Thread: Carbide Chainsaw chain

Whitworthsocket, it's been discussed here a few times, there are some people who feel it would be worthwhile. There are others who can't see the point.

I don't recall anyone who has actually used it and done any kind of real-life milling comparisons.....

Obviously longer lasting (unless you hit something hard and chip the teeth....), more expensive, but I'd like to see you sharpen it with a round file...

I've had several large tree felling contractors do work on our property, and significantly none of them use carbide chains. You'd need a diamond dressing wheel to sharpen them, and/or send it away to a specialised tool sharpening place.

If guys that are using their saws all day, every day don't go for the carbide, you'd have to assume that they don't stack up from a cost benefit point of view.

Having said that, I'm sure there are some niche applications where they ARE worthwhile.....just can't think of any ! Maybe it makes sense for the Lucas mill boys, working with clean timber? The only time I came close to buying one, my local saw dealer talked me out of it.

Basil, even for me, a Lucas Owner, I can't see the cost effectiveness of TCT chain

Your dealer talked you out of it.!!!
If the chain lasts significantly longer he would not make as much money.
I understand that You would need a different sharpening arrangement.
In metal woking workshops we use green aluminium oxide stones that are very soft to sharpen Tungsten carbide. It sounds a little crazy to use something verysoft to sharpen something very hard. However it works well.
This was a general enquiry to find someone with first hand knowledge.
Regards Whitworth

The closest I've come to them is to get a price estimate a few years ago. Does that count? IIRC, it was about US$100 for 18-inch bar, roughly 4 times regular chain at the time.

The bloke behind me at the shop counter identified himself as a firefighter, and told us that the entire department (for a service area of about 200,000 population) had ONE such chain for evaluation. The principal application is in firefighting, to facilitate rescue of occupants. Cost of tools is secondary in such a case. I don't know the outcome of their assessment.

Cheers,
Joe

Maybe not cost effective but do they make life easier?Store bought clothes or bread or mains power aren't cost effective - you could make your own bread and clothes at night by an open fire for light.I want to know if anyone uses one regularly because its a lot easier[ but maybe a bit dearer] ?Now my knees and arms are buggered I,m starting to consider power steering and auto transmission .Anyway is the additional cost offset by time saved and convenience of not having to stop and climb out of the tree or thick bush , find a file , some flat ground, let the saw cool so u can touch it etc?.And once your heart and breathing slows down sometimes hard to get all fired up and back into it

bought a solo saw with 2 tct chains a few years back ,to cut some hardwood , ended up using it to cut some burl that had ant dirt in it . usual chain 1-2 inch cut then blunt . carbide lots of oil did about 4 burls and still worked . just sharpen with diamond that fits in a dremel tool . no good for nails . but usefull if you have some dirty wood . cheers bob

There is one Aussie bloke on the arborisite that uses carbide regularly for milling but no one else I know that uses them regularly for milling.

Like others have said carbide seems to come into it's own when the wood is dirty but I'm not convinced enough to try one at this stage for regular milling and here is why.

If a regular chain can cut one slab of wood before needing to be resharpened, that means in practice it's loses most of its cutting edge in the first half the slab with the remaining half of the area being cut with what are basically blunter cutters. During this period the power head is working harder than average and during the last 1/4 of the slab the power head is working harder still.

Now lets consider carbide which can supposedly cut 10 times more wood before needing to be touched up. The first 5 slabs are dead easy, but the last 5 slabs are still essentially cut with blunter cutters, meaning the power head has to working harder continuously all the way through all those slabs. The last 2.5 slabs is the same as the last quarter of each slab for the regular chain. That's a high continuous load which is bad for powerhead wear.

It's the same as driving a car for numerous shorter bursts at very high speed versus a sustained long period at the same speed. The continuous hard

With regular chain the powerhead works hard for shorter sharper bursts. In contrast the carbide chain cuts well for the first half but then (to get the full 10 slab without sharpening benefit) the powerhead has to go through a long slow drawn out hard slog for the remaining slabs as it nears the end of its cutter sharpness.

The way to reduce this continuous power head load is then to sharpen the carbide more often (eg every 5 slabs) but that's defeating the purposed of having the carbides in the first place and carbide chains cannot be sharpened in the field, so they have to be swapped out meaning a number of swap out chains are needed to mill a whole big log. If you have several different size bars to accommodate then carbide chain becomes a very expensive investment.

I guess it basically comes down to money.

a carbide tip is 30000 times more wear resistant than a hardened steel cutter. Stellite is approximately 3000 times more wear resistant.

This does not mean that for every slab you cut with a standard chain you will cut 30000 slabs with a carbide chain but for every mm of wear on a standard chains cutter you will only recieve approx 1/30000th of a mm on a carbide chains cutter. however this varies with the grade of carbide used and some of the cheaper types would only be approx twice as good as stellite.

There is also the fact that on MOST carbide chain there is only approximately 2 to 3 mm of carbide and once it is gone the chain is finished. also if you hit anything there is costly retipping as usually it shatters the carbide. It is usually cheaper to replace the chain.

There is also the fact that although many people say that they can sharpen them, in reality very few can do the job properly without sacrificing excessive amounts of the carbide tip, thus reducing the life of the chain significantly and increasing overall cost per cut.

I have sharpened many carbide chains for people in the south west of western australia bobl however I do not know what they were being run on, I know that some were on gang saws in the jarrah country, but as I say I do not know who they were being used by. I also sharpened others from over there which were being used by small millers but I do not know what they were being run on, They would have been around the 40"+ cut, but could have been on a lucas or something else.

I would like to try one one day, but for now I will stick with the standard chains, I do not cut enough to warrant one.

Originally Posted by whitworthsocket

If the chain lasts significantly longer he would not make as much money.
I understand that You would need a different sharpening arrangement.
In metal woking workshops we use green aluminium oxide stones that are very soft to sharpen Tungsten carbide. It sounds a little crazy to use something verysoft to sharpen something very hard. However it works well.
This was a general enquiry to find someone with first hand knowledge.
Regards Whitworth

Those "green aluminium oxide wheels" are actually silicon carbide. they are actually not soft the granuals which do the cutting are in fact extremely hard, almost as hard as diamond. It is the matrix or bonding agent which gives it the appearance that it is soft, This causes the wheel to give its particles freely, otherwise it would generate that much heat that the solder holding the tip would melt and it would fall out. Silicon carbide wheels are NO GOOD for sharpening carbide chains or for that matter any carbide cutter as the wheel does not hold its shape, and this creates a progressive difference from cutter to cutter. the only way to sharpen any precision or semi precision carbide cutter is with a diamond wheel. These change very little in shape over a huge amount of grinding (and I do not mean the type used for cutting bricks in your angle grinder). Carbide is not something for the home handy man to play with!!! aside from the fact that you will quite easily wreck the tool you are attempting to maintain it is also highly carcinogenic and if you are grinding it with a silicon carbide wheel you should be wearing an appropriate mask or respirator.