Choosing the right saw blade for your DIY project can be arduous. You have to consider material, cut type, and saw power. But what if you could replace your saw blade with an ordinary, round piece of paper?
According to Popular Mechanics: "Anyone who has ever had a paper cut (read: "everyone") knows how deceptively sharp paper can be when it hits you at just the right (read: "wrong") angle. But does that mean that a disc of paper spinning at high speed could function as a saw blade and cut through actual wood?
Youtuber John Heisz—maker of a sweet knife or two—decided to find out by replacing the normal, metal blade in his table saw with a hand-cut circle of paper. Turns out that while something as feeble as paper isn't quite rigid enough to flatten out entirely it spins, it does have some cutting power, more than enough to slice through paper and cardboard. But wood?"
About the Author
Alexis GajewskiAlexis Gajewski
Senior Content Strategist
Alexis Gajewski is a manufacturing writer and editor with nearly 20 years of experience covering the people, practices, and technologies that keep industrial facilities running. For more than a decade, she served as Senior Content Strategist for Plant Services, creating content for plant managers, engineers, and maintenance professionals on a variety of industrial topics.
During her tenure, Alexis worked to develop the brand’s digital strategy and helped launch and produce Great Question: A Manufacturing Podcast. She also created The Lighter Side of Manufacturing, a weekly blog that explored the inventive and sometimes humorous side of the industry.
Alexis co-founded Influential Women in Manufacturing, a recognition program that honored 49 women in its first two years, earned an industry award for Best Product Launch, and received a proclamation from Illinois Governor JB Pritzker and a commendation from U.S. Senator Tammy Duckworth.
She also led newsroom operations and development at a large media company where she set editorial standards, developed training curriculum, and helped support AI adoption for more than 150 editors across 80+ brands spanning manufacturing, industrial processing, automation, and more.
Additionally, Alexis works as a freelance writer and editor, and her areas of interest include continuous improvement, the skilled workforce, and the role of emerging technology on the plant floor.
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