Page 307 - The Lost Ways

they didn’t have the capability of making belts like that. The technology actually came out
of designing pneumatic tires, which were invented in the 1890s.

Until then, belts were made out of leather straps that were stitched together. One
advantage of a mill that uses belts is the ability to disconnect the saw blade from the
water wheel. In this manner, the saw can be stopped without having to stop the mill
entirely.

That is a nice safety feature and a fairly easy one to build in. All that is needed is an extra

pulley that the belt goes around. Then, when the mill needs to be stopped, this extra
pulley is moved, creating slack in the belt. The friction in the saw will naturally cause it to
slow.

For Reciprocating Saws

I mentioned earlier that most sawmills used reciprocating blades rather than circular

blades. That was a simple necessity as the amount of steel required to make a circular
saw blade is much larger.

Most town blacksmiths wouldn’t have the capability of working that big a piece of steel.
But they could work a piece of steel big enough to make, repair, sharpen, or set the teeth
of a reciprocating saw blade.

To covert the rotational power of a water wheel into the linear mechanical power needed

for a reciprocating saw blade, a simple crankshaft is used. This becomes the axle for either
the water wheel or for the reduction gear, depending on how the sawmill is designed.

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