Woodcraft Enters Saw Blade Market with New WoodRiver Products

These four WoodRiver® table saw blades were the first Woodcraft offering in the saw blade market.

Woodcraft Supply, one of the nation’s oldest and largest retailers who offer quality woodworking tools and supplies, has entered the saw blade manufacturing market with six new WoodRiver® products.

Director of Product Development Darin Lawrence and Product Development Manager Charles Wolfe said, “The main focus when developing these products was to provide the best quality possible at a price that could beat anyone else in the market. We absolutely hit that with our new saw blades.”

WoodRiver is a house brand that encompasses hand tools, quality project kits, kit supplies/tools – and now saw blades.

“As we decided to go into the saw blade market, we asked two questions: is there room and can we find a manufacturer?” Lawrence said. “We determined there is a place for us in the market, and we did eventually find the correct partner, a company already making saw blades, many for the OEM sector and all very high quality meant for the woodworker.”

Choosing Saw Blades to Launch a new Product Line

Once a manufacturer was on board, Lawrence said “we wanted to cover the basics” of a woodworker’s need for saw blades. To launch the WoodRiver saw blade line, the product development team selected four 10" carbide-tipped table saw blades that pretty much cover the range of table saw cutting projects.

•WoodRiver® General-Purpose 40-Tooth Alternate Top Bevel Thin Kerf Saw Blade works well for both ripcuts and crosscuts.

•WoodRiver® Glue Line Rip 30-Tooth Triple-Chip Grind Full Kerf Saw Blade is optimized for ripcuts in material up to 1". The resulting cut is so smooth it does not require further machining (jointing or sanding) before gluing.

•WoodRiver® Heavy-Duty Rip 24-Tooth, Flat Top Full Kerf Saw Blade is optimized to quickly ripcut material from 3/4" to 2-3/4", and the surface is usually machined further before final use.

•WoodRiver® Precision Trim 80-Tooth, Alternate Top Bevel Full Kerf Saw Blade is optimized to deliver very precise, clean crosscuts in hardwood and plywood.

All the blades feature a copper plug insert that reduces both noise and vibration for a more pleasant cutting experience.

So, what makes a WoodRiver Saw Blade worth a second look?

According to Product Development Manager Charles Wolfe, “They are the perfect blend of high-grade German steel, premium grade Ceratizit™ carbide, and precision Israeli manufacturing. They deliver a superior cut on an edge that will stay sharper longer than other blades on the market.”

Wolfe explained, “We worked one-on-one with an engineer from our manufacturer tweaking all the details to produce blades of the highest quality possible. They are affordable, and I wholeheartedly believe they will be the last brand of blades a customer will buy.”

More Blades on the Way

As Woodcraft continues to expand the WoodRiver line, it will be offering two more cutting products in the near future – the WoodRiver® 12" 90T Miter Blade and the WoodRiver® 8" Stacked Dado Set. Both are made by the same Israeli manufacturer from the same high-grade German steel and premium grade Ceratizit™ carbon as the table saw blades.

The WoodRiver 12" Miter Blade’s design features 90 teeth arranged in a modified Alternate Top Bevel grind (four ATB  teeth and then one Flat Top tooth) – a better quality grind than a regular ATB. Wolfe says this “fancier” design produces a smoother finish for crosscutting. The blade works on mitersaws and compound mitersaws.

The WoodRiver Stacked Dado Set includes two 24-Tooth Hi Alternate Bevel Grind Blades, (5) Chippers (four 1/8" and one 1/16"); and (14) shims (5-0.002", 1-0.005", 4-0.01", and 4-0.02").

The WoodRiver 8" Stacked Dado Set is optimized to cut flat bottoms and square shoulders when making grooves from 1/4" to 61/64" for building furniture or cabinets where right angles are involved.

Wolfe worked closely with the manufacturer on the production of this product.  “The manufacturer made the dado design specific to our company in the fact that the two outside blades have 24 teeth, and it comes with 5 chipper blades. That is considered a high-end dado blade, reserved for the $300 market,” Wolfe explained. “We also worked a lot with making sure the tolerances were exact as can be. Sounds ‘simple,’ but it is rarely achieved on a consistent basis through mass manufacturing.”

Depending on shipping conditions in the COVID 19 environment, the new miter blade and stacked dado set should be available in June.

The WoodRiver Brand

Woodcraft registered its WoodRiver® brand in 2008 and then introduced a premium line of hand planes in 2009 to bring attention to the brand, Lawrence said. The initial offering – four bench planes from No. 3 to No. 6 and a low angle block plane—were all based on the Stanley bedrock-style planes that are among the most enduring, collectable tools in all of woodworking. WoodRiver V3s are inspired interpretations of these classics

Over time the V3 Bench Plane Series was fine-tuned and expanded to include No. 4-1/2, No 5-1/2, and No. 7 planes. Low angle jack, shoulder, cranked neck chisel, chisel and smoothing planes have also been added to WoodRiver line. Chisels, spokeshaves, and hand plane screwdrivers are some of the other WoodRiver hand tool products.

The WoodRiver brand also offers woodworkers an extensive selection of kits to make knives, pens, pencils, pepper mills, bottle stoppers, pizza cutters, ice cream scoops, and other small projects, plus tools and supplies to make the kits such as wood and man-made material blanks and knife scales, pen vises, and more. The popular WoodRiver pen kits offer woodturners many choices for creating one-of- kind writing instruments, including some based on themes such as firefighters, first responders, law enforcement, fireams, wildlife, and the Liberty Bell (shown above).

Woodcraft wants to help you work wood. Visit woodcraft.com or a store near you to learn more about our products and free how-to resources.