Day 31, A 16" Sears/Craftman scrollsaw
Today's garage gem was one that I bought a while ago, but haven't used hardly at all, and have little experience with: a Sears/Craftsman 16" scrollsaw.
It's appearance was due to one of my Pixar colleagues coming to the telescope making workshop on Friday, where he brought his incredibly awesome 10" telescope which was designed to be ultra lightweight and small. It was a strut tube design, very low profile, and demonstrated a degree of workmanship that I can only aspire to achieve. He fashioned the altitude bearings for the scope not with laser cutters or CNC, but by just careful work with (you guessed it) a scroll saw. I thought that based upon his experience I should dust mine off and see what I could achieve using it with some practice.
For power tools, I'm trying to augment my posts with links the appropriate manuals if I can find them. This scrollsaw doesn't bear a model or serial number, but I believe that it is identical to the one described in this manual.
Staring at the manual, I realize that this saw doesn't seem to have the blade guard/hold down gadget. So now, I'm searching the web looking for a replacement part. In the mean time to entertain you, you could look at the nifty video on the Pask Makes Youtube channel, where he uses his nifty scrollsaw to make his own jigsaw puzzle.
Hope you all are having a good day.
Addendum: While looking for a supplier for the blade guard for this saw, I ran across this exchange on the penturners.org website. Quoting:
Oh Russ you really do not need those things. Many people take them off right away because they get in the way especially if scrolling small ornaments and things like that. It is the same thing with those hold down devices all saws come with. They are a safety feature that some law maker made all saws to have but they just are more trouble than what they are worth.
Anyone who uses these have a contrary opinion? Let me know!