The Dale C. Maley Family Web Site

I bought a new scroll saw a couple months ago.  Scroll sawing was something I had never tried, and I saw some interesting patterns.  The saw came with a pin type blade in it.  Scroll saw blades can be split into 2 groups, those with pins and those without or plain blades.

I bought the book Wooden Clocks: 31 Favorite Projects & Patterns and decided to dive right into scroll sawing by making a clock face shown in the book. 

First I sawed out 2 blanks from 1/4" oak plywood. I then masking taped them together. I used Elmers white glue to glue the pattern onto the blanks.

I also taped a piece of cardboard to the saw as recommended to make a zero clearance insert. The zero clearance insert is supposed to prevent fragile pieces from breaking off. 

 I then checked to see how large of drill bit to use to drill a hole for the interior saw cuts. The pin blade takes a relatively large diameter hole.........in fact the hole is larger than the small cuts on the clock face! Right then I learned that for intricate scroll sawing, you must use the plain blades because they require a much smaller starter hole!

I went online and ordered some plain blades. I decided to go ahead and try sawing out the large interior areas. 

 I got the first fancy interior area cut out.  I then went to the next fancy area..........and darn........the board broke

 The break occurred when I switched from 3/4 speed to about 1/2 speed. The blade caught on the board and broke the delicate cross section.

I then went online and Googled beginning scroll sawing. I stumbled across a beginner who said he learned a great deal from the book Scroll Saw Workbook.

I bought the book and read the whole thing.  It appears to be an excellent guide for the newbie to scroll sawing. I decided to do some of the 25 practice exercises to learn how to scroll saw better.