Finishing

[plywood]

actually i have no accurate comparison... but following: on my old horizontal laminated ash core skis with some carbon in it i used sawblades made for hard wood. there i tried really a lot of different blades, some for plastiv, some for wood, aluminium, metal... but there these worked best. which means the cut 15-30cm if i was lucky.
so i took about 8cm long blades, cut as long as there were nearly no teeths visible anymore and then put a piece of wood under the jigsaw to lift it all up to cut with a deeper part that didn`t have any contact with the ski so far. using this method i could "shift" the area of abuse 3-4 times on one blade. so i needed about 3 blades per ski.

on my latest pair, fir core and no carbon, i used blades made for metal. nearly the same as shown above. additionally i coated them with some grease/oil every 20-30cm. and guess what: i cut two pairs with one blade, without shifting and stuff like that.

but i`ll be able to tell you more about this in two weeks. then i`m gonna cut an old fashioned core with the new blades

[rockaukum]

Bambi,
I have used the UHMWPE for sidewalls. You probably already know but patients patients patients is the key to a good results. I use a Crapman (one of their better quality) jigsaw and Bosh blades. If I try and not go too fast the blade will last one ski (If I'm lucky). The blades heat up fast and then they get ruined. The only other advise is to get to a good hardware store (speciality hardware type) and show them what you are doing and see what they recommend. Don't push the saw too fast and good luck. There is a resolution so don't ruin your skis!
rockaukum