What’s a Scroll Saw?
I’ve made several blog posts on doing various things with a scroll saw. In each you see close ups of the business end of a scroll saw. But it was pointed out to me that I’ve failed to present a single photo of the whole saw for people who aren’t familiar with the tool. My bad and this blog post is intended to address that omission.
This is my Dremel Scrollstation. It is not the best saw on the market but I chose it because it was the cheapest of the ‘good’ saws. What this means is that it costs 2-2 1/2 times the cost of the run-of-the-mill saws you find in big-box stores but considerably less than the very popular Dewalt 788 or saws like the Excalibur or European saws. You can spend a lot of money on a scroll saw if you want to do so. The scroll saw world is very much a ‘you get what you pay for’ world and, for me, The Dremel Scrollstation (roughly $300) was the best compromise between quality and the size of my wallet.
A couple things to notice in the photo above. Scroll saws have two arms that move up and down on pivot points. The blade is hung between them and that’s how the blade gets its motion. You can see the top arm protruding forward from the gray case. You see it in all the close-up photos you see in my blog posts. The bottom arm runs in the bottom of the case and is accessed through a door below the table, on the left side.
Notice the table that the saw is bolted to as well. Many argue (and I agree) that the best table for a scroll saw is a 3-legged table as it dampens the vibration better than a 4-legged table. If you’d like to build one, I discussed this one and provided a plan here. Notice also that I have a rubber mat between the saw and table, further dampening the vibration.
This top view, from the opposite side illustrates the “controls” on the saw. There is an on/off switch and a speed control. The basic operating instructions for a scroll saw are “flip the switch and push the wood into the blade.” It’s not a complicated machine. I do a lot of my cutting in the mid-range of speed and rarely (never?) use the fastest speed on this saw. Operating a scroll saw isn’t about the tool as much as it’s about coming to know how your blade choice and wood choice interact with one another.
Getting the blade tension right and how hard/fast you push the wood into the blade is, in my view, not something that can be explained in any objective fashion. It comes from doing and watching the results of different tensions, different pressures, and different blade and wood choices. Fortunately, it’s easy to experiment. You just have to follow the advise of the Nike commercial and “Just Do It.”
Note the funny looking tube that’s pointed at the blade. This is attached, on its other end, to a pump driven by the saw mechanism. It blows air, removing dust that would otherwise cover the cut line you’re trying to follow.
And lastly, note the round insert in the middle of the table. That’s not the standard insert. Standard inserts have larger holes and are typically plastic. They also, typically, aren’t completely flush with the table. For doing miniatures, however, you really need to fashion a ‘zero kerf’ insert so that the small parts you’re cutting don’t go down into the hole. The insert has to be flush with the table so that small parts don’t catch on it. A blog post showing you how these are made is here. It’s easy and you use your scroll saw to do it.
I hope this helps folks see what a scroll saw looks like and a bit of how it functions. My other posts about scroll saw use should give you some idea of why you should care (grin).
Cheers — Larry
Full Chisel Blog
Logan Cabinet Shoppe
Renaissance Woodworker
Tom Fidgen's Made By Hand
Village Carpenter
Wood Whisperer
Fine Woodworking Magazine
Popular Woodworking Magazine
Wood’n Bits
Larry, I click through immediately when I saw the title of this post. Can’t believe you actually did this. THANK YOU! I didn’t mean to point out any shortcoming on your part of course cos it is expected that you were sharing with people already in the know.
I had thought you would just post a pic but wow! you did way better. I had expected a handtool and for someone like me ,just looking at the machine is daunting. With your explanation, I will get one if I can get my workroom together. Look forward to reading more. THANKS again!
Ha…when you’re right, you’re right
I thank you for pointing it out to me and glad the new post provided you with something worthwhile.
Cheers — Larry
Larry, this looks like a full size model? I have one of these – different brand (my Dad’s old workshop stuff). I need to reread posts to see how to use it.
Lisa
Hmm..terminology nonsense raises its ugly head again. The short answer is that I don’t believe there is a “miniature” scroll saw on the market so yes, my Dremel saw is a “full-size” scroll saw.
Longer answer is that the tiny saws that move a blade up/down are what used to be called “jig saw”, which is where the name “jig saw puzzle” comes from. The old Dremel saw from the 60s-70s is an example of a ‘full-size’ “jig saw.” These days, if you ask someone about a jig saw, though, they’ll point you to a hand-held device that makes a blade go up/down but there is no table.
As I mentioned in my post, a “scroll saw” has two arms that move up and down and they maintain a constant tension on the blade whether its moving up or down. If you look at, say the mini-”scroll saw” that MicroMark sells you’ll see that there is no top arm. They try to do the same thing as a true scroll saw and probably do achieve as much success as the cheaper “full-size” scroll saws, but they will vibrate more and be less accurate than saws like my Dremel or the more expensive saws (eg – DeWalt 788).
So, in this case, “full size” scroll saws are actually superior for miniatures work than are the small ones. The same cannot be said for table saws
Cheers — Larry
[...] I did a blog post on the basics of a scroll saw. In that post I implied that spending at least enough on a scroll saw to get beyond the inexpensive [...]