Chain Saw sharpening guide advice needed

[Mark Kuzee]

I am looking for a new (manual) guide for sharpening.

I am considering the Pferd

http://www.amazon.com/Pferd-Chain-Sharp-Filing-Guide/dp/B003M4LGPE

Does anyone have experience with this or other guides?

Any suggestions?

Thanks
mark

[Tom M King]

My guide is a strip of plywood with a bunch of lines at the proper angle drawn on it with a magic marker. I just lay it behind the bar while I'm sharpening. I have very similar ones for sharpening handsaws. With a chainsaw, rather than pushing down with the file like you would sharpening a handsaw, you push straight back into the tooth. For a chainsaw, I use one hand. I start the file with the smooth part of the end in place on the tooth, and use a full length stroke. Count strokes, and put the same number on each tooth. If you don't let the chain hit the dirt, three strokes is usually plenty for each tank of fuel. I like to whet at each fillup, rather than letting it get any duller past that. Even on a long bar, three strokes is not bad. Many more than that, and it's too much like work. That way, you also are always cutting with a sharp chain.

Even my guide is just to start with, or if you haven't sharpened one in a while, to make sure the angle is right. Pretty soon, you will start to see the correct angle, and not need the guide.

After half a dozen sharpenings or so, check to see that the drag teeth are not now too high. As the cutter gets sharpened, it angles down, so the bite from the top of a tooth to the drag tooth (depth gauge-everyone around here calls it the "drag tooth") gets closer after each sharpening. If it's not throwing good sized chunks of wood, and more like sawdust, most likely the drag teeth need to be lowered. Don't lower too much though, or it might take too big of a bite for the saw. They make little gauges to set on a tooth to check the depth gauge height by.

[Eduard Nemirovsky]

Mark don't forget to check if you need a 3/16" files for your chainsaw or other size needed - don't ask how I know:eek:
Ed.

[Jason Roehl]

Much to learn here:

http://www.madsens1.com/muu_barchain.htm

(http://www.madsens1.com/muu_barchain.htm)And probably one of the best reads on that page:

http://www.madsens1.com/bnc_cuttingvibration.htm

[Justin Ludwig]

Use the right size file. I just follow the lines on the chain with no guide. A little spin of the hand or wrist as I push. You'll know real quick if you don't follow the chain's premarked angle. My FIL sharpens a chain painstakingly slow using a guide. I have to walk away. I throw my chainsaw in a vice locked on the bar and knock it out. It's how I was taught.