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Gardening in the UK

Sharpening Shredder Blades

17 years ago

I've had an old ALKO 1300S electric shredder for about 15 years or more. During that time I must have put a mini-mountain of stuff though it, but the biggest difficult is sharpening the two blades. Until recently I've been using just two sets of blades throughout all that time, and have re-sharpened them on many occasions with a file.

Although I can get a good 'edge' on them, it's a laborious and slow process.

The current blades, as supplied by ALKO, are much harder than the older ones, and a file makes very little impression on them. Having said that, you should see the state of them after shredding a pile of hard Bramble stems!

One Lawnmower retailer told me that he supplies new blades to his customers instead of sharpening their old ones, amazing when you consider that they cost about Â£15 a pair these days.

Do any members re-sharpen their blades with a minimum of effort?

I was considering buying a shredder having a crushing mechanism rather than blades, but how are they at dealing with more softer material?

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Comments (4)

shrubs_n_bulbs
17 years ago
I sharpen my shredder blades because they are a pain to use when they are dull. I use a stone. Its still a fairly slow job.
mike_jw
Original Author
17 years ago
I fully agree 'shrubs_n_bulbs'. By 'stone', do you mean a hand stone or grindstone. The latter is undoubtable the best and quickest method. In the past I used to get them sharpened at my old workplace. They had a floor-standing 'Linisher', which was like a large belt-sander, but you had to stop every few seconds and dip the blades into cold water as they got to hot to hold. I tried to duplicate the method at home by using a small DIY belt-sander clamped upside-down to a bench. Although the belts were supposed to be for use on metal, it took just as long to sharpen them as it did by hand using a file.

The latest generation of ALKO blades have "carbonitrite steel blades for an extended service life", and I have come to the conclusion that they're most probably not intended to be re-sharpened. It would be interesting to see if a powered grindstone would be successful on these!

Unfortunately the older 'softer' steel blades are no longer available - that's progress for you!
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shrubs_n_bulbs
17 years ago
I use a handstone because I don't have a mechanised grindstone, although a stone holder and appropriate angle clamp makes the whole thing much more acceptable.

carbonitrite steel blades

I sometimes think they make up these silly things on purpose! I think you can sharpen carbonitride steel blades, except for the one obvious problem that they are so hard you would rapidly destroy most sharpening materials.
Louise Gomez SS4
12 years ago
We are are sharpenening company...I am interested in your posting, obviously! Are the blades flat and are they removable from the machine? If so, we can probably do them for you. Yes they are hard metal and we have the waterstones to complete such a job. We also sharpen shears, secatuers and fat ower blades to a razor sharp finish. Just let me know. x x Louise

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