Sharpening little razor saws

[John C Cox]

Hey guys,

I tend to use razor saws a fair amount on my hobby guitar work... These saws are typically cheap throw away sort of things... But - I would like to get the most out of them when I do use them...

I did give one a quick try - 1 pass on each tooth with an itty bitty teeny file and it cut about 3x faster.. But these always seem to cut a bit crooked from the factory.. And I would like to be able to tune them up..

What sort of sharpening and tooth setting would you recommend for one of these super fine cut razor saws like a Zona or XActo? They generally run around 25tpi and maybe 0.010" or 0.015" kerf..

Thanks

[Mike Baker 2]

I would not want to try sharpening 25tpi, nor setting the kerf on such tiny teeth. I cannot see how it would be possible. Particularly with Zona and Exacto razor saws. But I bet someone here has either done it or tried it. Would love to know myself.

[Ted Phillips]

The teeth on these saws tends to be hardened. If you try sharpening them, a couple of bad things could happen. First, you might break off the tooth, since it is hard and relatively brittle. Second, if you file away the hardened part of the tooth, you will expose the relatively soft steel underneath - which won't stay sharp very long at all.

TedP

[bridger berdel]

You're going to need to scale the tools down and use magnification. One of those magnifier lamps or optivisors should do ya. Needle files. A miniature of the slot-in-a-board saw vise, held in a vise. For setting teeth perhaps a tiny nailset and a tiny hammer on a chunk of hardwood. Otherwise it'll be pretty standard saw doctoring i bet.