Easily Sharpen Lawn Mower Blades with a Bench Grinder

Most people are quite proud of their lawns and it is significant that you keep it looking beautiful and healthy. You require ensuring your lawnmower blade is kept sharp to offer your lawn a pleasant spotless edge plus to inhibit the grass from falling prey to disease or becoming damaged.

Your lawnmower is beyond doubt, one of the most significant tools you possess at home. On the other hand, with long-standing employment, the blades might grow blunt, plus you might begin perceiving incompetence when employing the machine. Luckily, that is an issue you can solve effortlessly.

Bench Grinder Definition

For individuals who are into serious DIYing or welding, you may have stumbled upon a bench grinder. It is fundamentally a bench top appliance that propels abrasive wheels for sharpening cutting tools or shaping metal. In our case, we are keen on the former purpose – sharpening cutting implements. The ensuing are the steps for honing the lawnmower’s blades using a bench grinder:

What is needed for this procedure?

bench grinder
wrench
nail or a plastic balancer
Protective glasses
heavy cloth and a couple of welding gloves
Grease
vise

1. Blade Removal

For blade removal, you are needed to turn the lawnmower upside (with wherein its operator grasps it) or on the side plus guarantee it is stable so that it doesn’t reserve down while being removed.

Put on one glove, grasp the blade on one side plus begin to unbolt the nut in the middle employing the wrench. A heavy cloth can serve or a slice of wood could be utilized to firm the blade if you don’t possess a glove.

Apply some oil on the nut to ensure it easily slips and opens if it is too taut. It is likewise significant to label the bottom side of your blade to avoid one from fixing back the blade wrong way up. If your blade isn’t correctly re-installed, it shall not cut grass appropriately.

2. Blade Assessment

Inspect the blade to discover out if it has scratches or if it is twisted. This phase is likewise indispensable to eradicate any grass from it in order to correctly sharpen it.

You can use a screwdriver or a dry cloth to carry out the cleaning. If the grime is copious, then detergent and water can be utilized to clean your blade.

It may be suitable to purchase a new blade instead of sharpening the present blade if the destruction is too much.

3. Label the Blade Sides

This is a prevalent blunder that people do: they take out the blade, hone it aptly, and afterwards reinstall it facing wrong side up. Despite how well you have sharpened the blade, it shall not cut the lawn. They typically have to go via the procedure of dismantling the mower to set up the blade properly, which you shall not find so expedient.

Consequently, employ aerosol paint or a marker pen for labeling the blade sides. You can simply label the non-cutting side since the sharpening act shall rub out the markings if it is put on the cutting side.

View Strong Bench Grinders for Sharpening Below

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4. Blade Sharpening

Make sure that you put on a welding mask or protective glasses, gloves plus long-sleeved clothes. This is to avoid the tiny metal chips from getting inside the eyes or other body parts.

Switch on your bench grinder. Make certain that you grab the blade in a spot that is stress-free to sharpen and hone it in the way that your blade is going inside. During the sharpening, the procedure ensures that the angle of your blade is upheld.

In both directions move the blade gradually over the bench grinder, this action shall ensure that the blade is appropriately sharpened.

5. Blade Cooling Process

By employing a pail of cold water ensure to quench the blade recurrently. The abrasion between the grinder and the blade causes the blade to become so hot. This can bring about the bending of the blade or even worse break it, therefore, the requirement to continuously cool the blade during the sharpening development.

6. Blade Balancing

After both cutting ends have been honed, there is one extra significant phase: balancing your blade. Winding up with an unbalanced blade sharpening can intermittently take away more metal from one end of your cutting edge than the other. Cutting lawn down with a blade that is not balanced shall cause extreme vibrating, which can impair the motor plus put unnecessary strain on your mower.

One method to conclude if a lawnmower cutting edge is correctly balanced is to just slip-up the blade’s middle hole on a nail bulging from a wall. In the horizontal spot hold the sharp edge and set free. If it stays level, then it is well balanced. Though, if both ends revolve down toward vertical, the edge is not balanced; hone the weightier end to eradicate some metal and afterwards recheck it.

Although the nail in wall method does function, for more exact results, employ a lawnmower blade balancer, a multi-layered, funnel-shaped metallic fitting.

Put your balancer on a flat area, and then place the blade over the top; the sharp, stepped design goes well with cutting edges with different diameter center holes. If your balance is well-adjusted, it shall stay level. If it isn’t, it shall lean to one edge or the other, specifying which end is weighty and necessitates extra sharpening.

7. Fixing Back the Blade into Your Lawn Mower

Clean the grass that is at the bottom of the mower ahead of putting back the blade inside the mower. This shall certify the efficiency of the mower to facilitate its functions like it is spanking new.

Place the blade in the center and utilize the nut to secure it into place with the lawnmower laid on its side or back. Take the thick cloth and grasp one side of the cutting edge with it as you stiffen the nut utilizing your other hand.

Maintenance Guidelines

Regularly hone the blade. The more one utilizes the lawnmower, the duller its blade becomes. That supposed; contemplate whetting the blade no less than two times every mowing season; more often if you employ it so regularly.

Hint on knowing at what time to whet: evidently, you must hone when the blade begins becoming ineffectual. Observing the grass is one method of telling the moment has arrived. If it has a straight, level edge that portrays the blade is sufficiently honed, however, if it appears raptured and tattered, the blade has perhaps grown dull and requires honing.

Look for help

Are you hesitant about honing the cutting edge? You are not assured if you are going to put it back fittingly? Possibly you are concerned that the engine shall in some way develop a problem or that the oil shall drip inside the carb.

In the event, it is commended that you get in touch with a specialist. This might turn to be a great choice, and also, by looking whatever they do diligently, you may be capable to accomplish the job next time devoid of requiring any aid.

The expert should hone the blade, balance it, plus fix it back. They may even rub in a corrosion remover or corrosion converter to handle any rust that has formed on the blade. Remarkably, they do not ask for a lot of cash; you might even get charged as little as $ 10 subject to your locality.

Also, the rust is another reason for dullness, thus so you may need to discover the ideal rust eradicators and employ them once on occasion.

Conclusion

Now you are equipped to begin honing. Undoubtedly, the apt and harmless means to hone the lawnmower blade is employing a bench grinder. You can effortlessly manage by putting the blade inside a vice and clamp on a table to make it steady. Then you can employ a file, the grinding fastener for a drill motor, or else the angle grinder. It is exceptionally imperative that you just grind the locomotive side of the lawnmower blade. One need not hone the other edge – the lawn edge – of your blade. You can differentiate between the two since the engine edge of your blade possess a bevel – that is the part of the lawnmower blade that you shall be whetting.

Through adhering to these simple phases for the manner to whet the blade of the lawnmower, one can securely and straightforwardly implement this assignment yourself. This shall assist to keep the lawn attractive and in good physical shape.