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Post by holajonathan on Jan 31, 2021 3:57:47 GMT -5
I bought one of these blades to try on my new 14" HP slab saw. I got the blade, read the tiny text engraved on it, and discovered that it is this blade -- Keenbon brand -- available on Ebay for $88 or best offer: So if you were thinking about trying this blade from HP, buy from Ebay and save 20% or more.
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Post by holajonathan on Feb 3, 2021 1:14:09 GMT -5
Just in case anyone finds this thread in the future... The Ebay seller accepted my offer of $80 with free shipping, so $30 cheaper than buying from HP. If you ever want to try a blade from this Ebay seller you should offer at least 10% less than the Ebay price, or the seller might be willing to discount even more than 10%. It's worth a try.
I will try to remember to post an update to this thread once I try the blade.
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Post by jasoninsd on Feb 3, 2021 1:28:51 GMT -5
I'll definitely be interested to hear your thoughts on the blade once you've had a chance to use it!
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Post by holajonathan on Feb 3, 2021 12:25:05 GMT -5
I'll definitely be interested to hear your thoughts on the blade once you've had a chance to use it! I've got it mounted on my slab saw, but it's been too cold and snowy to roll it outside and use it. Just as soon as I do I will let you know.
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Post by jasoninsd on Feb 3, 2021 18:22:57 GMT -5
I'll definitely be interested to hear your thoughts on the blade once you've had a chance to use it! I've got it mounted on my slab saw, but it's been too cold and snowy to roll it outside and use it. Just as soon as I do I will let you know. Not to rub it in...but...It was supposed to be rainy, then turning to snow today. It was 54 degrees at 8:30 and the sun was out, so I jumped on the slab saw and was able to cut until about 1:00 when the wind started howling and clouds rolled in. I was trying to cut a ton of different Prairie Agates today to try and find some decent interiors...for some reason. I'll shoot you some pics of them tonight or tomorrow to show you what I found.
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Post by holajonathan on Feb 4, 2021 21:54:39 GMT -5
I cut about 6 slabs with it today before it started snowing like crazy. The blade cuts fine and leaves very smooth slabs. No visible wear yet, but I only cut about 6 slabs of jasper. The jasper is hard, but not as hard as something like Brazilian agate or Montana agate. For now I give it a tentative thumbs up, but once I am able to run a bunch of Montana agates through it I will update my review. I do notice already that it is mucking up the oil a lot less than the super thick blade that it replaced.
Putting aside the fact that there is less material loss with a thinner blade, the prospect of not having to change the saw oil as often seems to offset the blade not lasting as long as a thicker blade. Oil is not exactly cheap, and it's a rather nasty job changing it.
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Post by holajonathan on Feb 4, 2021 21:56:17 GMT -5
I've got it mounted on my slab saw, but it's been too cold and snowy to roll it outside and use it. Just as soon as I do I will let you know. Not to rub it in...but...It was supposed to be rainy, then turning to snow today. It was 54 degrees at 8:30 and the sun was out, so I jumped on the slab saw and was able to cut until about 1:00 when the wind started howling and clouds rolled in. I was trying to cut a ton of different Prairie Agates today to try and find some decent interiors...for some reason. I'll shoot you some pics of them tonight or tomorrow to show you what I found. Sounds great. I've been slowed down by a stupid ear infection which is pretty uncommon (and un-fun) when you're almost 40 years old. But I've now got a little box together of a few things I want to send you, so I'll get it out sometime in the next few days. I know it's no hurry for either of us. We've both got enough other rocks to keep us occupied.
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Post by holajonathan on Feb 4, 2021 22:00:06 GMT -5
It just started about 2 hours ago and already 4-5" It's been a super mild winter so we were due for something like this. I imagine you get worse in S.D.
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Post by holajonathan on Feb 4, 2021 22:03:06 GMT -5
A good night for doing some of this in front of the wood stove.
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Post by jasoninsd on Feb 4, 2021 22:16:00 GMT -5
To be honest, we haven't had squat for snow this year compared to most previous years. We really need the moisture pretty badly. Plus, I want a couple huge snowfalls in order for a bit of erosion where I go hounding...it's been a couple years with little movement of the exposed surface. I'm just throwing this out there...don't shoot the messenger! LOL Maybe you need to invite a bunch of buddies over for a night of poker and cigar smoking out in the garage. The "old-school" remedy for ear aches/infections was to blow cigar smoke in the ear. Of course, they'd have to be REAL CLOSE buddies in order to get them to be blowing gently in your ear! LOL Love the fireplace activity you've got going on there!
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Post by holajonathan on Feb 5, 2021 14:03:43 GMT -5
I don't know what the ground is like where you live, but what really brings up new rocks around here is when the ground is really wet and then we get a super deep freeze that freezes the ground down to a depth of a few feet. That is actually what is going to happen this week, I think.
The saturated frozen ground acts the same way a bottle of water acts when you put it in the freezer. The ice expands and exerts pressure in all directions. One way it relieves that pressure is by pushing rocks to the surface -- called frost heaving. I have seen 10-12" diameter boulders appear out of no where in the spring in the farmer's field behind my house. They were probably only buried 6-12" down, but the frost pops them up.
About 6 or 7 years ago when we had the super-cold "polar vortex" thing happen (night time temps of -20 below 0, daytime highs of -5 to -10), we even a frost quake, which is like a tiny earthquake caused by the frozen ground relieving pressure. One of them actually shook my house a little bit, and I found 1" wide deep cracks running through the ground in the low-lying woods next to my house. I think you have to live in a low area with a high water table and saturated ground to get frost quakes. And I doubt you have a high water table in SD like we do here. I'm only a few miles away from Lake Erie, so the water table is just a few week below ground in some areas. Nevertheless, I bet you still get some frost heaving of rocks if you have a wet fall/early winter and then a cold winter. Or at the very least, like you said, if you get a deep enough snow pack then the spring melt will erode some surface level dirt, giving you access to new rocks that way.
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Post by jasoninsd on Feb 5, 2021 14:26:33 GMT -5
That's fascinating about the frost quake. I've never heard of that before.
What you're saying about the heaving of rocks to the surface makes absolute sense. Every spring, there are places all over out here along the paved roadways which have been heaved due to the moisture freezing under the surface of the road. Depending on the amount of snow, melting, and refreezing during a particular year depends on how bad the heaving occurs.
So it makes absolute sense that it would happen out on the grasslands as well...and yes, this week should allow for quite a bit that happening!
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