I gotta agree, again, with the others, knap, you did a great job heating that stuff.
Real pretty, err....I mean, handsome material.
Maddog, the main thing about cutting rock, is you want to do it wet.
Water or oil, you want a wet saw.
Some of you have been asking for pics of some saws, so I thought I'd post a few to give
you an idea what you're looking for.
Here's my first saw and probably still my favorite. A little 10" I found in a pile of junk at an
old rockhounds house, and gave him $ 50.00 for it. I have a few old motors sitting around
so just had to make the base to mount the saw and motor. New diamond blades for a 10"
will run $40-80. A 10" saw will cut up to a 5" thick piece, theoretically. I usually stop at an
inch under max, around 4" and that's still pushing it. This one has a vice that you can put a
gravity feed on, but I do everything hand-held on this one.
Now this 12" slab saw by Lortone is an auto-feed. Clamp the rock into the vise, close the
top, and turn it on. This saw runs about $ 1,300.00 new and new diamond blades run from
$ 50.00 - 200.00. A friend of mine that just plain got tired of it sold it to me for $200.00. I had
to put new bearings in it and upped the horsepower a hair. Great saw. Small enough to fit
on a table in your workshop, 2 person portable, and cuts rocks up to 5 inches thick no problem.
The biggest saw I have is this old Lortone 18". New these will run around $ 3,000.00.
This one was made in the 1970's. I paid $1,500.00 for it, but the man let me work some of that off
and gave me a couple of years to pay the rest. Since then I have had to replace about everything.
Bearings, feed rod and half-nut, etc., but it's worth it! New diamond blades will run from $150.00-400.00.
You don't want to have to move these around much. Cuts rocks up to 8.5".
I use mineral oil in the 18" all the time, but will switch back and forth from oil to water with the 12",
depending on what type of rock I'm cutting. Some porous rocks will absorb too much of the oil and
it will alter their character too much.
And here's a pic of a slab of the stuff I've got in the 18" now. It's some spherulitic rhyolite from NC.
The ONLY spherulitic rhyo I've ever seen from NC, and as far as I know, I'm the only one that's got any.
Unfortunately, I haven't found any that will knap yet, but I'm still slabbin'!
Hope that helps with some of y'alls questions about saws.
Joe
