Masonry Magazine September 2002 Page. 33
can use more of one material and less of another to harden or soften the blade or make the blade cut faster or last longer. There are many different binding metals that can be used: tungsten carbide, cobalt, iron or nickel, for example. We can use different percentages of different metals in the blade."
No one can copy another company's blade exactly due to all these combinations. If a contractor loves one company's particular blade, the competition might buy the blade, take it into their laboratory and analyze the metallurgical composition. That will tell them the metals used but they would still be unlikely to reproduce it exactly.
You're better off spending the money on a good blade because "you pay for what you get" in a diamond blade.
"You have to know the engineer who made the blade," claims Maddock. "That's because they can bake it a certain way when they make the segments. They are put through a heat process that hardens the metals like cooking them.
They can put in at different temperatures for different amounts of time. In layman's terms, how long they bake the segment, and how hot they do it, can make the blade react differently."
You're better off spending the money on a good blade because "you pay for what you get in a diamond blade. Maddock adds, "You have to play around with bonds, diamond grades, diamond grits and diamond qualities. You can vary all of those things; grade, grit, quality and size. They are all factors in the performance of the blade, along with all the metal bond components. There are variables of cobalt, tungsten carbide, etc. That's where the blade engineer comes in."
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The Voice of the Mason Contractor
September 2002
Masonry 31