05-21-2017, 05:20 AM
I just bought a 18" Rikon, last year and had trouble on the first boards I tried to practice resawing with, both with the flat fence and single point attachment. The cuts were very uneven and the blade kept walking leaving hills and valleys and was cutting diagonally. I tried cutting slower with the same results just less pronounced. The main issue I had was the blade drift was really bad and too much to compensate for with fence adjustments. I set the saw up per instructions and was getting a bit discouraged. A few days ago, after probably 5-6 months of not doing anything in the shop or touching the BS, I gave it another whirl and found I was slightly off on my table being square to the blade and the big thing was the blade was riding too far back on the crown. I made the table square and adjusted the upper wheel until the drift was reasonable and adjusted the fence to compensate for the minor drift. I put some 6.5" purpleheart through it and I came out with what I thought were very acceptable results.
There are definitely more knowledgeable guys here, but I would find a good set of BS tuning instructions online or in a magazine and be thorough and double check everything. I have also found, like in this case, that if I'm getting poor results and I get discouraged then I come back at a later date with fresher eyes and go over the setup again and I'll end up finding the problem pretty quick. Usually ends up being a "duh" moment.
Bob
There are definitely more knowledgeable guys here, but I would find a good set of BS tuning instructions online or in a magazine and be thorough and double check everything. I have also found, like in this case, that if I'm getting poor results and I get discouraged then I come back at a later date with fresher eyes and go over the setup again and I'll end up finding the problem pretty quick. Usually ends up being a "duh" moment.
Bob