Don't Oversharpen Your Lawn Mower Blades — Use An Affordable Tool From Amazon

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A dull lawn mower blade can often leave your grass looking rough, even if everything else is working properly. Instead of cleanly slicing through the grass, it tears it. Plus, it can leave the grass and lawn looking ragged, which takes longer to recover. That is where sharpening comes in, and fortunately, you do not even need an expensive bench grinder or another large tool to sharpen your lawn mower blades. You can do it with an affordable handheld tool like the SHARPAL 129N Multipurpose Garden Tool Blade Sharpener.

The tool is available for $13 on Amazon, and it measures 5 inches long and weighs around 30 grams. It is small enough to store in a small toolbox or carry in a pocket. There is a pen clip on the sharpener to hold it securely in place in case you want to keep it in your pocket. However, despite its small size, it features two sharpening surfaces: tungsten carbide and ceramic, and you can use it to sharpen other garden essential tools like shears, pruners, and knives as well.

Buyers seem to like the SHARPAL 129N Multipurpose Garden Tool Blade Sharpener, too. It has a 4.4-star rating from about 3,000 global reviews, with nearly 70% of the customers giving it a 5-star rating. The reviews on Amazon also consistently note that the sharpener is easy to use, small, portable, and versatile. However, not all reviews are positive. Nearly 7% of the buyers have given it 1-star ratings, too, with several buyers saying that it did not improve their blades as much as they expected and that working with it takes a lot of time.

Whenever you are sharpening a lawn mower blade, keep in mind that lawn mower blades do not need to be razor sharp to cut the grass properly. They only need to be as sharp as a butter knife, and oversharpening them is one of the biggest mistakes people often make when sharpening their lawn mower blades. Oversharpened blades dull faster, and they are also more prone to nicks and cracks. So, do not keep grinding away your lawn mower blade just because it does not feel like a knife. Also, when sharpening, use the tungsten carbide side first. It will help smooth out any dullness and nicks in the blade and is designed to remove metal quickly.

Then, once the edge of the blade feels smooth, you can turn to the ceramic side of the SHARPAL Blade Sharpener to remove any burr on the blade and give it a finishing touch. It is also important to note here that if your lawn mower blade is bent, badly nicked, or cracked, it is not worth sharpening, and you must replace it with a new blade. If you use a structurally compromised blade on a lawn mower, it can become a huge safety risk.

Lastly, do not put the blade back on the mower immediately after sharpening with the SHARPAL Blade Sharpener. Instead, balance it first. People often remove more metal from one side of the lawn mower blade during sharpening. This can leave the blade unbalanced, and when such a blade is put onto the lawn mower, it can cause vibrations, which will not only ruin the mowing experience but also shorten the lifespan of your mower.