To sharpen or not?

[bman]

Have a laser hand auger. The sharpener runs about 8 bucks. New blandes about 20. Does anyone have any input on the effectiveness of sharpening old blades? Or should I save that money and go buy new ones instead?

bman

[Moose-Hunter]

Hey bman...

Personally, I'm not a skilled blade sharpener when it comes to augers. I've tried, but never got the edges as "good as new". Seems to me you have three ways you could go here. First, you could go with the sharpener. For sure the least expensive route. Having little experience with hand augers, I don't know how effective this would be. Second, get a reconditioned set through Strikemasters blade exchange. For about 15.00, you get a set of factory sharpened blades. Problem being the time lag in the actual exchange process due to mailing. Or third, and probably the way I'd go, get a brand new set. If I was to use human power to drill, I'd want the sharpest blades I could find. And nothing beats new, right? Then, during the off season, you could use their blade exchange program and have a fresh set waiting for you in case things go dull next season. Then it's a simple swap and you're back in business.

[kslipsinker]

Go new blades, you will never regret it. Resharpend blades are like using the compact spare on a car. It will get you by, but only for a short time. You will have to make the investment in a new set of blades eventually anyway.

[Hemlock]

I can't comment on how long my freshly resharpened blades will stay sharp, but I just had my Jiffy blade sharpened by a guy in town. WOW, does this auger have new life! It just sucks it's way down to the water. I've never had this Jiffy perform like it did yesterday, not even with new blades.

This is just one man's story, but man I'll be taking my blades back to him whenever needed! $8/blade and he sharpened the center point up too which probably is making a big difference.

[upnorth]

The biggest problem with sharpening blades with any type of sharpener is keeping the proper angle on the cutting face. If you get it just a little bit off it cuts like dump, especially a shaver type blade, a chipper blade is a little more forgiving.

I have sharpened my own chipper blades and they worked good and I have tried to do a shaver type from my hand auger(just with a stone) and they worked like dump.

The best way to do this is get a new or professionally done set a blades. That or buy a special grinder, learn how to use it and then you can do all of ours

[scruffy]

bman:

hey. i brought my blade into "clayton's saw shop." he's this old local guy that has sharpened blades for years. he took a look at it, spent about 2 minutes on a belt grinder, and charged me $3. told me to bring it back if it didn't work. this was the end of the season last year. the blade is still doing awesome. worth a shot before purchasing new blades. like previous poster mentioned, it's all in keeping that same angle. if you don't have a shop to bring it to, i'd try to sharpen the blades myself before buying new ones~ nothing to lose, right?

good luck.