Chainsaw Sharpening - Crosscutting vs Ripping

[Aled Dafis]

A pic of my sharpening jig
Works very well for me.

Nice jig, I've never used one, I'm sure that it's able to produce a nice accurate tooth profile in no time. From a hobbyists point of view however, a simple file in a guide is cosiderably cheaper and with a little practice and 10minutes tutoring, is quite effective.

Edit: I've just looked that type of grinder up on the 'bay and was quite surprised how cheap they are, you can pick one up for about £30-35. Still more expensive than a file and guide, but not wildly so.

 

[chipmunk]

Aled,
Thanks. I'll have to buy a second chain sometime and have a go.
Jon

 

[Aled Dafis]

No worries.

http://www.chainsdirect.co.uk seem to have competitive prices, free delivery and a wide variety of chains. I've never used them, it's just a website that I bookmarked when doing a little web research this week.

Cheers
Aled

 

[dickm]

KwikChip are pretty good on price, too. Also service isn't bad. Terry Bass in Hereford is knowledgeable about chains for obscure saws, but a bit more expensive.

 

[Richard T]

Although the picture of the mill shows the saw at a point of perpendicularness, he will still be using the dogs on the saw to 'lever' it along, pushing the nose end along to cut to 45 degrees + then bringing the handle back to perp.
At work we had a saw with a double ended guide bar with a saw on either end - sounds like a good idea but you can't lever it - you rely on the extra power of the two engines and we found it's better to use one good saw with the dogging action. (Though for more info on this, to google 'dogging action' is probably inadvisable.)
Re the angle of teeth for ripping, I keep my general purpose Stihl somewhere between the two as I find the recommended CC angle too much; that is it cuts more than it can cope with especially with the likes of green Poplar, Willow et al that have very expansive chips when cut and the raking ability of the chain just ain't enough.
Come to think of it, same with my 064 with its 30" bed that only gets used for CC.

 

[davebrac]

I have a couple of sawmills that use chainsaws and also hand rip cut.

Professional (bespoke) ripping chains are sharpened to 10 or 15 deg, l find the 10 deg works better on hard woods. One word about bought ripping chains is that the do not have as good anti kick back links as cross cutting chains so l would think for small scale work changing the angle from 30 would be a better option.
http://www.chainsdirect.co.uk/Category/ ... hains.aspx

The variation to the 10-15 deg is the new grandenberg ripping chains that have a cutting angle of 0 deg but they also have two scorers to each cutter, l have kept away from these as it seems more complicated to sharpen at different angles for the cutting and scoring
http://www.alaskanmill.co.uk/Faqs.aspx#6

couple of points on ripping chains the depth gage is important you need to use a progressive depth gauge tool like the calton it is amazing the difference this makes
http://www.newsawchains.co.uk/Carlton-File-O-Plate-40mm

 

[Aled Dafis]

Thanks for your input guys, it's good to hear from more experienced users than myself, to learn how the pros go about their work and the nuances between different chains etc.

 

[davebrac]

Here is a photo of one of my setups this was a piece of spalted beech