Today I received a package in the mail from Tools For Working Wood - always a good thing! Inside was a new Olsen coping saw and two different sets of skip-toothed blades - one set was the 16-tpi offering from TFWW and the other was the Pegasus brand 18-tpi blades. If looks were the deciding factor the Pegasus brand blades looked nicer with their case coloring and shinny teeth. However, looks mean little...
I decided to test the saw and the two different blades on a scrap piece of 3/4" cherry since that is what gave me such problems with my last coping saw (junk...). What I immediately noticed was that the blade was held in much stronger tension than my last saw could ever muster. That alone likely accounted for a lot of the problem I was having with my last saw. As stated above, looks mean little, but the Olsen saw was shinny and had a larger, more refined handle.
I decided to test the saw and the two different blades on a scrap piece of 3/4" cherry since that is what gave me such problems with my last coping saw (junk...). What I immediately noticed was that the blade was held in much stronger tension than my last saw could ever muster. That alone likely accounted for a lot of the problem I was having with my last saw. As stated above, looks mean little, but the Olsen saw was shinny and had a larger, more refined handle.
  | In the next two pictures you will see a series of cuts. The three cuts to the far left were made with 10-full strokes of the TFWW blade. The next series of three lines to the right were made with 10-full strokes of the Pegasus brand blades. The two lines on the far right-hand side of the scrap were made by the TFWW (left) and the Pegasus (right) brand blades. The TFWW blade only needed 20-strokes to cut that radius while the Pegasus brand took 37 strokes(and was harder for me to make as smooth or as tight as the other). |
 | Another observation was that the kerf from the TFWW blades seemed cleaner upon entry that the Pegasus brands. Though likely user error, the Pegasus blades seemed harder to start and therefore did not begin their cut as clean as the TFWW blades. |
 | Synopsis: The Olson coping saw is worth every penny of the $12.00 I paid for it and it definitely puts to rest any thoughts of spending $100 on a Knew Concept's saw... Pegasus brand blades are much better than the horrific coping saw blades sold at your local box store, but for speed of cut and controllability, I preferred the TFWW blades hands-down. |
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