# bandsaw sharpener



## Dusty

I'm interested in building a sharpener to sharpen bandsaw blades for my Timberking sawmill. Has any forum members built one? If so how about some photos and a description of how you built it? Also how about some detailed photos of any bandsaw sharpeners anyone owns so I can get some ideas about building one. I've got a heavy duty chainsaw sharpener that I can use. It bolts to the stand and the cutting angle is adjustable, so I can reattach it to a dedicated base. A manual sharpener is going to be easier to design, but I still want the head to be cam driven to sharpen the face of the tooth and then for the stone to follow the blade through the gullet. Any and all help will be appreciated. 

Here's one I found on Lumberjocks, but the building isn't responding to questions. 

http://lumberjocks.com/projects/36263

Hal


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## Mizer

Dusty said:


> I'm interested in building a sharpener to sharpen bandsaw blades for my Timberking sawmill. Has any forum members built one? If so how about some photos and a description of how you built it? Also how about some detailed photos of any bandsaw sharpeners anyone owns so I can get some ideas about building one. I've got a heavy duty chainsaw sharpener that I can use. It bolts to the stand and the cutting angle is adjustable, so I can reattach it to a dedicated base. A manual sharpener is going to be easier to design, but I still want the head to be cam driven to sharpen the face of the tooth and then for the stone to follow the blade through the gullet. Any and all help will be appreciated.
> 
> Here's one I found on Lumberjocks, but the building isn't responding to questions.
> 
> http://lumberjocks.com/projects/36263
> 
> Hal


I have sharpened thousands of band saw blades over the years with one of Wood Mizers sharpeners. When I sold mill old mill in April I let the sharpener go with it. Now I have pipers saw shop do all my sharpening. They have a much better set up then I could afford. If you are wanting to build a sharpener just for the fun of building one I could help you. If you are wanting to save money by sharpening your blades to re use them I would have a saw shop like Pipers do them for you.


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## Dusty

I've been either sending them to a saw shop or taking them to one near me with good results from both. Only at $5 to $6 a blade, it adds up over time to a lot of money. The Cook's sharpener looks like the best one, but it's expensive. I owned a tool and die shop back in the 70's and I've built a lot of equipment over the years. Whenever I start designing something, I always try to look at as many examples as I can, then pick the best features of all the designs and avoid the flaws I see in each of them. I usually wind up with equipment that's better or cheaper, depending on what I'm trying to achieve. 

I think I can build a working machine for less than $200. (including another chainsaw sharpener for my chainsaw blades)


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## Kevin

A guy I know made one using just an old sears craftsman RAS and the stone. I've got an old sears RAS just like his and my munksfosaager profiled stone so all I need to do is make the indexing rig like he did - extremely simple - and viola. 

You'll still need a setter but you can pick them up a lot cheaper than a good sharpener. I'll try to find the thread over at WWT where he showed how to do it. It doesn't get any simpler than that. I have a WM sharpener and setter but it needs both motors replaced. I don't know how many blades I have but between 400 and 600 I believe. I'd sell the sharpener and a lot of blades if interested. I simply don't need that many blades. They are mostly WM blades - I'm keeping all my munky blades.


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## Dusty

Kevin said:


> A guy I know made one using just an old sears craftsman RAS and the stone. I've got an old sears RAS just like his and my munksfosaager profiled stone so all I need to do is make the indexing rig like he did - extremely simple - and viola.
> 
> You'll still need a setter but you can pick them up a lot cheaper than a good sharpener. I'll try to find the thread over at WWT where he showed how to do it. It doesn't get any simpler than that. I have a WM sharpener and setter but it needs both motors replaced. I don't know how many blades I have but between 400 and 600 I believe. I'd sell the sharpener and a lot of blades if interested. I simply don't need that many blades. They are mostly WM blades - I'm keeping all my munky blades.



Kevin,

I found a Cook's setter on Craig's List and it was only 20 miles from my house. I have a Timberking 1220 and a big stack of blades too. It's time to sharpen a couple of dozen and I think I can build a sharpener for less money than it will cost to have them sharpened. After a couple of google searches, I've found a lot of photos and videos. When I get time next week, I'll see what I can come up with. Today's task is visiting some scrap yards for some metal for the base and linkage to move the blade. 

Hal


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## Kevin

Hal I can't wait to see what you come up with. I've seen some ingenious homemade sharpeners out there I bet you can make one too. Keep us posted please.


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## Treecycle Hardwoods

Hey hal if your contraption works and you are interested in building and selling one to me i would be interested. The guy who has been sharpening for me recently found out his cancer came back and he wont be able to sharpen for me any more. The next closesest shop i know to sharpen is across the state. With shipping and sharpening costs adding up I need to look in to buying a set up.


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## DavidDobbs

Have you looked at EZ Boardwalks rig I think he gets around $450.

An your done yes you might build one for $200.

But Ed's has all the bugs worked out.


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## Kevin

DavidDobbs said:


> Have you looked at EZ Boardwalks rig I think he gets around $450.
> 
> An your done yes you might build one for $200.
> 
> But Ed's has all the bugs worked out.



Looks like he adapted a chainsaw chain sharpener. Should work great and his price is reasonable because that appears to be an Oregon grinder not a cheapo harbor freight junker. You're right it would be easy to duplicate that for less money but his price of $425 is quite reasonable IMO. For the cost of having 50 blades sharpened it's paid for. I didn't see a setter on his site but those are easy to DIY.


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## Dusty

Kevin said:


> DavidDobbs said:
> 
> 
> 
> Have you looked at EZ Boardwalks rig I think he gets around $450.
> 
> An your done yes you might build one for $200.
> 
> But Ed's has all the bugs worked out.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Looks like he adapted a chainsaw chain sharpener. Should work great and his price is reasonable because that appears to be an Oregon grinder not a cheapo harbor freight junker. You're right it would be easy to duplicate that for less money but his price of $425 is quite reasonable IMO. For the cost of having 50 blades sharpened it's paid for. I didn't see a setter on his site but those are easy to DIY.
Click to expand...


Kevin,

There's a seller on E-Bay also selling a sharpener based on a chainsaw sharpener. The chainsaw sharpener both of them use is made by Northern Tool. I've bought the chainsaw sharpener and some steel channel for the base and some angle for the blade holder. I've also got some flat aluminum stock to make the tooth feeding arm. I've got a lot to do for the next few weeks, but as soon as possible, I'm going to get it working. I'm going to make it sharpen only the face of the tooth to start with, then I'll work on designing the linkage to raise and lower the stone to follow the gullet and remove the microscopic cracks that lead to early band failure. After it's working I'll attach a scribe to the linkage and mark an aluminum circle to give me a rough shape for the cam, then I'll cut it out a little oversize and grind it till it follows the shape of my blade as the blade moves forward. Looks like this is going to be my Winter project. 

Here's a link to the guy's site that has sharpeners listed on E-Bay. 

http://www.precisionsharpeners.com/w-07model.html 

The design looks like the one made by EZ-Boardwalk. Here's a link to the EZ-Boardwalk website with pictures of the sharpener.

http://www.ezboardwalk.com/ecom-prodshow/ezboardwalk-sharpener.html

The best DIY sharpener I've seen is this one on the Lumberjocks site. 

http://lumberjocks.com/projects/36263 

Hal


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## Treecycle Hardwoods

Dusty said:


> Kevin said:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> DavidDobbs said:
> 
> 
> 
> Have you looked at EZ Boardwalks rig I think he gets around $450.
> 
> An your done yes you might build one for $200.
> 
> But Ed's has all the bugs worked out.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Looks like he adapted a chainsaw chain sharpener. Should work great and his price is reasonable because that appears to be an Oregon grinder not a cheapo harbor freight junker. You're right it would be easy to duplicate that for less money but his price of $425 is quite reasonable IMO. For the cost of having 50 blades sharpened it's paid for. I didn't see a setter on his site but those are easy to DIY.
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> 
> Kevin,
> 
> There's a seller on E-Bay also selling a sharpener based on a chainsaw sharpener. The chainsaw sharpener both of them use is made by Northern Tool. I've bought the chainsaw sharpener and some steel channel for the base and some angle for the blade holder. I've also got some flat aluminum stock to make the tooth feeding arm. I've got a lot to do for the next few weeks, but as soon as possible, I'm going to get it working. I'm going to make it sharpen only the face of the tooth to start with, then I'll work on designing the linkage to raise and lower the stone to follow the gullet and remove the microscopic cracks that lead to early band failure. After it's working I'll attach a scribe to the linkage and mark an aluminum circle to give me a rough shape for the cam, then I'll cut it out a little oversize and grind it till it follows the shape of my blade as the blade moves forward. Looks like this is going to be my Winter project.
> 
> Here's a link to the guy's site that has sharpeners listed on E-Bay.
> 
> http://www.precisionsharpeners.com/w-07model.html
> 
> The design looks like the one made by EZ-Boardwalk. Here's a link to the EZ-Boardwalk website with pictures of the sharpener.
> 
> http://www.ezboardwalk.com/ecom-prodshow/ezboardwalk-sharpener.html
> 
> The best DIY sharpener I've seen is this one on the Lumberjocks site.
> 
> http://lumberjocks.com/projects/36263
> 
> Hal
Click to expand...


Thanks for the links! I will have to get something soon.


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## Treecycle Hardwoods

A new blade for me with shipping is $20. It costs $7 for me to pay someone to sharpen a blade. About $10 if i have to ship it out and have it sharpened. At the price of the models discussed that is only about 50-70 blades and the machine is paid for. Even if I get an expensive set up at about $2000 that is 200-250 blades to recoupe the cost. I estimate that i can have a blade sharpend 5 times before the hardened tip is ground away. For me that is $20 for the blade and $35 to resharpen it 5 times for a total cost of $55 to buy a blade and 5 more when they dull it would be $120. Resharpening saves me $65 bucks over the life of a blade. I would hope that either machine (cheap or expensive) will last long enough to make your money back and save you a bunch before it takes a crapper.


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## Kevin

Treecycle Hardwoods said:


> A new blade for me with shipping is $20. It costs $7 for me to pay someone to sharpen a blade. About $10 if i have to ship it out and have it sharpened. At the price of the models discussed that is only about 50-70 blades and the machine is paid for. Even if I get an expensive set up at about $2000 that is 200-250 blades to recoupe the cost. I estimate that i can have a blade sharpend 5 times before the hardened tip is ground away. For me that is $20 for the blade and $35 to resharpen it 5 times for a total cost of $55 to buy a blade and 5 more when they dull it would be $120. Resharpening saves me $65 bucks over the life of a blade. I would hope that either machine (cheap or expensive) will last long enough to make your money back and save you a bunch before it takes a crapper.



Greg,

To shed some light on the motivation for Bosox's post, look at his posting history to understand it better. I am pretty sure he sells blades.  

Not saying there's anything wrong with that, just saying. 

:morning2:


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## Mizer

Treecycle Hardwoods said:


> A new blade for me with shipping is $20. It costs $7 for me to pay someone to sharpen a blade. About $10 if i have to ship it out and have it sharpened. At the price of the models discussed that is only about 50-70 blades and the machine is paid for. Even if I get an expensive set up at about $2000 that is 200-250 blades to recoupe the cost. I estimate that i can have a blade sharpend 5 times before the hardened tip is ground away. For me that is $20 for the blade and $35 to resharpen it 5 times for a total cost of $55 to buy a blade and 5 more when they dull it would be $120. Resharpening saves me $65 bucks over the life of a blade. I would hope that either machine (cheap or expensive) will last long enough to make your money back and save you a bunch before it takes a crapper.


There are a lot of ways to look at the pros and cons of sharpening blades. If everything worked out like it should on paper life would be pretty easy. A couple things you have left out is your time. I would imagine that the 7.00 cost for sharpening includes cleaning and setting the blade. I think that there could be a case made for using a blade once with maybe one sharpening then throwing it away. Sometimes you have to weigh the cost of trying to save money instead of making money.


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