grade stakes

[Peter Drouin]

Is the Hud-Son gas powered grade stake sharpener any good??   1" -11/2".  Thanks Pete

[bandmiller2]

Pete, I guess no one here has one. Hud-son is in upstate NY I'd grab a armfull of stakes and make a road trip to try it.Looking at it you should be able to tell if it will hold up and how much trouble to resharpen it. They usally show up at the northeast loggers show. Frank C.

[Dave Shepard]

We have the electric unit. I find the frame is not very stiff, so you need to get it set up on solid ground, it will want to shift and get out of alignment, and the carriage will not slide smoothly. The carriage has adjustable parallel bars, as well as a tilting feature to adjust for different size stakes. If it were my machine, I'd toss that in the bushes and make a couple of fixtures with a piece of square tube that lines up in the right place, and you would just stick the stake through the tube as far as you need to go. You develop a feel for when the point is finished. The square tube keeps it aligned, and also keeps it from spinning in your hands. You would have to make a tube for each size of stake. The carriage provided is doing the same sort of thing with the two parallel tubes, you have to adjust them for different widths as well. If you are making a 1" stake, you would want a tube of maybe 1.125". It doesn't need to be tight, and will accommodate a little variation in stock dimensions. You could also put a little flare on the infeed side of the tube to make the stake blank go in faster. The carriage also comes with a Vise-Grip clamp, that takes too much time, the square hole fixture eliminates the need for clamping as well. It might take a couple of hours too modify the machine and make the fixtures, but changing them out would only be a couple of bolts. Are you reading this Hud-Son? You are welcome to use this idea, that carriage is a real pain.

[Dave Shepard]

I guess I should give my opinion of the machine unmodified. Once you get the machine set up on good footing, and get the carriage adjusted for the size stake you are making, it works well. You can put a point on a 4' stake every 7-10 seconds if you have your supply of blanks close and a bin or pallet with sides close by.

[Cedarman]

Do grade stakes need a 4 sided or round point or will a chisel point work?

[Peter Drouin]

So Dave you think there ok .just a little stiffening.thanks. does anyone have a different tool or machine that will do the same thing for a $1000 or less

[bill m]

A 4 sided or rounded point will help it drive in straighter.

[fred in montana]

I used to do a lot of surveying. Most of our stakes were 1x2 and were miter cut on two sides only. Worked fine.

The short oak hubs were 2x2 and had to be mitered on all 4 sides or sharpened round.

[Captain]

I HAD one and sold it to FF member Farmer Doug.  It was the gasoline powered one (6hp?)  It was OK.

Bought a 220 V home built rig from a fellow in Hudson, MA.  Fine pointer.  Just need to make a new custom knife for it before tomato stake season.

Captain

[bandmiller2]

Cappy, what does the actual cutter look like, is it the interior of a cone with a knife at the same angle as the outer wall.I wonder if you had a steel cone with one side milled away near the tip, cutter a stack of say 71/4" carbide saw blades on a mandral.You would push the stake in giving it a twist,with gloves of course. Frank C.

[Peter Drouin]

Well men I bought a Hud-son grade stake sharpener made in the USA . works great ,cuts as fast as you can move. now I have something to do with the side wood low grade stuff. A little more work with sharping but at 1.44 to 1.80 a B.F. not bad for the low grade junk. my first time with the stakes will see how it gos :D :D :D 8) 8)