New Rikon 10-326 Bandsaw: Flexible 14″ Shop Toy!
CNCROi.com just got a new Rikon 10-326 bandsaw, let’s see how I put it together and discuss why I picked this over an endless assortment of bandsaws out there.
Although Rikon tells you that two people are needed to carry this box and set-up the Rikon 10-326 bandsaw, I had no problems doing so alone.
As we are moving to a new shop in a few weeks, I don’t mind having the laser next to the bandsaw until then, it isn’t ideal but there isn’t really any other space for it and I already have projects waiting for what this bandsaw can bring to the shop as far as capability is involved!
Before buying this Rikon 10-326 bandsaw, the front-runner was a Grizzly and Laguna 18″ but then I realized what this bandsaw will be primarily used for at CNCROi.com, cutting small items across a host of materials.
Having a really powerful bandsaw is great but if you are cutting plastic with it, it’s nothing but trouble and the band moves too fast, melting the material, hence going with a two-speed bandsaw to begin with.
The major features I really liked about this bandsaw where the lack of tooling required to adjust the bandsaw guides above and below the table and HUGE for me was being able to adjust the resaw table without tooling or caring if anything else was out of wack.
Our first bandsaw at CNCROi.com needed to be FLEXIBLE and dead-easy to use and adjust, Rikon 10-326 bandsaw fit the bill almost perfectly!
The instructions for assembling the new CNCROi.com Rikon 10-326 bandsaw where pretty straight forward when I needed to make reference to them, as you can see from the time-lapse of the assembly in the video I made, everything fits only one way.
As we keep on expanding into materials, projects and to meet our customer’s needs, this bandsaw was a long time coming, I’m so happy to finally have it and it was used almost immediately after assembly to boot!
Each bandsaw manufacturer has their unique points, it was frustrating because one manufacturer had something I really liked then the other something different and due to patents, there couldn’t be a cross so they just keep one-up-selling one another.
What I really liked about the Laguna bandsaw over the Rikon 10-326 bandsaw was the better finish and the ceramic guides, Grizzly had other features that made their system incredibly powerful as well.
At the end of the day, I think I made the best decision for where CNCROi.com is right now in its growth, if we get into a lot of resawing and need a dedicated machine, a horizontal bandsaw is actually the way to go for ultimate precision run off a conveyor belt.
What I really enjoy about the Rikon 10-326 bandsaw is that right out of the box, the blade was good for production, normally, this is something you chuck out right away as most manufacturers give you junk to cut your teeth with.
Now that the base is finished being assembled, it was time to lift the Rikon 10-326 bandsaw into place, again, not sure why Rikon and a bunch of videos said two people were needed for the assembly and lifting of this bandsaw, I had no issues doing it myself.
If you use your smarts, it’s quite easy to assemble and build machinery that otherwise would be quite a challenge, you just got to destroy the box your equipment came with in order to achieve it!
In the picture below, you see the metal table I bought and will be converting into a custom welding table, I was in the process of doing so but decided to wait till I move into our new shop with twice the space as it will be trouble to move due to the weight it will have with half-inch metal plate on it!
I far preferred my technique to put the base onto the bandsaw that what Rikon recommended, this means I just had to leverage it from the end of the bandsaw and lift it up.
Easy!
Once the Rikon 10-326 bandsaw is standing upright, adding the table and other items just takes a few more minutes, I think it took me about an hour to assemble everything myself and I was taking breaks to make sure I wasn’t in the camera frame and taking photos as well!
Lots of custom stuff in this production shot, our Austrian CNC laser to the right, custom downdraft table middle, CNC router table next to it and then the upcoming welding table to the left and a bunch of MDF for a project we are working on in the meantime.
CNCROi.com is a busy shop, it’s amazing how much was made in this shop but with room at a premium, I look forward to being able to expand!
The heavy cast iron table base was a major selling point to me, most bandsaws actually use aluminium which is by far the worse as it can warp and can’t handle loads well, you want your equipment to be HEAVY and this played a bit role in it.
The Rikon 10-326 bandsaw also has an engine made by Rikon, so every part of this machine is theirs, like Trotec Lasers or ShopBot Tools, if you have any problems, they designed, fabricated and support the entire thing.
The blade given with the Rikon 10-326 bandsaw is a fantastic resawing blade too, I cut myself a few times assembling this and it wasn’t even on!
I looked at bandsaws at department stores and hardware, nothing fit the requirements I had as much as this Rikon did.
After assembly was finished on the Rikon 10-326 bandsaw, it was time to do my first cut, a small piece of wood I use in our Austrian CNC laser to hold things was itching to get cut.
I needed to do a few more adjustments before the cut just to make sure the blade was true but overall, nice cut!
I ran this without the dust system hooked-up, another thing that I look forward to upgrading when I get into our new CNCROi.com shop!
I cut a few small boards just to make sure everything was performing as it should.
Next step was resawing, I had a piece of finished oak in the shop that would be a good test.
Really nice results, and this is a stock Rikon 10-326 bandsaw blade!
Looking for something custom made? Contact me at CNCROi.com right now!
