Sharpen a Bandsaw Blade?

Re: Sharpen a Bandsaw Blade?

Dick Coers

YouTube would a better place to start. Several techniques shown and easier to study a video vs words.

better to find a cheaper source

Bill Tindall, E.Tn.

I might understand an interest in sharpening a blade if paying $30 for one. But everywhere has places that weld up blades from quality Lenox or Starrett stock. The last blades I bought in 2016 for a 14" saw were $7 each. A good general purpose blade for this saw is a 3/8" x 6 tpi . That's nearly 600 teeth to sharpen. Better to spend the time to find a local shop that welds blades.

Sharpening

John K Jordan

I buy long blades for my 18" bandsaw (1/2" 3tpi) and for my Woodmizer sawmill.

I generally sharpen the shop bandsaw blades at least two or three times by a simple method. Eventually the blade set is reduced and the efficiency of the cut is reduced due to a reduced gullet. The smoothness of the cut may deteriorate with each sharpening depending on how careful I am. This doesn't matter for my use.

I use a little metal-cutting disk in a Dremel and touch it briefly, less than 1 second, to the front of the tool at the right angle. This works very well. Takes a bit of time with depending on the number of teeth. My shop blades are 11'10" long.

JKJ

Re: Sharpen a Bandsaw Blade?

William Duffield

I don't think I would resharpen a 6 or more TPI blade, but in an emergency, and depending on how far I might have to drive to get to a dealer, 3 or 4 TPI makes sense. I just use a EZE-Lap diamond paddle hone, slid across the table, with the blade still on the saw. depending on the rake, an appropriately tapered shim hot melt glued to the back of the paddle can get a better tooth geometry. I've made this work a couple of times, even if the results were not as good as a new blade. If you wanted to adjust the fleam, you would need to tilt the table, but that won't work on most saws, since most tables will only tilt one way. Instead, another shim would need to be used for half the teeth.

$38

David Weaver

The saw that I had used a 137" blade, so the cheapest blades were more than $7.

The timberwolf blades were the cheapest good blades that I used, but it was less about cost and more about convenience. It's just easier for me to sharpen things than it is to go order them and replace them a lot of the time (doesn't even involve removing the blades from the saw, even though that was probably a 2 minute process on my old saw).

I suppose those were 3 tpi or so blades - so around 400 teeth give or take. No clue how long it took to sharpen them - 10 minutes?

I used a dremel and a diamond burr. Let it slip over the top of a tooth and then tuck it under the gullet of the tooth. Like sharpening lots of things, it was about doing just a little to refresh the tooth, and not too much where you'd needlessly spoil geometry or drastically change tooth height.

Re: Sharpening

Derek Cohen (in Perth, Australia)

I do the same as John. The essence of this method is to leave the gullet alone and just file the back of the tooth.

Some with use a file on the full backside ..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AcN-k7Q2mlc

Here is a video very similar to the way I do it (with a Dremel). I do it freehand, and this video uses a jig ...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GRFASuwGodE&t=22s

Another version with the same aim ...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-vcDSPNxPW8

Regards from Perth

Derek

Not the cheapest

Bill Tindall, E.Tn.

The cheapest you were willing to look for but not the cheapest.

Lets think your statement through. When saw shops sell a 96" blade for $10, what would they sell a 141" blade for( my Delta 20" saw). The selling price is a combination of fixed cost and variable cost. The only variable cost is the cost of the material cut from a 100" roll. If all the cost was the variable cost the material cost would still only be $1/ft and a 141" blade would cost at most $15, not $38, were one to buy from a place that welded them up from 100' stock rolls. In fact I just bought several large blades for my 141" saw and they were around $13 each.

Like many aspects of woodworking, if you want the inexpensive source of lumber, sharpening, band saw blades, etc. ask you local cabinet shop where they buy these things.

Re: Sharpen a Bandsaw Blade?

Barry Irby

I made a wedge that supports a Dremel at the correct angle to touch up the teeth. Has a hole in it to allow for a hose clamp or zip tie to attach the dremel and a base piece on the bottom that's about 2" wide to steady it.

Then you sit beside the saw with it unplugged and move the blade with one hand and touch each tooth with the Dremel on the steady rest with the other. Good light and the sitting part were important to me. Doesn't take long, but new blades are still better.

The place I buy my blades from will sharpen them for $5 each. Better than hand sharpening but still not quite new.

Re: Not the cheapest

David Weaver

I'm sure I could've found a blade for $20 that I didn't like as much. But I also didn't want to get in the car and drive for it. My bandsaw was like a poorly designed pistol. It had serious favorites regarding what was loaded in it, and it liked the timberwolf far better than the cheap stock blade that came in it.

Sharpening cost a non-issue, but if I'm being honest with myself, it always was.

top and gullet, both, quickly and on the saw

David Weaver

I no longer have a bandsaw (I do that work by hand), but this is how I sharpened the blades when I had one. Just dribble the burr over the teeth and then touch up the gullet quickly.

There are other videos showing a much longer process where someone really goes hog wild on the gullets, but I noticed most of those people also burn the tips of the teeth, which doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_akVVJo3G0M

For anyone prissy enough to worry about the metal dust, I brushed the table off and never saw any effect from it. Far easier to sharpen the blade in the saw under tension.