Final Cut Saw Blade Review

The Final Cut 10″ Saw Blade is one of those ideas that almost seems too easy. Install some sandpaper on the sides of a saw blade and then you can cut and sand in one pass. When we first heard of about the Final Cut Saw Blade it reminded us of something we might see on a late night infomercial that could have questionable results. The idea seemed simple enough, but we had some questions as to durability and long term use that we wanted to investigate.

Final Cut Saw Blade sandpaper

The 10″ Final Cut Saw Blade is one of those ideas that almost seems too easy. Install some sandpaper on the sides of a saw blade and then you can cut and sand in one pass. When we first heard of about the Final Cut Saw Blade it reminded us of something we might see on a late night infomercial that could have questionable results. The idea seemed simple enough, but we had some questions as to durability and long term use that we wanted to investigate.


Our test saw blade arrived with 100 grit sandpaper disks already applied to both sides of the blade. The 10″ diameter saw blade is tipped with 40 carbide teeth which makes it well suited for both cross cut and ripping applications. At this time there are no other styles available for the blade (neither kerf, nor teeth variations apart from the three blade sizes). The thin blade kerf is 0.104 inches and with the the sand paper that is applied, the blade width is slightly more. What this seems to do is ensure that the sandpaper fully engages the cut edges of the wood so that you will have a fully sanded final surface. While the idea of the sand paper on the blade seems like a good idea, it did raise some questions for us like, Will the sandpaper rip off once we start using it? How long will the sandpaper last? Can I replace the sandpaper if it does wear out? How will the sanding action affect the accuracy of my cuts? The best way to figure out these questions was to put the blade to the test.

Final Cut Saw Blade Testing and Use

We loaded the 10″ Final Cut saw blade into our Bosch GTS1031 table saw. We had a great application where we were were going to be ripping several hundred feet of 3/4″ thick cypress material to make some custom trim for a home that was being renovated. This application was a fantastic chance to test the blade’s long term durability and also see if it would actually save us finish time for our trim applications. This particular job featured all square trim in various widths that we cut down from nominal 8″ wide stock. Needless to say, both edges of the trim material were going to be visible since most of the trim was going to be used for interior window and door casings.

Cutting with the Final Cut bladeOnce we had the Final Cut saw blade set in the saw, we set our fence to the required width and dialed our blade to the right height. Then we went to town. Since we were working with a softer wood for this project, we found that we were able to slice though the material fairly quickly. Right away we noticed that the edges of the ripped down wood were smooth and did not require any touch up sanding. While we did see some instances of kerf markings on the ripped edges of the wood, the surface finish of the wood was reasonably smooth and more then acceptable for what our purpose was. It took us a few cuts to learn how fast we could send the wood through the saw for best performance. We found when we fed it too fast, less sanding action took place. In order to maximize the sanding action, a medium feed was needed to let the blade do what it was designed to do. One thing that we also noted was that the Final Cut saw blade eliminated feathering of the cut edges of the soft wood.

Smooth finished cut on the first try

Smooth Finished Ripped Edge

We used the Final Cut saw blade extensively for a few weeks; actually we used it until we pretty much wore the sandpaper smooth. During this time the blade never smoked or caused our saw to bind up. What we did experience is that when we first set our blade height at about 1″ to slice though the 3/4″ material, we wore down the outer perimeter of paper. To again achieve more sanding action, we simply raised the blade until we were using some fresh sand paper on the blade again. We did this until we did not have any more blade height left.

Getting back to our initial questions, we did not experience the edges of the sand paper or any of the sand paper for that matter coming off of the blade. The sand paper seemed to last a reasonable amount of time. We ripped approximately 350 feet of material before we ran out of sandpaper on the blade. As to replacing the sandpaper, it is possible since Final Cut does offer just the sand paper for sale separately from the blade. Actually, they offer the sand paper in other blade sizes so that you can turn just about any saw blade into a Final Cut style blade. When we did try to peel the sand paper off the blade, it proved to be very well adhered and difficult to remove. As far as accuracy, we were not able to find a measurable negative effect the sanding action had on the final size of the wood, at least not with what we could measure with our Stanley Fat Max tape measures.

Conclusion

The Final Cut 10″ Saw Blade is one of those types of power tool accessories that makes you think, “Gosh, that is so simple, why didn’t I think of that!” By effectively combining the work of cutting and sanding in one pass, you are definitely saving time and effort. For our Performance rating we gave the sanding saw blade combo a 7/10 since it does what it was designed to do very well. Had some extra sanding disks been included with the blade, it might have scored a few more points in Value since the carbide teeth will outlast the sanding ability of the applied sand paper. For our Value rating, we gave the Final Cut Blade a 6/10. While it does come with the sand paper pre-applied, it is more on the higher cost scale for just a 40 tooth saw blade.

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