The "Jaguar"

[lobudugas]

Hello everyone

I am working on the full size jaguar pattern from Kathy Wise. I decided to follow her recommendations and I am using 1" Wenge boards for the spot (over 600 of them). I am having a hell of a time trying to find the correct blade. This stuff is super hard and really difficult to cut.

In her description of the pattern, Kathy recommends the Wenge even saying that it is easy to cut. What am I missing? I am using mostly Olson blades with a mixture of PGT and reverse tooth usually number 5 or 7. Most of the time, I have to exert a lot of pressure to be able to cut.

My scrool saw is an Excalibur EX-21.

As anyone made this pattern and used the Wenge? If so, what blade did you use?

Any help will be appreciated

Alain

[oily]

I use FD blades and have often found #2R and #3Ultra Reverse to cut better in hard material than the what should. I almost exclusively use #'s 3-5-7 FDUR for everything.
The best supplier for FD blades is Mike right here on the forum.
He is great to work with and extremely fast. Mike's Workshop selling Flying Dutchman brand fret and scrollsaw blades

[ASDLF22]

The PGT by Olsen are pretty aggressive cutting blades and can sometimes be a bit hard to control - I would think they should be cutting the wenge reasonably well though. I prefer the FD blades myself, I found that FD Polar blades are a bit more solid the the reverse blades, cut a bit slower, but are pretty easy to control and with intarsia usually sanding the bottom of the wood is not a big deal so the burrs on the bottom are okay. Usually with thicker wood you'll want to run the saw a bit faster too. Wenge is fairly hard, but there are some real buggers out there... I guess its just try a variety of blades and different speeds. Mike with FD can definitely help!

[Rolf]

That is a very ambitious project you are taking on.
I use the pgt 5 all the time with wenge, also the Mach 3 series and have no trouble with it.?