Thread: Get your hand saws sharpened for free

Just to elaborate a bit on my short post and photos last night.

Unfortunately, due to my medical problems we arrived at Matt and Sally's place on Saturday morning while most of the other participants arrived on Friday and stayed overnight.

We found the place about 9:00 am and I was very grateful for the help and suppor tI received from the others while I am not as mobile as I like to be. Dave met us at the car and helped us carry our gear in. I had been in hospital last weekend when I was supposed to be making a saw vise, but Pete and Dirk helped me out with a lend of their spare one. Everyone else was very supportive and helpful while I hobbled around or got in the way when trying to file saws sitting down. Matt and Sally helped us take our gear back to the car at the end of the day. I am most grateful for all the kindness and support.

Anyway, the saw sharpening kicked off around 9:30 with Ian giving a talk about what we would be doing, then he demonstrated tooth formain g and sharpening a rip and a crosscut saw. This took us up until lunch time when out came more food than we could possibly have eaten between us. Most people ate lunch on the go, all keen to get in and practice what Ian had just taught us while it was still fresh in our minds.

Dale set up his retoothing machine after lunch and after some fussing and fiddling it was used to mangle a couple of saws resulting in the odd sawplate being reduced in size with an angle grinder prior to some successful retoothing, followed by some straightening and retensioning with Matt's old panel-beating hammers.

I managed to file one of my "practice" saws for rip very successfully. I then tackled another "practice" saws for crosscutting. I managed to file the saw successfully but a few teeth broke o f during setting and a few more broke during the test cut. Ian declared the sawplate to be of poor condition. It was, however, good practice and I am confident to file another saw for crosscut at home.

I finished the crosscut saw about 4:30 and the light was getting too poor formy ol deyes and I was happy to sit down and take the weight off my injured feet for the rest of the afternoon. Ian started a demonstration of tooth forming on a new sawplate at about 14 or 15 TPI using another sawplate as a template. Before long he needed the assistance of two of us providing additional light with the torch apps on our mobiles..

Just before dark, the fire was lit and some beers mysteriously appeared and we sat around the fire chatting. An enormous dinner was served sometime later and after that the marshmallows were being poked into the fire. It was a great social evening.

Unfortunately we had to go home just after 8pm and could not stay the night like everyone else, but that may have turned out for the better as a big storm came through about midnight and we would have been in a tent if we were staying.

Thanks again to everyone for their support, assistance and company while we were there and of course thanks to Matt and Sally for hosting and to Ian for passing a small amount of his knowledge.

Cheers

Doug

Ripper write up there Doug, could almost smell the steel and oil.

Looks like a good time by all even with not as many photos as some like to see...apologies....well done upon all for your efforts, one could nearly want to and enjoy hand tools but then..Cheers, crowie

Well there you have it ,what a great weekend.
First ,I would like to give the biggest heart felt thank you to Ian W.
What a gentleman. And true hero.
Who of his own merits ,came down from the picture perfect gorges weathered place he lives in Brisbane.
To the sub zeros of Ballarat with its floods hail and storms.
Despite my re assurance I would be organising perfect Queensland weather.
Next I want to thank Dave who gave up a first bday party to join us who arrived Thursday midday to check out all our perpetrators to make sure everything was ship shape and perfect.
And also made a quick boardwalk for everyone to walk between the saw tent and our back doors top effort,
Dirk and Pete woke before sunrise Friday morning to drive all the way from Sydney carrying a precious cargo of brand new saw files ,custom made at there expensive, file bags ,cushioned no less.
And the best ever, I mean ever ,Thai take away ,which was served Saturday night.
What can I say big thank you for that
Dirk ,then spend over two hours sitting in my workshop turning his first pen as a thank you to my sister for having a pile of noise ratbags around.
Mick the new kid on the block ,showed up with saw file handles by the dozen free to any and everyone which came in very ,very handy .
And also happily chauffeured Ian back to Melbourne were he is staying tonight.
Dale arrived late Saturday morning due to chores needing done first .
And was quickly in the the thick of it.
Then after seeing us all tire using bloody files emerged with his fooley re tother and was happily and Chifley re toothing blades mechanical for everyone what a champ.
And then later in the night provided the worlds biggest marshmallows.
Doug despite being told by four surgeons three specialists and a stray cat .
Said he had more important things to attend to then hospital and arrived Saturday morning and leapt straight in to sharpening saws.
And finally the worlds biggest thank you to my wife Sally ,who made sure everything run perfectly and provided more food than an army of chefs could provide.
Plus her incredible laughter and humour xx

Thank you Matt

Pics [IMG]http://
Matt Ian



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Doug


Mick and Doug


Gear a plenty



Tool Box



Pete doing teeth



Dave doing teeth



Ian discussion



Dale immmm not sure what to say

Many thanks to Matt & Sally for hosting a terrific weekend and to Ian for facilitating our learning.
Thank you.

Been an interesting journey to follow. I hope the knowledge that you have gained comes in handy.

Life is funny some times.
After much searching over the last 2yrs I haven't been able to find much info on my Disston saw jointer other than sales adverts. As I was explaining on the weekend it is obvious it has more than one function but I couldn't work out what.

After I left you guys I headed to Lake goldsmith and met up with some people I met there last year and showed them photos of the flat belt grinder I have restored which one of them sold me when he figured I had much more enthusiasm for it than he did, and another fellow gave me some wheels fir it which he had for sale after he saw me sweating trying to carry the darn thing back to my car. Both were over the moon that I had thought to come back and share the photos which has led to the acquisition of more rusty arn.

All this transpired me to take a completely different route home on the way I cane across this.





Now available to all who search

My body is trying to figure out what the heck's going on, one minute it was basking in subtropical comfort, next minute plunged into the arctic, now it's back copping an unseasonable 30 degrees!

Well, I can say I enjoyed myself very much over the weekend, & met a few more great people. I will add my thanks & appreciation to Matt & Sally's efforts to look after us - they seemed determined to have us all go home at least a size larger than when we arrived! It was a lot of fun on Saturday, a bit cool by Qld standards, but nowhere near what I feared, thank goodness. As with Dale's saw-making w'shop a couple of years ago, the day was full-on, and there were no slackers - I certainly didn't have to whip anyone to keep at it. There were some quick learners, and I expect they will be surpassing my skills by the end of the year.

Thanks to Mick for the lift to my daughter's place. I capped off a great weekend with my two girls and their spouses, some rather nice takeaway curries, a bottle (or was it two?) of some rather good Pinot, and slept very well!

A huge thankyou to Pete for providing the files and their carry bags - that was an elegant touch. I will spend a bit of time evaluating the Bahcos when I can, & file a report (pun intended ) in due course. My initial impression, which is based on using just two files (so it could easily change!) was that they are very similar to the Pferds, similar performance (they sheda few corners), similar finish, even the way the brand is printed (in exactly the same place) is eerily similar. Coincidence, or what?

I'm now back home, safe & sound, & got the most enthusiastic greeting from the dogs I've ever experienced, you'd think I'd been gone a year! Saws are now off my agenda or a week or two while I finish closing-in the carport, which I promised to do about 8 years ago......

Thanks again to Matt & Sally,
Cheers,

What a wonderful weekend. Firstly many, many thanks to Matt and Sally for a fabulous warm welcome, even if the ambient temperature was at last starting to resemble cooler months.

Ian was wonderful with his history and theory of how he sharpens saws and what he knows, then it was a session of him showing how it was done. We had a quick gander at his U-Beaut tool that attaches to a file to aid in saw sharpening, bit too pricey for most of us. That said, we could all see how useful it could be and would be.

After lunch the serious business of filing got underway, it soon became apparent some could file straight, some couldn't. I had a serious swinging arc when I was filing. Something I was completely unaware about. After many trials, Pete came up with a suggestion of following my thumb with the other thumb. This was a light bulb moment and from then on I started to file some seriously straight stuff. I do need more practice though.

Here Ian is showing how the Veritas File tool works, and his set of external eyes to actually see his sharpening.
Saw_weekend_001.jpg


The Veritas thingamajig.
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Doug getting a birds eye view of how it's done.
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Dave trying to figure out whether it is worth fiddling with.
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Matt trying to see if it is straight, true and sharp, after being filed almost to death.
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Where it all happened, sometimes the sun shines in Ballarat.
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Here Dale is watched by (L/R) Ian, Dave, Dale and Pete as he inserts Dave's single sided saw blade into his machine, with the end result Dave ended up with a double sided saw blade, very impressive bit of machinery to have in one's shed.
Saw_weekend_007.jpg

Mick.

Mick

The Veritas thingamajig is actually very good, but as you say, a little bit exxy. You can replicate angles with small pieces of wood, one can sit on the saw for the fleam angle and the other fixes to the end of the file. They work well, but are not adjustable so you need one for each variation.

Regards
Paul

Originally Posted by Bushmiller

...The Veritas thingamajig is actually very good, but as you say, a little bit exxy. You can replicate angles with small pieces of wood, one can sit on the saw for the fleam angle and the other fixes to the end of the file. They work well, but are not adjustable so you need one for each variation....

Agreed on all counts, Paul, except that you can use just one stick for both fleam and rake angle. Several of the participants did just that on the weekend. It's a bit fiddly working out the compound angle to jamb the file into the stick, and you need to reverse both angles for each side, which means making another stick. So if you intend sharpening many saws & have the cash to spare, or a loving partner/offspring/whatever willing to splurge on your birthday, the fancy-pantsy guides can be very handy. But if you are only going to tackle the occasional saw, a stick will do the job...

I advocate using some sort of a guide when forming teeth, but once you get a bit of practice, it shouldn't be necessary when sharpening - you should have nicely-formed teeth to guide you. I do have lines marked across my vises (one of the advantages of wooden saw vises) as a rough guide for fleam angles, & to assist me to keep them consistent. The fleam angle itself isn't super-critical on a crosscut saw, if you are making general-purpose saws, anywhere between 15 & 25 will work. I think it's most critical to keep those points even. Once you develop consistency & confidence, you can fool around with the various angles to your heart's content, & if you're like me, you'll eventually conclude that something within the range of angles recommended in the various texts available works just fine....

Cheers,

Just a few shots of my little saw .
I've started the final mile on this one. Adjusted the hand grip.
Those that attended the saw class, will note there were a couple of areas that could catch your knuckles.

There've been cut back 3/4 mm which makes a big difference.
Thanks for all the input there .
Handle has been sanded all over to 600
Then three Coates of WOP gloss applied.sanded between coats.
I give this a final buff later.
The brass back has seen the file a bit towards the mortise and bit more at the front
so far ,just so I can get some pics.
Been sanded to 400 dry then buffed up
It will need a fair bit more tho ,the polish really showed up some file scratches I missed .
Thanks to Ian ,last weekend who quickly cut some teeth in .
Which I then sharpened 14TPI crosscut ,
And it cuts beautiful and tracks straight.
The saw bolts(sex bolts) I'm still not sure on
I'm now thinking of making some in brass ??

Nice set of pics Mick. Missed it all earlier.

I like your bling Matt

Still jave a few more pics to load at some point. Hope to get to them soon



Dave TTC
Turning Wood Into Art