How To Clean Your Circular Blades Without The Poisonous Fumes
Many woodworkers including myself and others I know tend to use commercial grade cleaner to remove the pitch on our saw blades. This works fine and dandy. It takes the gunk off of the blade and brings it back to its shiny original self.
However, if you look at the main ingredient in a lot of these products, it tends to be sodium hydroxide. I don’t know if you know anything about chemistry, but it is a caustic element. It can cause severe respiratory problems, nausea, dizziness etc. It is basically like inhaling paint fumes that kids use to get high. Since I picked up woodworking4home I have been tinkering with many old ways of woodworking. It has opened my eyes a lot such as cleaning my blades.
But with a little experimentation, there are many other items that can be found in your house hold appliances that will do the exact same job as these rancid, caustic, potentially harming products.
One such item is acetone. Acetone is the main ingredient in nail polish remover. It is also a caustic agent with some fumes. Not as bad as professional saw blade cleaner though. It does a good job of removing gunk.
Another is baking soda. Again baking soda is found in most house holds and is also non-toxic. This is fantastic, especially when you have little children around. Mix it with warm to hot water and let the blade soak. Ammonia, which is commonly used to clean kitchen floors as well as other things around the house has been found to work. Use warm water and let the blades soak. You can also use Easy Oven Cleaner. Just spray it on, let the blade sit, and proceed to wipe it off. If it can cut through all that gunk and stuff in your oven, then it will easily clean your circular blades. Anyways, hope you liked some of this advice and that it opened your mind to different ideas and new possibilities when it came to cleaning your circular blades.