billstuewe
ArboristSite Operative
There are a number of devices out there to file the rakers down but I have settled on using my chain grinder and for years have used feeler gauges to measure the raker depth below the tops of the nearest two teeth. A couple of weeks ago I made this Shop Built tool to do this job for me fast and accurately. I am a pack rat for keeping junk that is "too good to throw away". A friend had given me a very expensive looking digital micrometer but with no way to use it without making a jig of some sort to hold it--so it sat in my junk drawer for a couple of years. The same guy (a bigger junk collector than me but with less space) also had given me some sort of small aluminum press. I took it apart, modified it, re-drilled and tapped a hole for the the threads in the bottom of the micrometer, made a plate to straddle two saw teeth and presto I had a raker depth measuring micrometer. Notice that the gullet is .280 and the raker depth is 0.0270 on the micrometer. Very close enough to the 10% ideal. I have used my wixey angle box to measure the angle like BobL does but find that problematic because the slop of the front of the raker effects the angle and has nothing to do with the height. Plus my grinder running makes the wixey go mad so I have to shut off and wait for the grinder wheel to spin down to get the measurement. This works great.
Just about any micrometer will do--digital or dial--that has a way of attaching it to the saddle and the saddle could be made of wood. The point at the bottom must also be flat. This micrometer had a rounded one so I searched my can of bolts and found a small, large headed one that would thread into the micrometer base and sanded the slot out of the head to make it flat.
Just about any micrometer will do--digital or dial--that has a way of attaching it to the saddle and the saddle could be made of wood. The point at the bottom must also be flat. This micrometer had a rounded one so I searched my can of bolts and found a small, large headed one that would thread into the micrometer base and sanded the slot out of the head to make it flat.
