Sharpening blades for customers - what cleaing tool to be used

[MobileSawMilSlo]

 Hi

Does someone know with what cleaning tool Woodmizer or other re-sharp services are using to clean customer blades before sharpening and setting?

Some say to soak it with diesel fuel for few hours, some are cleaning them with the metal brush ...

But I am sure WM or other big company are not using this technique 

In the USA you have apparently good product CMT 2050 but I would need something that can be affordable in for few gallons.

Thanks

[bandmiller2]

Unless your sharpening fee allows for the time spent cleaning I would leave it up to the bands owner. Any solution that will remove pitch will be messy and require drying. Frank C.

[terrifictimbersllc]

Not sure but think Woodmizer Resharp uses a tank with a proprietary cleaning liquid.

[tawilson]

Woodmizer has a machine dedicated to it. They don't offer it for sale. But in the sharpener manual they say: "When using a Wood-Mizer wash tank,  blades are run through a cycle that cleans,  deburrs, and washes the blade in solvent.  The wash cycle also includes a set of rollers to pinch the blades to flatten and equalise the set.  This allows for the blades to be properly set during the setting process."

[YellowHammer]

I've visited the Resharp in Newnan Ga.  They are very professional and well equipped, but as Tawilson said, the one thing they use that I've never seen them sell is their special wire brush auto feed band cleaning machine.

It looks like an automatic setter or sharpener, with autofeed, but instead of a setting or sharpening head, it has spinning wire brushes, and oil applied at the band, and the bands come out very clean, or as clean as they can be.  Very nice machine, and if I was going to get into it commercially, I'd try to get them to sell or make me one.

The one thing I remember is how nasty some of the bands were that they were being asked to resharpen.  Some looked like they had simply been thrown on the ground in a big pile for a long time, to rust.  Some looked like they had been tossed into a mud puddle.  Some looked good, but were black with pitch, that even the wire brushes had trouble scraping off.

Some had the teeth knocked off.

Their steps were:
Wire/solvent clean and downset.
Sharpen
Set
Sharpen again to square the teeth up.  

If x number of teeth didn't meet the setting spec, measured automatically, then they would reject the band.    

[tacks Y]

I bought a used wide belt sander and they had some pitch remover with it. It came in a gallon, spray on with a spray bottle let set 10 minutes and hose off. Works well on them, I will look to see what it is if you wish.

[terrifictimbersllc]

Wetting a band with diesel and letting it set awhile loosens a lot of crud to where it can just be wiped off.

Wetting with Industrial Purple cleaner and letting it set a few minutes is very effective, crud can just be sponged or hosed off after that stuff works for a few minutes.

Often thought I'd get a long plastic drywaller tray and put an inch of industrial purple in it to give an easy way to wet and rinse a band.  But I don't have enough of them needing this where I've done it yet. Could pour the cleaner back into a container if you wanted to.

The right size plastic swimming pool holding an inch or so of cleaner would be pretty effective, but not something you would want to leave unsupervised out of concern for children or wildlife.  

My go to method is to pull a band under a spinning cup brush pressed against a wood plate on a floor standing drill press.  Very fast.

But more lately I've been wiping bands off by hand as soon as I get home and hanging them up for resharpening. Most of them don't need much to get them clean.  

It is best not to let a bunch of dirty bands accumulate.

[Sixacresand]

I use a wire brush or scrape with a pocket knife if necessary.  Spraying with WD40 or wiping down with diesel helps.

[Chuck White]

I use a 2" wide putty knife, do one side then invert and do the other side, working over the corner of my sharpening bench! 

Always works best for me when the blade is due to come off the mill, flood with soap and water lube before removing!

[MobileSawMilSlo]

Thank you guys for good suggestion.

I found this cool and simple device:

How to Sharpen Bandsaw Blades - Wood-Mizer BMS500 - SE Metals - YouTube

[Crusarius]

Could use any of those solvents as the cutting fluid. They will offer a small amount of lubricant but will clean as you go. No sense adding extra steps if you can avoid it.