Saw
A saw is a tool consisting of a tough blade with a hard toothed edge used to cut through material, very often wood, though sometimes metal or stone.
Saws began as serrated materials, and when mankind learned how to use iron, it became the preferred material for saw blades of all kinds. There are numerous types of hand saws and mechanical saws, and different types of blades and cuts.
Manufacturing by hand
Saws can be made from a heated sheet of iron or steel, produced by flattening by several men simultaneously hammering on an anvil.[1] After cooling, the teeth can be punched out one at a time with a die, the size varying with the size of the saw and then sharpened with a triangular file of appropriate size, and set with a hammer or a wrest.[2]
Materials used for saws
There are several materials used in saws, with each of its own specifications.
- Brass
- Used only for the reinforcing folded strip along the back of backsaws, and to make the screws that in earlier times held the blade to the handle.
- Iron
- Used for blades and for the reinforcing strip on cheaper backsaws until superseded by steel.
- Zinc
- Used only for saws made to cut blocks of salt, as formerly used in kitchens
- Copper
- Used as an alternative to zinc for salt-cutting saws
- Steel
- Used in almost every existing kind of saw. Because steel is cheap, easy to shape, and very strong, it has the right properties for most kind of saws.
- Diamond
- Fixed onto the saw blade's base to form diamond saw blades. As diamond is a very hard material, diamond saw blades can be used to cut hard brittle or abrasive materials, for example, stone, concrete, asphalt, bricks, ceramics, glass, semiconductor and gem stone. There are many methods used to fix the diamonds onto the blades' base and there are various kinds of diamond saw blades for different purposes.
Uses
- Saws are commonly used for cutting hard materials. They are used extensively in forestry, construction, demolition, medicine, and hunting.
- The production of lumber, lengths of squared wood for use in construction, begins with the felling of trees and the transportation of the logs to a sawmill.