Cleaning your table saw blade

nice

-- Jim, Kentucky

We’ve suggested that to customers for many years and it’s a heck of a lot less money that some of these “pitch & gum removers” that are pretty much oven cleaner with a floral scent. Spray oven cleaner on the blades…go to lunch…remove oven cleaner when you return.

To many folks try and turn in a blade for sharpening that they think is dull but just has pitch buid-up. Clean it and keep cutting!

Right on andyboy.

-- http://www.federalsaw.com

If it damages alloys, how can you be sure your blades aren’t made of one of them?

-- Debt is nothing more than the 21st Century's form of slavery.

Thanks for the tip.

-- Whether You Think You Can or You Think You Can't, YOU ARE RIGHT!!!

Hey guys, one of my student’s is an air craft mechanic and she wondered if it might even wreck the steel. She also agreed however, as long as the cleaner is neutralised with water and maybe lightly oiled, it would be sweet.

-- Andy Halewoodworker

Simple Green is earth friendly and works VERY well.

-- Never board, always knotty, lots of growth rings

The bottom line is clean the blade and get it off, eh?

-- Debt is nothing more than the 21st Century's form of slavery.

goof off works well too

-- Jim from Heirloom Woodshop, custom furniture ,maker, woodworking school, heirloomwoodshop.com

I have used both Simple Green and EasyOff Oven Cleaner. Just depends if I want to walk to the laundry room or to the kitchen to get the cleaner!

I must say that EasyOff does a better job on that really heavy buildup. I bought a couple of 10” blades at a garage sale once because they were so cheap. Very heavy buildup. After an overnight soak, they looked almost brand new!

Routine cleaning gets the Simple Green. Works very well.

As a hint, go to the dollar store and buy a metal pizza pan, the kind with the lip that’s about a half inch deep. I have one that’s 11 inches in diameter. Ten inch blades fit perfect. That way you can put a couple washers in the pan (I superglued mine in – it keeps anybody from thinking about using the pan to make pizza! ) that will hold the blade off the pan’s bottom. Pour in enough Simple Green or EasyOff to cover the blade and let it soak. (I also spray painted the outside of the pan RED in case they missed the washers!)

Cheers!

-- Dave; Lansing, Kansas

strong black coffee works to.

ive heard oven cleaner is not a very good idea to use

I think i have also heard about certain types of cleaners which might loosen the bond between the blade and the carbide on the teeth

not sure but…

-- BRODY. NSW AUSTRALIA -arguments with turnings are rarely productive-

Thanks for the tips guys.

-- Mc Bridge Cabinets, Iowa

Does it work on coated blades too or would it damage the coating? I use easy-off quite a bit to strip paint from plastic models and it removes acrylic/enamels/chrome plating very well. Not sure how much that will strip my freud blade’s chrome.

-- Ed

I’ve had good success cleaning blades with several methods, but I consider oven cleaner to be among the harshest and messiest…it works but no better than many other methods. IIRC, Freud warns against oven cleaners, and long term soaking in Simple Green due to possible damage to the binders.

Instead, I’d try 409, kerosene, Greased Lightning, LA’s Totally Awesome, Fantastic, Goo Gone, and even Windex….whatever you have available in the house. I spray, hit the blade with a toothbrush, rinse and wipe…it’s literally a 3-4 minute process. The important thing is to clean them often.

just whatever you do, DO NOT mix household cleaners! and never ever EVER mix bleach with ANYTHING!

bleach + ammonia (as found in windex) = chloramine gas
bleach + acids (vinegar, some rust removal products, toilet bowl cleaners) = chlorine gas

Chlorine gas and water combine to make hydrochloric and hypochlorous acids.

Using an oven cleaner is actually an old trick. I first heard about it about 10 years ago but I am sure it’s older than that.

The main active ingredient in oven cleaner is caustic soda ie: sodium hydroxide (NaOH). It works the same way that soap is made. The caustic soda reacts with fats to produce a soapy residue which can then be wiped off.

I’m not entirely sure of the chemistry of removing pitch from blades but it does work but it’s smelly, messy and caustic.

A possible safer alternative would be what I now use to clean ovens: baking soda, vinegar and some salt as a slight abrasive.

Of course you could just use straight caustic soda as well or possibly make your own from wood!! Ashes from hardwoods will leach potassium hydroxide (KOH) when water is flitered through it. KOH is another caustic soda and this is how soap is made from ashes and fat!

Just always use gloves, safety glasses and be in a well ventilated area no matter what choice you use, natural or otherwise. Caustic soda burns the skin.

-- Steve, New Zealand, www.steveracz.com

Tried Simple Green for the first time yesterday. I had an old blade that had never been cleaned. yellow paint on it. Black smears and lots of brown sap. I soaked it overnight. This morning it looked the same. But, when I went to pick it up out of the tray the blade came up but the other stuff slid off as if they were a thin film floating on the blade. It’s as if I unzipped the gunk and it fell off. I wirebrushed a couple of spots. Shiny new blade. I hadn’t seen the teeth in a long time. They’re in pretty good shape. I didn’t know as they were encrusted. So, my two best cleaning friends that get it done are:
Simple green for blade cleaning
Evaporust for rust removal.

-- The smell of wood, coffee in the cup, the wife let's me do my thing, the lake is peaceful. http://web.me.com/deceiver6/Deceiver/Craftsman_on_the_lake/Craftsman_on_the_lake.html

I think my wife was stocking up on oven cleaner before the y2k scare, then we got a self cleaning oven, and now I have a life time supply of it. I don’t cut a lot of wood that has resin in it, mostly hardwood, but I do give the blades a cleaning now and then. Spray them in my deep sink, let them sit for a few minutes, wash them off and wipe them down with camilia oil.

-- Tim -- http://tmuli.com

I use Pro 409 (the heavy duty version of 409) that you can get at the Ace Hardware. Have been using it for years because it’s very safe (no fumes, rubber gloves, etc) and does a great job.
You just put about a 1/4 inch of it in a cookie sheet with a rim, and soak the table saw blade in it for about 5min. You can then use an old toothbrush to scrub the pitch off the carbide teeth-very easy, almost no effort.
I used to use oven cleaner, but think there was an article about the 409 in an issue of FWW years ago.

-- Gerry

We made soap at school usiing woodash and fat. The teacher told us to not use it on our face and hands when she sent it home with us. Imagine doing that today :-))

-- Debt is nothing more than the 21st Century's form of slavery.

This is probably not an option available to most, but I used to do a lot of watch/clock repair, and I have a nice ultrasonic cleaner which I used for the movements. For those who don’t know, an ultrasonic cleaner is basically a tank you fill with an appropriate cleaning solution, which the cleaner heats slightly & permeates with high frequency sound waves, in the range of a few hundred thousand hertz. For saw blades, I’ve found a few minutes in the cleaner with a solution of water & dish washer detergent gets them literally sparkling. Of course, you have to be sure to dry the blades thoroughly afterward.

If someone happens to have such a cleaner, they may want to give this a try.

Dan