Dovetail Backsaw

 Here is another post from Stewie regarding one of his wonderful back saw (thanks for permitting to show here).Hi all. I have just finished work on a new dt backsaw. Ron Bontz had kindly sent me some 2 inch depth pretoothed saw plate quite a while ago, and I finally got round to using some of it. I needed to come up with a new handle design that would best suit this smaller depth plate, to insure adequate clearance of saw plate below the handle. Generally dts fitted with smaller depth plate also will also have a high hang handle. I personally prefer the feel of lower set handles, so coming up with a suitable handle design became even harder. It would need to be an open handle for starters. But even then the critical area of concern would be the shape of the bottom grip. This is the design I finally ended up with. As you can see the bottom of the grip has a unique shape to it.  I have sized the grip to suit my own hand size which is 4" across the palm. The grip itself feels extremely comfortable in use. Now to cover the basics. The handle wood is Tas. Fiddleback Blackwood. I have orientated the curly grain to flow quite nicely through the neck of the handle to maximize the handles strength. The saw blade length is 12" long, and its been sharpened 16tpi rip.
Here is an earlier photo of the assembled saw after the handle has had multiple coats of garnet shellac. Note the brass back is still unshaped at this stage.
And here are the completed shots of the finished backsaw.
As a final wrap up I am very happy with the look of the new handle design. Its not quite traditional. But it does has a great feel to it and works extremely well with smaller depth saw plates. It would also look quite compatible for use on even deeper saw plates say up to 3". I also enjoyed working with an open handle design this time round.
Stewie

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