Reel Mower Sharpening Kit
The Reel Mower Sharpening Kit is an easy do it yourself way to get your old reel mower to cut like its brand new. This sharpening kit is exclusively designed for reel Mowers from Scotts, American Lawn Mower, Great States, and Earthwise. Contains crank handle, sharpening compound, application brush and full color instruction manual with easy to follow color photos.
Sharpen a Push Reel Mower
Easier than it looks.- basically reverse the rotation and lap with a grinding compound
Here is a video of the mower cutting grass once it is all sharp.
I recently bought a Fiskar push reel mower and it is great:
Step 1: Basics
A push reel mower is like scissors, except one blade is fixed and the other blade is on a reel.
Step 8: Push the Mower Backwards
Pushing the mower backwards will now sharpen the blades. Push the mower until it the reel is moving easily, then adjust the screws on the fixed blade so that it is is hard to push the mower. Now push the mower until it is easy, again. You want to repeat this until the blades are shiny all the way across.
As the blade gets sharper you can start to wash off the grit with water. This makes the blade easier to turn. You also want all the grinding compound to be gone by the time you are done.
Step 11: Take Off the Wheels, Again
Put the gears back on the correct sides. So that the mower will go forwards.
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Комментарии и мнения владельцев
Thank you so much! Revitalized a free-bee mower. 🙂
Couldn’t be bothered changing the gears so reverse rotated it by hand. Did end up with a lot of grinding compound on my hands as I spun it. Worked brilliantly. Now I have sharp blades and got such smooth exfoliated hands too. Double win.
Thanks Marc, great instructable. I wasn’t able to get the wheels off to change the gears around, but even rotating the reel backwards by hand was enough to sharpen things up nicely. Makes mowing the lawn a pleasure again. And the grinding paste worked great on my grass shears as well. Thanks for sharing your knowledge.
Just wonder should the pin be swaped too. How are the pins to be positioned? Can you illustrate further with photos or scatches. Thanks.
I just swapped the gears and didnt touch the pins. I had no problems.
Maybe different models require the pins to be turned. it didn’t work for me until I turned the pins over so the squared edges and curved edges went in the opposite direction from usual. Then I switched them back when I put the gears back in the correct wheels.
I used this method today on my 5 yard sale reel mower and it worked! The only thing I found in the instructions that was not clear was that the pins have to be turned over so that the straight edges catch the gears correctly when you switch them back and forth between sides. The ends of the pins are curved on one side and squared on the other and this does matter. In my first attempt, I didn’t notice this detail (and although there is a picture in Step 4, it is not explained) and the blades would not turn at all. Then I disassembled the wheels again and noticed that the pins were not squared on all edges. that was my “aha moment”. I went on to complete the project and then mowed my lawn with great satisfaction.
Very useful instructable, Marc. Thank you!
Reviving this, because it certainly was helpful to me and only for the price of valve grinding compound!
Step 6:I would simply add: The screws that adjust the fixed blade towards the curved ones work in concert; you loosen one while tightening the other other.
Try to keep the same adjustments for both sides so that you keep your fixed blade parallel and grinding the curved blades evenly.
When you say make it so the blades are going in the wrong way, do you just flip the lawn mower over a push it?? Not sure.
You have to flip the gears to the opposit side so you can push it backwards.
My reel mower is older and the blade wheel can move forward of backward. So in theory do you agree I can just spin the pup backwards? I am not worried but for the life of me I see no difference. Thanks.
Hey this can be much easier I think. My 1940’s reel mower spins forward and spins backwards so QUESTION: Can I apply the compound and let her spin backwards? How many minutes is normal? Thanks.
I sharpened my recently restored Craftsman with the blade and gears swapped and tan it bacwards. You can actually feel tge blade moving more and mo r e freely. I purchased a reel mower sharpening kit with the grit in a jar. That old mower cuts grass like scissors now. Once it got sharpened i tightened it a bit more and added more grit to take off more uneven wear due to heavy rust for so many years. So I did this process twice. Switched tge gears and flipped the blade back around and replaced the tires and tried it out on Newspaper. It sliced the paper without ripping on evety area I tried. The mower cuts even thick patches of grass with ease.
Suzie, where did you purchase your sharpening grit in a jar.
Going to try this this evening as the closest reel mower sharpening place is 35 minutes away charges per blade. :(. Will let you know the results. 😉
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