Re: Are jig, sabre, and scroll saws the same?

thanks John for your quick reply! I had been wondering for the longest time what the difference was, and now I know!

Do you or anyone else know off hand if metal or wood jigsaw/sabre saw blades can cut plastic? Or is there a special blade?

S.

What country are you in ?

Here in the UK, jigsaws are small

Scroll saws are bench mounted, sometimes called powered fretsaws. They use long thin double-ended blades. Some blades are plain ended, some use pins. Many machines have interchangeable clamps to take both.

They can, but it's a Goldilocks between too coarse, which chips plastic, and too fine, which melts and jams. Favor the fine, don't dawdle in the cut and make unnecessary heat, and you should be able to cut your plastic well.

Depends on the plastic. Plexiglass, I just score and break like glass (assuming a straight line). I have bad luck with it melting when I try to cut with a power saw.

djb

I *could* do that, but scoring it and breaking as if it was glass works very well in my experience.

I use a straightedge and score with a utility knife, then put the piece with the score mark over a piece of dowel or the bench edge (score mark up) and snap it.

Qualifier: I've used this up to 3/16, haven't worked with thicker for many years. I have no doubt that the stuff can be cut with a saw quite successfully.

djb

Shattering it into a million sharp little pieces too.

When I did the glass for the doors on my little hutch thing, I wound up scoring/snapping and cleaning up with a straight bit in the router table. The router made lots and lots and lots of translucent little whispy shavings, but didn't melt the plastic.

I found a jig/saber saw was only good for shattering the plexiglass into a million sharp little pieces. Too much chatter, even after rigging up some clamping arrangement with a backing piece of plywood.