saw or split

[mullet]

 For me, If I saw it straight I back it.

[Crash]

New question. Maybe I'll have to start a new topic. I'm having a lot of confusion as far as horizontal and vertical grain goes. I think I really need a picture for clarification. Anyone know where I can find one? I googled and searched the sight with no luck

[George Tsoukalas]

Vertical, longitudinal, lateral. I think longitudinal is better. Here you go. Jawge
http://georgeandjoni.home.comcast.net/~georgeandjoni/layout.html

[Eric Garza]

Historically I've split most of my logs, but more and more I'm attracted to ban saws because they allow you to waste less wood.

[adb]

From a slit stave, I bandsaw out the bows profile... so I'm not sure if sawing a stave is a bad thing. Lately, I've been splitting logs, and bandsawing one edge to waste less wood. So, one edge is split, and one is sawn... especially for smaller diameter logs.

[yazoo]

I am still in favor of splitting the following longitutal grain as best as you can,,sure it waste less wood when you bansaw, but you you are taking more chances on future problems,,I work mostly with osage,,and I work with the most crooked and twisted wood I have,,I sell the straight ones,,when you are making osage blanks, and do a lot of straightening you must follow grain,,the only bandsawing I do is waste wood off the belly,,of course I have to look at this form a business perspective,,,this is my lively hood,,I would rather to produce 1 bow that I can stand behind , that 4 I cant,,I would also never recommend for beginners to do any sawing,,,till they have several bows under there belt,,

[Hillbilly]

I bandsaw my staves to bow dimensions, too-but following the grain. I follow the natural curves of the split stave for my width layout-I measure the width of the rough bow from the center of the split stave from one end to the other. If the stave curves, so does the bow. This keeps the grain intact. If you want to straighten it for cosmetic reasons or to correct tip alightnment, you can do that after you have it roughed out.

[adb]

I understand and follow those guidelines, but most  bow profiles are not straight from grip to tip, so while sawing profiles, you will not be able to avoid violating gain somewhat, yes?

[Del the cat]

Vertical, longitudinal, lateral. I think longitudinal is better. Here you go. Jawge
http://georgeandjoni.home.comcast.net/~georgeandjoni/layout.html

Nice pics Jawge... I'm trying to set up my website... but a certain dumbass company doesn't seem to want my money...
"You can have your site up in minutes"....yeah right, 2 weeks later moan...moan...moan)
Anyhow, When it's finally up, I'd like to link to your site  if that's ok? (as you have good in depth build info...my site is more...well wait and see)
Del

[George Tsoukalas]

Thanks, Del. Glad you like it. Jawge

[George Tsoukalas]

BTW, for those who care, LOL,  the bow in that picture came from a  sawed stave if memory serves. I gotta be honest the avoiding of   sawed staves is making me scratch my head right about now. It really is easy following the long. grain but I already said that. I can understand why yazoo does it. He can't always depend on a customer to do it right and splitting does it automatically but... Jawge

[Crash]

So what I picked up here (and this could be selective hearing) is that if I have a small diameter stave with straight grain, using a saw isn't terrible. But if it's got any kind of character, split is safer. Could I do the same thing with a tablesaw? I don't have a bandsaw.

[yazoo]

split it , work it down with drawknife ash works very well,,it cuts like butter,,in the time it takes to read this message you could have roughed it out

[Crash]

Haha, thanks Yazoo. I would have finished it by now but Lost was on