Old Hand Saw Restoration

[bczygan]

I have a dozen or more old hand saws.

I am interested in rehabilitating them including sharpening.

This thread is for a discussion of that.

And show us your saws!

 

[rlitman]

I have a few rip saws I've been meaning to touch up.
Most crosscut saws just don't seem worth sharpening. For the time involved (with their finer teeth), you can get a nice new high fleam toothed saw that cuts better, has harder and longer wearing teeth, but cannot be sharpened by hand.

You can get sharpening triangle files at any hardware store, but saw sharpening vises are hard to come by (though easy to make out of wood).

 

[KEH]

I think I posted brief tutorial on sharpening hand saws on here somewhere. Having a saw vise is not the most critical thing since a person can use a medium sized machinist's vise. A saw set is, for all practical purposes, necessary to set the angle of the teeth. Look along the saw blade andyou will see that the points of the teeth bend out. alternatively. This is to keep the saw from binding in use and is called the saw "kerf'.

KEH

 

[Stuart in MN]

No pictures, but I have a dozen or so old handsaws of various brands - Disston, Simmons Keen Kutter, Simonds and probably one or two others. For some reason, they show up regularly at automotive swap meets in my area, and I can usually pick them up for $5 or less. They're all in good usable condition but could use cosmetics and sharpening, that's one of the things on my list of stuff to do some day... I'd like to find out how to clean up the blades without removing the brand hallmarks.

 

[Milton Shaw]

There is also a tooth height tool that used a flat file to get all the teeth to the same height before setting and filing the teeth. This is a forgotten skill on hand sharpening hand saws, crosscut saws and other saws that help build the country from the 1800's to the power tool age. My grandfather on my mothers side and his father both graduated from carpenter's apprentice school and I have pictures of them from about the 1890's to 1910. I also inherited some of their tools and tool chests that they made in school. Old wooden planes and other tools that still work better than a lot of new tools. My father used to take his crosscut saw to my grandfather for him to sharpen it, talk about something that would make a man out of you, pulling on a 6 foot crosscut to fell or cut up a tree. Glad I have the old saw but never grab it instead of a chain saw.

 

[RivennHewn]

Files, sets and clamps are readily available on Ebay.

http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_fro...TRC0.H0.Xsaw+vise.TRS0&_nkw=saw+vise&_sacat=0

 

[ctb]

Just last week I finished re-toothing an old 6tpi combo saw into an 8tpi panel rip saw.

It was my third attempt on the same saw, the previous two versions turned out pretty crappy. This time I used an old craftsman jigsaw blade with 8tpi as a guide for the file, held on with double sided tape and moved down the saw as necessary. Worked great for the spacing.

For the file I found the smallest file I could at an OBI (like home depot) for 3 euros and to my surprise it was made in Germany, not china. It's 4'' long and perfect for the tooth profile, the only problem being that the file was double cut and not the preferred single cut. In practice, however, I couldn't really tell any difference between this and an old Nicholson single cut I had worn out previously.

I didn't make a saw vice, just stuck the saw plate in my big woodworking vice and went at it. As much as I tried to keep the file at the same angle, some of the teeth were still cut smaller/larger than others. This also effects the tooth height, so consequently some teeth are lower than others, though not by very much. I figured that rather than re-jointing and trying to even the teeth out I'd try it just as it was to see how bad /good it worked. I set the teeth then gave a couple swipes with the file to each tooth, put the handle back on and tried it.

It cut fast,but the cut was very coarse. I took an old diamond sharpening plate (bought for 1 euro from LIDL, a supermarket) and ran it down the sides to take out some of the set. This time the cut was a lot smoother. The sawing action was a lot better than expected with the teeth being a bit uneven, so I'm going to leave it as is for now and just use it. When the teeth get dull again I'll do a rejoint and even out the teeth.

Next job is to make a new handle for the saw. I've got some beech left over from an old workbench I scrounged and rebuilt that'll work for that.

Pics tomorrow, when I find the batteries for my camera that my son "borrowed" for his x-box.

 

[pendragon1998]

Paul Sellers: how to sharpen a saw:

Paul Sellers' file recommendations:
saws with teeth 14-16 TPI, 4-6″ XXslim taper file
saws with teeth 10-13 TPI, 4-6″ Xslim taper
saws with teeth 6-10 TPI, 4-6″ slim taper
for jointing, a 10” single cut mill file.

The new Nicholson files are sub-par. Paul suggests Bahco made in Portugal as being high quality.

 

[NY_treeguy]

Best resource out there, Vintage Saws

http://www.vintagesaws.com/cgi-bin/frameset.cgi?left=main&right=/library/library.html

I have done at least 50. My routine is as follows:

1. Remove handle, use a spring clamp to hold to a section of 2x8 I keep for doing this.
2. Scrape off major rust with a razor
3. Sand with 220 grit wet dry lubed with WD40. Go with the grain only. Use a block of wood to keep things even and go lightly if you want to preserve the etch. Some patina is definitely OK
4. Repeat with other side
5. Clamp in saw vise. Joint
6. File one side then the other.
7. Set. I use a Stanley 82. Go with less set to start. Its easy to add set and impossible to remove it
8. Wax the blasé with Butcher's wax. Re-install handle.

Takes me about 2 hours to do a full sized saw.