Hair / dog clippers

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deruitem

Joined
Oct 30, 2010
Messages
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has anyone had much sucess working with clippers. I started a knife sharpening business and have had severals ask me to do clippers. I have not tried it yet but it seems like it would not be that hard. Anyone have suggestions? I have an edgepro and several stones for free hand work
 
yea that style is what im looking to sharpen. I have seen a few videos on youtube about it, doesnt mean it realy works though
 
Yep....Just lap the flat side on your finest stone. Works great!
I do it every few months, back to new.
 
If you are going to sharpen clipper blades for dog groomers, don't do it with out the right equipment. I sharpen for a living and groomers are my bread and butter.
My clipper blade machine cost $1600.00 and I have another $500.00 in the other tools that it takes to do it right. Groomer blades are hollow ground for both the cutter and comb blade, the springs have to be at the right tension and the blades have to have the right amount of set back. Personal blades are hollow ground for the cutter blade and the comb blade is flat ground.
When I do a groomer I get anywhere form 10 to 40 blades at a time at $5.00 each. As someone starting a sharpening business you don't want people bad mouthing you for screwing up $1000.00 worth of blades ($25.00 ea new x 40), they say that people talk more about a bad job done than a good job done.
I'd be glad to help if you need to know more.
Joe
 
Joe is correct.
You can lap the blades a few times, but eventually they will need to be reground.
 
Bill DeShivs said:
Joe is correct.
You can lap the blades a few times, but eventually they will need to be reground.
Click to expand...

I have been doing this for the last 5yrs..Not sure what you are talking about, but I have done it more than a few times ;)
 
Thanks everyone, I told her that I would attempt a pair and to give me an old one that she would just trash if she couldnt get it sharp. Of course I told her it would be my first attempt and I would do it for free this time. We will see how it goes, I suspect that I am going to have to wait until I can make the investment on some equipment. Maybe this will get her to let me do her cutlery though! That I know how to do
 
If *I* were you, I'd find someone else in your area that can do the clippers for you at a discounted rate. That way the customer is still yours, and eventually maybe you'll have the equipment to do it right.
 
deruitem said:
Thanks everyone, I told her that I would attempt a pair and to give me an old one that she would just trash if she couldnt get it sharp. Of course I told her it would be my first attempt and I would do it for free this time. We will see how it goes, I suspect that I am going to have to wait until I can make the investment on some equipment. Maybe this will get her to let me do her cutlery though! That I know how to do
Click to expand...

Good luck in finding the proper way to sharpen those blades, I had the same situation about a year ago. I thought what I was doing was sharpening the blades but after two go's and no improvement I decided to only do her scissors, but that can get complex too because some scissors are convex sharpened.

I could never get the info on how to properly sharpen clipper blades so if anyone (J Crowder) would like to give away the secret that would be great. Or at least tell why flat grinding the clipper blade on a bench stone did nothing.
 
The blades actually have a slight hollow grind to them. If you take that out the clippers don't work all that well.
 
No big secret, just the right equipment, training and screwing-up your stuff while you figure things out before you work on other peoples stuff.
My machine is from Nebraska Blades, it has a 16" alum. plate with a .11 taper turning at 1700rpm. When you oil the plate and dust with alum oxide grit it acts like sandpaper. You put the blade on the plate and move from the inside to the outside and back a few times. The taper gives the hollow grind.
With dog hair being thicker and more corse than human, groomer blades must be hollow ground. With it being hollow ground the teeth act like scissors in the way they cross each other with a "set" or x pattern like scissors. The spring pressure has to be right, not enough pressure and the blades will not cut right, they kind of skip over each other. These are the clipper blades that are easy to take off.
Personal clippers (the ones with the blades screwed on) don't have to do the work of groomer clippers so you can get away with flat grinding the blades, but if I hollow grind the cutter blades and flat grind the comb blades they will go 2 to 3 times longer before they need resharpening.
Hope this helps.
Joe
 
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