Lawn Looking Ragged? Sharpen Mower Blades Easier And Faster With A Tool From Amazon

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If you go to the trouble of mowing your lawn regularly, it's more than disappointing to find it developing uneven lines and brown spots, and looking like someone mowed it with a weed whacker. The culprit is probably the lawn mower blade, which you need to sharpen at least twice in the mowing season — more often if you have a large or dense lawn. Amazon has an inexpensive tool that makes this easy. It's called the Sharpal 103N All-In-One Knife Garden Tool Multi-Sharpener, and it costs $21.99. This handy gadget will sharpen all the garden tools you use for cutting, including knives, axes, pruners, shears, scissors... and lawn mower blades. And thanks to its preset sharpening angle, it's easier to use than a file or grinder. 

It's a manual device that works exactly like your kitchen knife sharpener, honing the edge of a blade as you draw it along the edge. The Sharpal has an oversized plastic handle that's easy to grip when wearing gloves, and it has four different slots. One is for sharpening knives, one is for axes and machetes, one is for pruners and lawn mower blades, and one is for maintaining the edge on an already-sharp blade. 

If you're looking for the best dedicated lawn mower blade sharpener, this probably isn't it. A corded or cordless grinding tool is easier to use and will sharpen damaged blades faster and with more precision. The advantages of the Sharpal tool are that it's the only tool you need to sharpen all your blades, and it costs about half as much as a cordless tool. 

The grinder in the Sharpal tool is set at an angle that's optimum for most lawn mower blades, and if your blade is still relatively sharp, you can hone the edge without taking it off the mower. To do this, disable the mower by removing the spark plug or battery, turn it on its side (with the gas tank facing up to avoid spills), and run the tool along the edge of the blade several times as if you were sharpening a knife. Be sure to use the same number of strokes on each end to keep the blade balanced, because an unbalanced blade wears out the motor and cuts unevenly. 

If you don't sharpen the blade frequently, it will develop nicks and gouges, and to remove these, you should take the blade off the mower and put it in a vise for sharpening. Even if you have to do this, the Sharpal tool makes the job of safely sharpening your blade easier than using a file or grinder, because of the preset angle. Instead of aligning a file or grinder with the blade angle and maintaining the alignment, all you have to do is stroke the Sharpal along the blade. A key requisite to successful blade sharpening is a clean blade, and grass and other debris are easier to remove with a simple WD-40 trick: Just treat the blade and undercarriage with WD-40 whenever you sharpen the blade.