Knowledge base
Resources
& guides
Practical technical guides written for sawmill operators, woodworking shops and sawshop staff across Southern Africa. Covering blade selection, maintenance procedure, troubleshooting and operational best practice — based on decades of hands-on industry experience.
More guides on the way
This section is being built out. Topics are added as they are completed. If you need information on a specific subject not covered yet, email us and we will prioritise it — or answer your question directly.
resources@sawmilling.co.zaPublished guides
Available now
Three detailed technical guides, each covering a core sawmill discipline in full — with tables, figures, troubleshooting checklists and product references from our stocked range.
Bandsaw blades
Bandsaw blade selection guide
How to choose the right bandsaw blade — width, thickness, tooth shape (LS, S, SB), hook angle, pitch, clearance angle and setting method. Includes hook angle tables by timber and blade type, the wheel-diameter to blade-thickness rules, and a full application matrix.
Read the guideBandsaw blades
Bandsaw care & maintenance
The full maintenance sequence in correct order — levelling, tensioning (with light-gap table by blade width), straightening, swage setting (with set amounts by timber type), sharpening, gullet deburring at ≥28,000 RPM, weld annealing at 400°C, and stellite tipping procedure. Includes a full fault/cause/action troubleshooting table.
Read the guideTCT circular saws
TCT saw care & troubleshooting
Friction martensite and why it kills TCT blades. Machine setup — spindle runout, flange cleaning, correct torque. Feed rate: too fast and too slow both damage blades. Grinding wheel selection, cutting fluid flow, resin management, and when to sharpen versus re-tip. Twelve-row troubleshooting table.
Read the guideIn progress
Guides being written
These topics are planned or underway. If any of these are urgent for your operation, email resources@sawmilling.co.za and we will move it up the list — or answer your question directly in the meantime.
Machine knife selection & care
Planer knives, chipper knives and flaker knives — steel grades, edge angles, setting procedure, when to regrind versus replace.
Waterjet cutting — what to know
How waterjet cutting works, what materials it can cut, how to prepare DXF files, tolerances and surface finish expectations.
Setting up and running a small sawmill
Practical checklist for operators starting out — machine selection, blade stock, sawshop setup, maintenance schedule and common first-year mistakes.
Abrasive wheel selection guide
Diamond, CBN, aluminium oxide and silicon carbide — which wheel for which application, grain and bond selection, dressing and safe handling.
Wagner moisture meters — field guide
Using the Orion 910/950 and MMC range. Calibration, species correction, pinless versus pin measurement, and interpreting readings for green and kiln-dried timber.
Sawmilling basics
Log grading, conversion factors, cut patterns, drying fundamentals, and the relationship between kerf width and recovery rate — for operators new to the industry.
Suggest a topic
Something we haven't covered yet?
This knowledge base is built around questions we actually hear from operators across Southern Africa. If you have a specific problem, an application you can't find answers on, or a topic that would genuinely help your operation — let us know.
We may publish a guide on it, or we may just answer you directly. Either way, it costs you one email.
resources@sawmilling.co.zaTopics we get asked about most
These come up regularly. We'll be publishing guides on all of them — sooner if you ask.
Need an answer today?
If a guide doesn't exist yet but your operation has a pressing question, call or email us directly — we have been solving sawmill problems across Southern Africa for decades.