How to Sharpen Lawnmower Blades

Introduction

Your lawnmower blade is dull. Sharpen the blade twice each season to help maintain a green, healthy lawn. A sharp blade not only cuts blades clean so grass plants recover quickly, but it also helps reduce your lawn mowing time.

A dull blade rips and pulls the grass blades, leaving ragged tears that both weaken the plant and promote fungal growth and other grass diseases. A sharp blade, on the other hand, cuts cleanly, allowing the plant to heal and recover quickly. A lawnmower blade sharpening also lets you complete your lawn-cutting chore faster and with less stress on the mower.

Lawnmower blade sharpening is a simple task, even for a novice. It’ll take a few sharpenings to master the technique. After that, the chore will take less than 10 minutes. Plan to do it twice every mowing season. We show here the steps of a lawnmower blade sharpening that will work for just about any walk-behind mower. Riding mowers require different blade removal techniques, which we won’t show here. Read on to learn how to sharpen mower blades.

If you’re having trouble with your lawnmower find out why your why your lawnmower won’t start.

Watch this video tutorial to learn how to sharpen a lawnmower blade yourself:

How to remove the lawnmower blade

Remove spark plug

• Pull the spark plug wire from the spark plug to prevent the motor from accidentally starting. Tape or tie it back so it doesn’t flop back into contact with the plug.
  • We recommend always removing the spark plug when you’re working on the blade. If the piston happens to be at the top of the compression stroke, a little bump to the blade might force the piston over the “hump” and into the power stroke. If that happens, the blade will lurch around and could break your hand!

Tip mower on its side

• Turn the mower onto its side with the air filter and carburetor side up. This keeps oil and gas from dripping into the air filter.
  • The carburetor is usually easy to recognize because it has throttle cables running to it. If you keep this side up when you tip your mower over to get at the blade (Photo 2), you won’t get a smoke cloud from leaking oil the next time you start it. Some mowers have gas caps with air holes that could leak a little gas onto your garage floor, so work outside or keep a rag handy to clean up drips.

Mark Your Blade

• Mark your blade with spray paint before you remove it so you know which way to reinstall it. Mower repair pros say that the biggest mistake homeowners make is installing a blade upside down after sharpening it. The blade won’t cut—and they’ll go nuts trying to figure out why!
  • Tip: Keep a second blade on hand. The store will probably be closed when you need one!

Remove the blade

• Wedge a short 2×4 between the blade and the deck to clamp the blade. Loosen the bolt (or nut) with a long-handled wrench. Turn counterclockwise to remove the bolt and blade counterclockwise.
  • You’ll usually find a single bolt or nut holding the blade on. It’s usually very tight and you’ll need to clamp the blade to loosen it. The 2×4 method we show is simple, quick and safe. Don’t use your foot! A good tool to keep handy to loosen the bolt is a breaker bar or long-handled wrench with a socket to match the bolt. It’ll give you plenty of leverage to loosen extremely tight bolts, and you can keep your knuckles well away from the blade when bearing down. Use a squirt of penetrating oil on really rusted, stuck bolts. Wait 10 minutes to give it time to work.
• Once the blade is off, set the mower back onto all four wheels until you’re ready to reinstall your blade.

How to Sharpen the Blade

Sharpen the blade with a file

• Clamp the blade in a vise and sharpen the cutting edge with a mill bastard file as a lawnmower blade sharpener, held at the same cutting angle as before. File until the blade is “butter-knife” sharp.
  • Once you remove the blade, examine it to determine whether to sharpen it, or replace it. We recommend that you sharpen it with a hand file. Mower blades are made from fairly soft steel. You can sharpen most with fewer than 50 strokes of a clean, sharp “mill bastard” file that’s at least 10 in. long. Grinders also work, and much more quickly (pros use them). But they’re more difficult to control and you might overheat and ruin the blade.

Check for the Proper Filing Angle

• File in the direction of the original cutting angle. Always sharpen from the top side of the cutting edge; this will give you the longest-lasting edge on the blade.
  • The file cuts in one direction only, on the push stroke; you’ll feel it bite into the steel on the blade. If you don’t feel that cutting action, your file is probably dull or you’re not pressing down hard enough. Don’t try to make your blade razor sharp; it’ll dull more quickly. “Butter-knife” sharp will do.
  • Pro tip: Sharpening mulching blades is sometimes more difficult. Mulching blades may have longer or curved cutting edges, and you may need several types of files to sharpen them. In some cases, you may have to resort to a 4-1/2-in. angle grinder to sharpen mulching blades. If your mulching blade is too difficult to sharpen, take it to a hardware store or a blade sharpening service.

Reinstalling the Blade

Check blade balance

• Before reinstalling the blade, hang it on a nail to check the balance. If one side dips, file a bit more off that side until the blade remains horizontal.
  • Before you reinstall the blade, be sure to balance it. An unbalanced blade will cause vibration and possibly ruin the blade shaft or bearings. To check the balance, simply drive a nail into a stud and set the blade onto it like an airplane propeller. If one side falls, it’s heavier, and you have to file more metal off it. Keep filing until the blade stays level.

Reinstall the blade

• Reinstall the blade and screw in the bolt. Then wedge the 2×4 back in and tighten the bolt firmly with your socket and breaker bar.
  • Reinstall the blade and hand-tighten the bolt. Insert the 2×4 in the reverse direction so you can bear down on the breaker bar to tighten the bolt. It’s difficult to over-tighten the bolt. Mower sharpening pros say that the second most common mistake they see is under-tightening the bolt. A loose blade throws off the engine timing and sometimes makes the mower hard to start.

Do You Need a New Lawn Mower Blade?

Check Your Old Blade

• Examine your lawnmower blade when you remove it and look for the problems shown in the above photos. If you’re unsure of the condition of the lawnmower blade, take it to a hardware store or home center and compare it with a new one.

Buying a New Lawn Mower Blade

• Always replace your blade with an exact replacement blade, or the blade recommended in your owner’s manual.
  • Resist the temptation to convert your regular straight-blade mower to a fancier mulching mower by simply changing the blade. Your mower probably won’t work any differently than before, and it may not work as well. The mower deck on a straight- blade mower is shallow and has a side discharge to eject the grass clippings quickly. A mulching mower has a deeper deck without a side discharge; the grass is chopped three or four times before it drops to the ground. The mower design is as important as the blade.

Dedicate a Set of Tools

• To get in the habit of keeping your blade sharp, dedicate a set of tools for lawn mower blade sharpening only. Hang them nearby so they’re ready to go. And keep a second, sharp blade handy too. You can always slip it on and sharpen the dull one later.

Required Tools for this Lawnmower Blade Sharpening Project

Have the necessary tools for this DIY lawnmower blade sharpening project lined up before you start — you’ll save time and frustration.

• File
• Rags
• Socket/ratchet set
• Vise
• Spark plug socket
• Gloves
• WD-40 lubricant

Article source here: How to Sharpen Lawnmower Blades