After I posted my video on sharpening carbide tipped saw blades by hand, I had a lot of comments about what I used for cleaning the blade. I’ve always used straight lacquer thinner to remove the resin and gunk from my blade, just using a rag. Two problems with that method are that it’s not as efficient as it could be, with the rag flopping around. The second is that I would want to wear a nitrile glove to keep the thinner off of my hands as much as possible. So, I got to thinking about it and figured a quick way to make cleaning pads that would make the operation faster and also limit the skin contact from the solvent.

I started by drilling a 1″ hole into a piece of pine 2×2:

I could then cut it to length and round over two of the corners:

Then cut some pieces of material to form a pad and staple that onto the block:

After making two of these, it’s time to test it out. I soaked both pads with the thinner:

You can see the resin build-up on the side and top of the tooth:

A pad goes on my index finger and thumb and lets me pinch the blade, soaking the tooth. Then I just pull back toward me, scrubbing the gunk off.

Clean, and the best part is the blade didn’t have to be removed from the saw:

I made a video showing how they work:

Simple, fast and easy, just the way I like it!