reel mower sharpening?

[Benjamin DayParticipant @benjaminday94198]

hi all, has anybody attempted using a lathe to sharpen a reel (cylinder) type lawn mower? im working on two at the moment, one Atco 17″ deluxe petrol and t’other is a Suffolk super swift manual push along. I’ve so far tried “back lapping”using valve grinding paste (coarse then fine) and a power drill with limited success. well limited success with the manual mower and no “reel” difference on the petrol one! And even with the push along in order for it to cut, i need to adjust the reel way too close to the bed knife, which causes friction, and ultimately jamming the reel up! i do love these mowers, both well older than myself and would love to use them properly…..but only if they can be made to perform as im told they once did!
Well any help, suggestions, nostalgia welcome thanks alot!

[Benjamin DayParticipant @benjaminday94198]

[Michael GilliganParticipant @michaelgilligan61133]

Many years ago; in my innocence, I bought a secondhand lathe that had previously been used for mower blade sharpening.

Over its working length the bed was nearly 15 thou' concave.

Harsh lesson learned

MichaelG.

[Jeff DaymanParticipant @jeffdayman43397]

If you enquire at a golf club the groundskeeper may tell you where they get their greens mowers sharpened. Be prepared for a shock to your wallet. There are a few people near me doing this type of specialty reel mower sharpening and they do a great job, and the sharp state lasts a long time, but naturally you have to pay for a professional's time and equipment.

[Maurice Cox 1Participant @mauricecox1]

My wife used to work in a very comprehensive iron mongers' shop in Marlow, sadly, long gone. They had a department that just repaired mowers. It contained a machine to regrind the cylinders. It closely resembled a lathe, the cylinder being held between centres rotating"front upwards" i.e. contrary to normal lathe practice. On the front was a carriage with auto traverse, mounted upon which was a motorised grinding wheel about 2 1/2" across the face and about 5" diameter.It was rotating against the rotation of the cylinder. It would go back and forth for a while until the noise reduced indicating there was not much to grind, and then the operator turned a handle to put more cut on and so on, until you could hear that all the blades were being ground; quick visual inspection, job done. By contrast, the fixed blade was just resharpened on a bench grinder! The machine was installed in a corrugated iron building. If the mower was in a bit of a state, the prolonged did in made nearly drove the staff in there mad. The principal mower man had had many years of repairing mowers, and said that most people adjusted the bottom blade much too close to the cylinder. They aimed at cutting a piece of paper with the mower; he said that cutting a cigaret packet a better target.

[John RuddParticipant @johnrudd16576]

I personally haven't done it, but seen it done in our workshop….

The Mechanical Engineer did it, betwen centres on a large Colchester using a tp grinder….a slowish rotational speed and travel….

[Benjamin DayParticipant @benjaminday94198]

15 thou over the bed! lots of grinding, and no clean up perhaps? hopefully I could sharpen just one or two cylinders without that kinda damage!? i had spoken to a few golfy types “in the know” about these things and the prices tossed around in those conversations for this kind of job were…..prohibative! and know one knew any details about the mystereous sharpening machine lol…..I was thinking along the lines of John’s suggestion… putting it between centres and using some hand knitted tp grinder but wasn’t sure if I was missing some clearance angle or some other mystical geometry! would I even need a tool post grinder? maybe clamping a sharpening stone to the top or cross slide? may take longer but should have the same effect? Or am i about to win a darwin award? remember im not wanting to start a new business hear, just a one-time(maybe two) regrind!
Thanks so much for the responses…..does anyone actually use one on the lawn at home?

[Rik ShawParticipant @rikshaw]

I have sharpened many cylindrical mower blades mainly on night shift and in the quiet hours but I did 'em all between centres on a variety of universal grinders. Foremen, supervisors and managers being my best "customers" I always turned down the odd ten bob or so as it ensured a look the other way when I wanted a "homer" doing!

I've never tried sharpening them on a lathe though (not a lot of point if a grinder was available). Bottom blades I did on something like a Cincinnatti T&C grinder using a universal tilting vice and a white cup wheel.

I have to admit though, I never heard of them described as "reel" until I read this thread.

Rik

Edited By Rik Shaw on 16/07/2018 17:41:14

[John MCParticipant @johnmc39344]

Many years ago a neighbour wanted to sharpen his cylinder mower. He asked me to drill some holes in a file and remove the tang so he could bolt it in place of the mowers fixed blade. It worked very well, sharpened the cylinder blades once a year for many years.

I have also seen the cylinder blades from a "Dennis" mower sharpened in a lathe by normal turning, the blades not being very hard a HSS tool coped well.

John

[Benjamin DayParticipant @benjaminday94198]

yeah, i guess if you have access to a proper machine for the job, why would you even think about other make-do methods! just so i know, is the cutting paper thing something to aim for? I just cant get it to cut with the recommended clearance between cylinder and bedknife…
have to have them touchinh/scraping!
Ive heared them called reel mowers, cylinder mowers, cassette mowers, greens mowers, even english mowers….

[richardandtracyParticipant @richardandtracy]

A good few years ago I used a different brute ignorance & force method that actually worked rather well. I put an aluminium extrusion over the knife, and glued green grit paper to the extrusion, adjusted the mower to just touch the paper, ran it for a few seconds, adjusted the knife again and so on until the reel was all ground. Probably wouldn't work with big nicks out of the reel, but outherwise wasn't bad at all.

Regards

Richard.

[Alan JacksonParticipant @alanjackson47790]

Years ago I tried to sharpen my Dad's cylinder lawnmower. Well it took me all day to dismantle it then place it on my old lathe to skim the cylinder and reassemble it. Eventually I devised a thin sheet of metal the width of the cylinder clamped to one of the cross bars that space out the bearing end plates. On the other end of the metal sheet I clamped a parallel, oval shaped sharpening stone that was used for sharpening scythes etc. The plate assembly was pushed up to the cylinder so that the sheet metal acted as a spring. Then by dragging the lawnmower backwards it sharpened the cylinder. This worked very well and I sharpened quite a few lawnmowers. I even thought about making and selling them but rotary blade mowers were becoming the thing. This way saved dismantling and reassembling the whole mower.

Alan

Edited By Alan Jackson on 16/07/2018 18:11:29

[Dennis DParticipant @dennisd]

Looks like someone had the same idea as Alan **LINK**

I had one years ago when I had a petrol mower.

[Benjamin DayParticipant @benjaminday94198]

that’s a good point John MC the blades are un-hardened, a hss tool would cut, but how sharp would the edges be? how sharp do they even need to be!?

[JonParticipant @jon]

They have been around for 37 years to my knowledge the link above.
Tried carborundum nosing from work bolted to cutter, didnt work same as revolving the cylinder in a lathe you have no relief just ok for touch ups.

Proper job on a Suffolk Colt 14" in 1989 was £35 ex works and self fit etc.

[larry phelan 1Participant @larryphelan1]

Buy a goat,simple,cheap and you can even sell the milk !

Might need to be careful with the washing though !

[Mike PooleParticipant @mikepoole82104]

Are the blades just ground as a cylinder or do you use a tooth rest and grind a clearance?

Mike

[Benjamin DayParticipant @benjaminday94198]

+1 for getting a goat 😀

[Benjamin DayParticipant @benjaminday94198]

+1 for getting a goat 😀

[Benjamin DayParticipant @benjaminday94198]

I was wondering about clearances….what is a tooth rest? what clearance grind is recommended? I can find people mention it, but cant find any detail

[alan-lloydParticipant @alan-lloyd]

I worked for a horticultural engineering firm on golf club mowers, to do it properly takes many passes of the grinding wheel until it stops grinding, you don't want the burr on the leading edge. the bottom blade will need to be sharpened at an angle so its cutting on its leading edge and like a previous poster said they actually should not touch. Funny enough the machines are made by a company called Burnard

[Adam MaraParticipant @adammara]

Posted by Maurice on 16/07/2018 16:50:09:

My wife used to work in a very comprehensive iron mongers' shop in Marlow, sadly, long gone. They had a department that just repaired mowers. It contained a machine to regrind the cylinders. It closely resembled a lathe, the cylinder being held between centres rotating"front upwards" i.e. contrary to normal lathe practice. On the front was a carriage with auto traverse, mounted upon which was a motorised grinding wheel about 2 1/2" across the face and about 5" diameter.It was rotating against the rotation of the cylinder. It would go back and forth for a while until the noise reduced indicating there was not much to grind, and then the operator turned a handle to put more cut on and so on, until you could hear that all the blades were being ground; quick visual inspection, job done. By contrast, the fixed blade was just resharpened on a bench grinder! The machine was installed in a corrugated iron building. If the mower was in a bit of a state, the prolonged did in made nearly drove the staff in there mad. The principal mower man had had many years of repairing mowers, and said that most people adjusted the bottom blade much too close to the cylinder. They aimed at cutting a piece of paper with the mower; he said that cutting a cigaret packet a better target.

It sounds like a Garfitts Speedy 17 lawn mower cylinder sharpener. I Used one several years in the 60's and 70's, as for the machine with the concave bed, It could have been the old one we sold when we got the Speedy 17, it was rubbish!

[Adrian GilesParticipant @adriangiles39248]

A proper cylinder grinding machine can be very expensive, the one our firm installed about ten years ago cost in the region of 25K! It was capable of sharpening cylinders from 12” up to 40” and some cylinders could be sharpened ‘in-situ’, I.e. still in the body of the mower rather than stripped out. However the cost of sharpening a bare cylinder wasn’t expensive, we used to charge around the £2.00 per inch, so a 12” cylinder was £24.00. Bottom blades were ground straight and true on a special grinder like a surface grinder, providing there was enough meat left to allow adjustments when reassembled, otherwise a new blade would be fitted. Adjusting a domestic cylinder mower to the bottom blade was usually done using fax paper or fine copy paper. Fine cutting cylinders like golf green mowers would always be backlapped against the bottom blade before final adjustment. This involved rotating the cylinder backwards to normal direction, using carborundum paste, (like valve grinding paste) coarse first, progressively finer until the cylinder just purred against the blade, this gave the cylinder and blade a super smooth sharp edge that would give a very fine finish. Again, clearance was using fine fax paper or similar. On other machines like gang mowers where grass volume would cause a problem with bottom blade clearance, fag packet cardboard was the order of the day!

[Bill PudneyParticipant @billpudney37759]

Where I used to work (British Hovercraft Corp) in the 60s, there was a specially set up lawn mower grinding facility!! It was a recognised "spot" for an apprentice. The apprentice had other stuff to do of course, but it was there none the less!! Once again, how times have changed!!

cheers

Bill

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