When they came back there was only 5 blades,said one they coundn't do nothing with. I tried the resharp blades and they didn't cut or last any longer then what i can do. They didn't seem to be as sharp as the ones i sharpen. and these blades were sharpned by a big name company. i'm saying all this that you can sharpen blades just as good or better then a resharp company can.

I sharpen my own but can in no way do it as cheaply as a service can. Time is money.

Find a different service.

I can sharpen a blade a lot faster then having to roll them up,put them in a box and ship them off. Thats a lot of work and time spend for nothing,plus all the cost involved. The company I sent them to was highly recommended by everyone as one of the greatest resharp facilities.

Maybe if your just sharpening the tooth face but there is likely no way you can beat a machine that grinds the entire tooth profile AND gullet and then having to set. Its just not possibl when your having to address each tooth one at a time.

That could be true,but my blades cut better than theres after resharp, and then the money lost from spending on shipping and then add the cost of them resharping equels a loss and nothing gained. Maybe I just to picky when it comes to having something sharp.

Agreed that I also seem to get my blades sharper than new however I have never taken the time to compare my output with a group of blades Ive sharpened as compared to a group brand new blades. My guess is the new blades (equivalent to having blades sharpened), while they may be (or seem) a bit less sharp, may actually perform better for longer.

It may not seem like it, but just like sharpening anything, tooth/edge geometry and the accuracy of the set has a tremendous effect on performance and the life of the cutting edge. Just like a chisel, you can sharpen it to a razor edge which will be very sharp but very fragile or you can sacrifice a bit of edge for a stronger cutting edge that will hold much longer. Hook angle could be slightly steeper when you sharpen your own, who knows. Accurate setting (I know my set is not as accurate as a new blade) also has a major effect in that some teeth will be working harder while others not at all.

My point is simply the same as always, even if your blades are "slightly" less sharp, which Im sure is an issue you can work out with your sharpening service, if you apply $25-$35 per hour to the time you have invested in making the sharpener, and the setter, and the time you have invested in standing there sharpening blade (at which time, no logs are being sawn), the sharpening service is likely still the smarter choice give that you have to address each tooth one at a time. Its a very slow process.

This of course all only applies if your looking at your work for profit as opposed to a hobby where you devalue your labor to zero.

My blades cut better lumber and last longer and I can cut faster. I have no idea what the difference is on theirs verse mine, I sharpen blades when there are no logs to cut, in my spare time. The sharpener and setter might of took maybe 4 hours to build,so at 25 dollars an hour thats $100. Shipping and cost of sharpening was about 14 dollars each,not counting the time I had to spend packaging the blades and shipping off,and the time waiting then I had to un-package them. So I would add an hours worth of work packing and un-packing to the cost of resharp. Also most of the time I resharp my blades right on the mill so I'm not wasting time taking the blade off and then time put the blade back on. Also if you have to send blades off to resharp you have to have a bigger inventory of blades.

"I sharpen blades when there are no logs to cut, in my spare time"

The hobby/business factor. In business there is no spare time. All hours are billable.

And again, your not comparing apples to apples. Sharpening your blades on the mill is an unfair comparison to removing the blades, possibly having to clean them, set, then sharpen. Its a difference anyone would know before they even sent off to a sharpening service so its a "rigged" comparison. Sitting and touching up a blade with a dremel or a grinder on the mill is not re-sharpening. Its perfectly fine to do but its not a valid comparison to what happens to a blade sent off for sharpening.

I regularly time my own sharpening because its a process I find obnoxious and would much rather avoid. That said I have an automatic sharpener so I load the blade and walk away and either clean/set the next blade, clean the shop, do something else, while the blade is being sharpened. That said, at my fastest, I can fully set and sharpen about 5 blades an hour MAX. Only 4+ will come off the sharpener but several extras will already be set and clean ready to go. At $50/hr (my lowest shop rate) thats $10 per blade plus the cost of consumables and my investment in the sharpener. With that I am slightly (and I mean slightly) ahead of sending them out for sharpening. I dont doubt for a minute that I could find a sharpening service that would sharpen my blades to my satisfaction.

Anyone can choose to do anything they wish, but in my business there is no "spare time". If I am working in my business I am damn sure going to be paid for it. All hours are billable hours. The concept of "spare time" is a slippery slope. Its like thinking just because you got through a month and paid your bills your "making money".

I believe sharpening on the mill is a fair comparison. I may not set the teeth,but the blade will cut without making waves in the lumber plus you can get back up to speed on cutting... As for the "spare time",it all depends on how efficient you are doing what ever you are doing. One people might be able to do something in an hour while another person will take 2 hours or more. I'm not sure how long the person charging twice as much will stay in business on billing by the hour. I've had a few jobs in my life that I was paid by the hour, and I had ''spare time'' then. I understand there is 480 minutes in an 8 hour day,but most people don't work efficient all those minutes. As Bill Gates dad would ask his son Bill,''what are you doing'?'' Bill would reply,''I'm thinking''. My point is that ''spar time'' can make a person rich is they are using their spark time wisely.

Sharpening on the mill is in no way a fair comparison. That would be like saying that I can sharpen a $200 14" carbide ATB saw blade on the saw just as effectively with a dremel tool and a diamond bit from home depot as compared to a professional sharpening service with a computerized sharpener. Its simply not possible.

Can I sit at a TV tray in front of the television at night while Im munching on some cheetos and "re-touch" a blade with a dremel? Sure can. But its in no way the same as having the blade professionally sharpened.

There is one immutable fact. When people do things themselves, build their own gadgets and gee gaws, they make great accommodations (excuses) for the short comings of their end product. We all do it. They can often live in a world of delusion thinking that they saved a fortune, or that it didnt really cost them anything because they had this stuff laying around, or it really doesnt matter because "all that was just scraps anyway". All the while it cost them ten fold in time and energy and they worked for pennies on the dollar for something that will require endless tending and tweaking and live a very short life.

Its still good work but the simple fact is, you can not build a truck for what you can buy one for right?. To think you could, and be profitable, would require you to lie to yourself about the countless hours, trips to the store, fuel, time, research, ancillary equipment, and so on, that we conveniently leave out of the mathematics of what it actually cost. Not to mention that the truck would require endless repairs, be broken down, need to be tweaked, would only be able to be driven by one driver who knows all the problems and work arounds, and so on. "oh, dont look at that, you gotta pull this lever, shove over here, hit this with a hammer, then it'll start".

Its not to say its a waste of time but when it comes time to compete on the open market, and your forced to compete apples for apples, it gets far more difficult.

It would be like you selling your oak shingles. In the time it takes you to shove your screwdriver wedge in to tilt the cant, a shingle mill has made a dozen shingles or more. Forget about the issues of red oak vs. cedar (I know some were chestnut oak which would have been a wiser choice for them all).

The point is whether or not you will think your red oak shingles are #1 viable, and #2 that you can make them _cheaper_ than a shingle mill because they are made from scrap or whatever. The simple fact is you cant. They need to be marketed to a clientele who want shingles made one at a time and are willing to pay 5-10 times the cost of anything available on the commercial market because thats what it will cost you to make them.

As always, Im not trying to poo poo your work ethic or enthusiasm.

Same thing as always, when you add up all your time and expenses honestly (without lying to yourself) it will often work out to be far less savings than you want to believe.

You are right about building a truck. The reason I wouldn't build a truck is because they are plentiful. Bandsaw mills are not as plentiful. I live in West Virginia and all the hills are covered in trees. I've never seen a bandmill on the road or many ads for one. Those people who built there own sawmill are the people who are they ones people buy there sawmills from. Its all back around on how you are able to accomplish the build. I built my sawmill and their is no way I would of been able to buy one that is comparable. I've worked in a lot of machine shops that the owner would go to an auction,buy a bunch of junk and we would build a machine to do what needed to be done. This guy I worked for became very rich off of junk machines. His shop machined piston rings for GM. But in the end as long as your making a profit how ever you do it then you are doing something right. Here in WV most of these sawmills that are still in bussinss are made from junk cutting millions of feet a year. But I can also understand that many people can not build things so they are left from buying from someone who can.

I am in WV as well and there are no sawmills in WV that are sawing millions of feet a year that are made from scrap my friend. Its simply not true.

The days of someone making a fortune with an old cobbled together frick mill are gone. Production mills in this state that are sawing for national companies like Bruce Hardwood Flooring are struggling to stay alive.

Your lying to yourself if you thing cobbling together parts is going to make you rich. Its just the opposite. You have to be smart.

I own and manage a large lot of timber and there is simply no way you cant do it on a small scale unless your able to cater to a very high end client. The costs are simply to high. Making picnic tables that will fall apart in a couple years aint gonna get ya there.

If you are single with no children, sure, you can make a few bucks for your food and a case of beer and go on. If you have a wife with a good job, that helps. If you have a wife AND children, who all need food, clothing, school and college money, health care and insurance, your nuts.

Im lucky in that I have no children and all my equipment, tooling, land, is paid for. If you have a wife and children, your insane.

Check out Pierson Lumber Co in Clay sometime. When there mill burn down a while back they instarlled Corley sawmill. I worked at a place that was called NATCO that most of their machines were made from junk.Google them and you might be supriesd at what they built I remember some of there machines were from 1920's. I have children and I've never had healthcare for me or my family. I've never been to a doctor in over 50 years so that point is moot, Your reasoning on shingle is moot also because I'm not trying to be a high production opertion with all their overhead they have to invest. I'm into custom work,kind of like art work. I know a guy right now who was cutting 10,000 feet a day of pallet cants on an old hand set frick. I never worked in a machine shop that had a bunch of new machines. But I understand about what you mean about production,and I have no plans of going that route. I'll leave that to those people like in places like China.I also understand that human labor is becoming to expensive,and the more you can replace human labor with a machine the more profit there could be, For example people can use simple apps that now have replaced many accountants. Then all the robots in manufacturing. CNC machines are a thing of the past now days. Back in the 80's I remember CNC machines needed someone to progam the machine. Now the machine can progam itself and doesn't need a room full of CNC computer progamers. So after 65 years I still getting by and happy with my life which means more then anything.

I don't know if you heard that Coastal lumber closed all their mills and sold off all there mills in WV. The link below from 2011 says this'' Coastal Lumber Co. said Tuesday that it was going out of business, laying off more than 350 people in West Virginia and three other states.''

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