PLEASE HELP With Cutting Cylinder Cabinet Pegs

[FellowCollector]

I am having an awful time trying to CLEANLY cut some mailing tubes (that I recently purchased) into 3-inch cylinder cabinet pegs!

I have a brand new top of the line DeWalt 12-inch double bevel compound sliding mitre saw and I purchased an 80-tooth saw blade for cutting the tubes. It leaves the pegs ragged and distorted on the ends. So today I went to Home Depot and purchased a 100-tooth saw blade ($80) and it STILL leaves the edges of the mailing tubes ragged and bent out of shape on the edge! I'm at my wits end here trying to figure out how to CLEANLY cut these mailing tubes into 3-inch pegs without having to tape each section of tube before cutting. I want to do this quickly. I should be able to cut 3-inch pegs from these excellent quality mailing tubes with the 100-tooth blade. I have a 3-inch stop fence in place on the mitre saw and no matter how slowly I lower the blade to cut the mailing tube the ends come out ragged and the blade kicks the peg out like a bullet.

Any help is appreciated. I have purchased enough mailing tubes for 750 pegs but I've already ruined the first few tubes by trying to saw them cleanly. Very frustrating!

Thanks, in advance.

Doug

[recordmaker]

Card tubes of this type are normally machine cut with a blade while rotating.
Any type of circular saw will do exactly as you describe a small bandsaw with a fine wood blade or course metal blade would be good 12/14tpi.
in this case a sled/ open sliding box containing the tube and of just less than the 3 inches in length would help in making quick safe work of the job.
but any sawing rather than cutting with a sharp blade will still give a bit of a rough finish.

if you need few hundred then a card tube company will normally make the tubes and cut them to you required length for a reasonable cost and with less mess and effort than you can do it yourself.

[FellowCollector]

Thanks for your comments, recordmaker. I'm going to try making some sort of jig to secure the 3-inch end of the mailing tube so that the cut peg doesn't go flying after completing the cut. I have purchased quite a few 48-inch mailing tubes so I want to try to use them. I have several cylinder cabinets in need of pegs and was hoping I could make them myself. I have the end caps as well. It's a project that has patiently waited for years. Thanks again for your helpful comments!

Doug

[recordmaker]

Have you tried a manual miter/framing saw jig these come with a fine blade and a guide frame and end stops. It is harder work than a powered saw but you don't need to do them all in one day.

[Curt A]

Wrap painters tape (easily removable) around the cut area on the tube before cutting, which should stop the fraying but is more time consuming...

[JerryVan]

I would experiment with placing a close fitting dowel inside the tube, (for support), then cutting it with a pipe cutter.

[FellowCollector]

Thanks for all of the helpful input! I ended up using a spring loaded clamp to secure the end of the mailing tube that will become the newly made peg. In other words, the end of the mailing tube between the saw blade and the stop fence.

The problem was that only the long end of the mailing tube was being secured during a cut so the last few cuts from the saw blade were catching the {almost completely} cut peg and launching it like a bullet thereby ruining the edge. With the 3-inch pre-cut section of mailing tube securely held in place, the saw blade cuts through it like a knife leaving a nice clean edge.

So, if BOTH ends of the mailing tube (on either side of the saw blade) are held securely in place before cutting and then making a nice even SLOW cut, the edges of the newly cut peg are cut cleanly. All I have to do is wipe off the paper dust on the edge of the newly cut peg and it's perfect! The saw blade I'm using is a 12-inch Diablo 100-tooth blade from Home Depot ($80) and it has a reasonably narrow kerf which results in very little waste from cutting 3-inch pegs out of the 48-inch mailing tubes. I can now cut a 3-inch cylinder cabinet peg about every 20 seconds or so which is nice.

Again, thank you to all who have kindly provided input on this! I especially want to thank Rich Gordon who graciously provided helpful advice via PM's when I was planning this little project.

Doug

[hbick2]

Have you tried using a bandsaw? Most of the things I have cut on mine come out pretty clean. You might also score the outside of the tube before you cut it to keep the outer edge from fraying.