a Japanese saw against a straightedge before. Maybe I just don't have very good technique, but keeping the blade flat against the straightedge for the entire pull is much harder than I expect, especially when trying to get it started.
Lat_axe: Well! I would never have known to look for a "stair saw," since I'm not trying to cut dadoes. But mounting a thin blade in a block seems like an excellent solution. I think I'll start with just a hacksaw blade. Most woodworkers would probably use wood for the block, but I'm also a fan of HDPE, aka "cutting board plastic." No grain, almost as slick as teflon, and easily shaped with woodworking tools. Take two long blocks, route a dado in one slightly thinner than the hacksaw blade, and drill some holes for bolts so I can clamp the blocks around/over the blade. That will give me a nice long edge to rest against a fence as I slide it back and forth to cut the slot, and it automatically depth-stops all the slots to the same depth. The cut should be perfectly perpendicular, and I'm not trying to put the blade against the straightedge.
Again, thank you all for the help.
I'll second the instrument making suggestion. StewMac and others sells bases that you can mount a Dremel in. Proxon also makes a small router that can use these bits (I think you have to get a 1/8" collet to hold the bits). You can buy carbide bits less than 1/16th in diameter in a number of sizes. Using a simple guide fence, you'll be able to cut these slots with no trouble.
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