Special silicon carbon steel with good abrasion resistance and fatigue life is used for the manufacture of friction cutting blades. Friction cutting is accomplished by running the band saw blade at high speed (8,000-15,000 S.F.P.M.). The high frictional heat created allows the blade to burn or melt away the material and the saw teeth remove the molten metal from the work piece. Very thin or odd-shaped metals may be successfully cut by friction sawing when conventional methods fail.
