Restore a Vintage Handsaw for Everyday Use

The first step is to find an old saw. Look for something with a nice comfortable-looking handle with no obvious breaks or missing parts. A good handle, like the one on this saw, won't look blocky or have any sharp arises on the grip. The more detailed and refined-looking the better.

A little surface rust is OK but look out for any pitting, especially near the tooth line. Anything worse off than the saw in this guide is probably best left as restaurant decoration, unless it's a family heirloom of course.

Look down along the tooth line to see how straight the blade is. A shallow curve in one direction is OK. Even a slight "S" curve in the blade is fine. What you want to avoid is a sharp bend or kink in the blade; these are virtually impossible to fix.

If you happen upon a very old saw with split nuts instead of the domed saw bolts like this saw has you may want to reconsider using it for this project. Check with the Disstonian Institute or Vintage Saws to make sure you don't have a valuable antique.

Carefully unscrew the saw bolts holding the handle to the saw plate.

Be very careful when you do this. If the threads are frozen the bolt may just start spinning freely all the way through the handle. Once it starts doing this it's very difficult to remove without damage.

WD-40, Liquid Wrench or other penetrating lubricants can be used if necessary.

To begin cleaning the handle first start with a flexible card scraper and scrape off all the dirt and old finish you can reach with it. It's much faster than sanding

After scraping, sand away the remaining dirty finish with 220-grit paper and then lightly sand the whole handle with 320-grit paper.

After scraping and sanding look for any cracks or breaks. If you find any, carefully bend the cracked area so the crack opens up a little - careful not to break it completely - and try to wick as much thin CA glue in as possible. When it's taken as much as it can, lightly clamp it closed and let it sit for at least an hour.

Once the glue has dried scrape and sand any glue off the of the surface of the wood.

Apply boiled linseed oil (BLO) to the handle. An old dried-out saw handle will soak up A LOT of oil so just keep wiping it on with a rag every few minutes. At first you'll actually be able to see the oil being sucked into the wood, especially the end grain. Once it stops soaking in fast enough to see it you can stop applying it.

Let the oil in the handle cure overnight before applying additional finish.

I like a shellac finish on my tool handles. Here's how I apply it. After the BLO has cured overnight rub in another light coat before shellacking the handle; it will help lubricate the shellac. Load up a rag with a few squirts of shellac from a squeeze bottle and start wiping it on the handle, with the grain. Take a swipe across the top, then another overlapping swipe below it, etc... until you reach the bottom. Go back to the top and repeat until the rag starts to stick. Take care to shellac the end grain as you go. Reload the rag and repeat on the other side.

Once the sides and end grain are done, do basically the same thing to the top and bottom only wait a few seconds between swipes to give the alcohol a chance to flash off.

Warning: Shellac uses denatured alcohol as a solvent which is highly flammable. Take all due care when handling it.

Warning: Rags soaked in BLO should be hung up or laid flat on a non-flammable surface to dry. BLO-soaked rags can spontaneously combust if left wadded up in a confined space due to the heat generated by the curing oil.

If your saw is less than about 1 1/2" wide at the toe you may want to consider trimming it back a few inches. Likewise if there is kink near the end or just heavy corrosion at the toe, cutting it off can be your best bet.

For this saw I trimmed it down to 21" at the tooth line because I needed a solid fast cutting panel saw in my collection.

If you need to cut down the saw for any reason a rotary tool with a cut off wheel is probably the best way to go. A metal-cutting bandsaw or jigsaw will work well too, but whatever you do don't try to use shears of any kind; they will warp the blade near the cut and make the saw useless.

After cutting round off the sharp corner with a file and generally clean up the cut area so it's smooth and nice-looking.

Time to work on the blade. Line your bench with newspapers or plastic before starting; this is messy.

The shape your saw is in when you start really determines how aggressive you have to be with the blade cleaning. The one in this guide was at the limit of what can be saved. Anything worse than this is probably beyond saving

First thing to do is check for an etch. A saw etch is a decorative maker's mark acid-etched into the blade. Usually it shows the company logo, the model number and some claims about the saw. They don't affect how the saw functions but they do look cool and are worth saving.

The etch is always found on the left side of the blade in the middle. Check this area by lightly sanding with #320 sandpaper and looking carefully at the metal in a low raking light after you wipe it clean. If any text or images jump out you've found the etch. Continue to carefully sand the area until you define the borders of the etch and then stop for now.

According to the etch this is a Hibbard, Spencer and Bartlett Company branded saw. HSB was a pretty well-known Chicago area hardware company in the early part of the 20th century. Much like Sears Craftsman, their house-branded tools were made by other big-name manufacturers. This saw was probably made by Disston for HSB.

Start by lubing up the blade with either mineral spirits, WD-40 or, if ventilation is an issue, Windex (yes, really).

The first weapon is a razor scraper to try and knock as much of flaking rust off as possible. Go nuts with this; just be careful not to scratch the blade and mind the etch.

When sanding use a piece of scrap wood as a make-shift sanding block. This will help you sand evenly along the blade. For this saw I had to actually start with #80 sand paper which is ridiculous. Normally after scraping #180 is the coarsest paper you'll use. Use firm but gentle pressure, keep the blade lubricated and wipe it clean with shop rags frequently to check for progress. The middle picture is how the blade should look when you're done with the #180 grit.

You can start sanding the etch area, with the sanding block, once you start with the #180 grit paper, just be careful and never sand just the etch. Always sand across the entire blade.

The last two pictures show how the whole blade and the etch should look when done with the #180 paper.

Keep sanding at higher grits up to #320ish. You can use the #320 to clean stubborn spots freehand.