Last week I decided I needed to resharpen my saws. I have a back saw from the US, obviously its a push saw and a rip saw. But my cross cut is indian and hence a pull saw. Both are about 2 years old and have done duty almost everyday and in everyway.
So coming to the rub, they needed sharpening. A lot of articles exist out there to help explain how saws work and hence how to resharpen them. Some are brief, some are verbose, I read them all. Read the Part 1 of this article.
While that article and the embedded link talk about the concepts and show how to sharpen, it doesn't quite explain the making of the jigs. I've read so many articles that the jigs are sort of in my memory now, but here goes
1. Saw clamp: A lot of sites suggest buying a nice iron one, but if you have 2 saws to service all your needs then you really don't need to put down that much cash. I built one its the easiest thing ever
Most saw you are going to use are 1 to 1 and a half foot so your saw clamp can be anywhere between 8 inches and a foot. I made one by cutting 3 pieces of 6mm ply that I had lying around.
The 2 large pieces are about 8 by 6 inches and the small one is 8 by 1 inch. The reason for the 1 inch piece is that when the clamps are applied to the saw clamp, the tops of the large pieces come together to tighten around the blade and keep it stable. without the small piece of ply in place you would have to clamp right on the saw to make sure that blade is stable.
One problem I did face with the back saw is that it is just about a foot long and hence the handle was in the way of the clamp. It took me nearly 15 minutes to figure out that I should just pull the saw back and clamp up only the first 6 inches and do that properly.
Since I don't have a vise, and I'm not going to get one, I simply clamp up a thick piece of wood to the underside of the table, at the edge, to act as a skirt. The saw clamp is then attached vertically to that. This is also how I plane edges or cut tenons.
2. Saw Jointer: The saw jointer is used to flatten out any inconsistencies in the height of the teeth. I made a simple jointer by chopping a groove in a thickish piece of wood and inserting the file
Here is the effect of the jointer. Notice how the top of each tooth is flat and shiny. Some of the teeth even have a burr formed with the action of the jointer.
I may have jointed a little too much, but these teeth are so tiny that it was difficult to see. I would suggest if any of you are doing this for a 14 PPI, then get a good magnifying glass, so you can examine the impact of your action.
The one thing to watch for is that all the sites say, that each top MUST have a little material knocked off. But common sense will tell you that if a few (1 or 2) teeth are really short or broken, there is no way that you should joint down to that level.
So coming to the rub, they needed sharpening. A lot of articles exist out there to help explain how saws work and hence how to resharpen them. Some are brief, some are verbose, I read them all. Read the Part 1 of this article.
While that article and the embedded link talk about the concepts and show how to sharpen, it doesn't quite explain the making of the jigs. I've read so many articles that the jigs are sort of in my memory now, but here goes
1. Saw clamp: A lot of sites suggest buying a nice iron one, but if you have 2 saws to service all your needs then you really don't need to put down that much cash. I built one its the easiest thing ever
Most saw you are going to use are 1 to 1 and a half foot so your saw clamp can be anywhere between 8 inches and a foot. I made one by cutting 3 pieces of 6mm ply that I had lying around.
The 2 large pieces are about 8 by 6 inches and the small one is 8 by 1 inch. The reason for the 1 inch piece is that when the clamps are applied to the saw clamp, the tops of the large pieces come together to tighten around the blade and keep it stable. without the small piece of ply in place you would have to clamp right on the saw to make sure that blade is stable.One problem I did face with the back saw is that it is just about a foot long and hence the handle was in the way of the clamp. It took me nearly 15 minutes to figure out that I should just pull the saw back and clamp up only the first 6 inches and do that properly.
Since I don't have a vise, and I'm not going to get one, I simply clamp up a thick piece of wood to the underside of the table, at the edge, to act as a skirt. The saw clamp is then attached vertically to that. This is also how I plane edges or cut tenons.
2. Saw Jointer: The saw jointer is used to flatten out any inconsistencies in the height of the teeth. I made a simple jointer by chopping a groove in a thickish piece of wood and inserting the file
I may have jointed a little too much, but these teeth are so tiny that it was difficult to see. I would suggest if any of you are doing this for a 14 PPI, then get a good magnifying glass, so you can examine the impact of your action.
The one thing to watch for is that all the sites say, that each top MUST have a little material knocked off. But common sense will tell you that if a few (1 or 2) teeth are really short or broken, there is no way that you should joint down to that level.
3. Rake guide and Fleam Jig
Here I used the section on Making a Rake Alignment Jig from http://www.vintagesaws.com/library/primer/sharp.html.
The fleam jig theory is from the same article but the jig or guide is from the section "Hand saw sharpening guides" at http://workshopcompanion.com/KnowHow/Tools/Sharpening/8_Sharpening_Hand_Saws/8_Sharpening_Hand_Saws.htm
One thing that I did wrong while drilling the hole to take the triangle file was that I made the hole too small and then jammed the file in there. After which it was a problem to adjust the angle of the file, which is kinda the whole point of the exercise. What you can do to get the size right. is hold the tip of the file over the shaft of the drill this will tell you how much of the file will comfortably go into the hole without binding.
Now I've done this rake guide for the push, rip cut, back saw. I will have to make a different guide for the pull, crosscut saw.
And that's it folks.
Here I used the section on Making a Rake Alignment Jig from http://www.vintagesaws.com/library/primer/sharp.html.
The fleam jig theory is from the same article but the jig or guide is from the section "Hand saw sharpening guides" at http://workshopcompanion.com/KnowHow/Tools/Sharpening/8_Sharpening_Hand_Saws/8_Sharpening_Hand_Saws.htm
One thing that I did wrong while drilling the hole to take the triangle file was that I made the hole too small and then jammed the file in there. After which it was a problem to adjust the angle of the file, which is kinda the whole point of the exercise. What you can do to get the size right. is hold the tip of the file over the shaft of the drill this will tell you how much of the file will comfortably go into the hole without binding.
Here is my rake guide. The rake guide should ideally be just one, because the rake angle for all the teeth will be the same regardless of whether they are bent away from you or towards you or whether it is a cross cut saw or a rip saw. The issue is actually with the secondary angle on the cross cut saw each, what is called the fleam angle. This is where the direction of the handle comes in handy.
Now I've done this rake guide for the push, rip cut, back saw. I will have to make a different guide for the pull, crosscut saw.
And that's it folks.
No comments:
Post a Comment