How to Balance Lawn Mower Blades? Detailed Guide

How to balance lawn mower blades is important to know if you want to maintain the quality of your lawn mower longer and give your lawn an even cut. A blade balancer is your best option.

This is another significant thing you should pay attention to aside from keeping it sharp and running smoothly if you want to save your lawn mower from easy wear and tear and keep your lawn evenly trimmed and tidy. Read on to discover the step-by-step process.

How To Balance Lawn Mower Blades?

To balance lawn mower blades, using a blade balancer is the best option. You can also identify if your lawn mower blades have the proper balance by using a balancer. An unbalanced blade commonly occurs when you shave or grind more metal off than the opposite side while sharpening.

Doing this procedure also saves your lawn mower from any other side effects brought about by the unbalanced blades. Refer to the following steps below to discover how to identify if your blades are unbalanced, what materials to prepare, and how to do it. So let’s start!

1. Identify if Your Lawn Mower Blades Need to be Balanced

It is important that you identify the problem with your lawn mower first because there are other factors that may cause this symptom to appear on your mower.

So to ensure that your lawn mower blades need balancing, look for unbalanced lawn mower blade symptoms like your lawn mower is not giving your grass a quality and even cut, as well as vibrating and making odd noises while running.

2. Prepare the Tools You Will Need

After making sure that the mower blade is problematic and is wasting your time by not helping you mow your lawn efficiently, you should probably be doing this next step: gathering all the materials.

To carry out the actual balancing of the lawn mower blades, here are the tools and equipment you will need:

• Safety eye goggles – It is recommended to use safety eye goggles with side protection while doing the repair to avoid mishaps, especially eye hazards.
• Cut-resistant gloves – You need this to maintain the safety of your hands from cut accidents.
• Steel wire brush – You will need this for cleaning your blades.
• Sharpening tool – Prepare this to sharpen the mower blade. You can use either a flat file or a grinder.
• Socket wrench – This is used for loosening or tightening nuts.
• Lawn mower blade balancer – A lawn mower blade balancer looks like a cone-shaped object made out of metal material that can accommodate different sizes of blade axis hole openings. However, if you don’t have one, you can either use a DIY lawn mower blade balancer, which we have covered below, or a magnetic lawn mower blade balancer.
• Lawn mower blade holder

3. Remove the Blades

The first thing you should do is detach the current blade of your lawn mower. Ensure safety by disconnecting the battery and spark plug first.

This will prevent your mower from starting by accident while you are doing the work. Tip-off your lawn mower on a flat surface. It is best if the carburetor is on the high side.

Try to rotate the blade using your hands, and observe whether the blade has flat and straight ends. If the mower blades are already bent, then you will need to buy a new one, if they are still straight, you can continue with the procedure. Hold the blade in place, and remove the bolt and the blade using a socket wrench.

4. Clean the Blades

Next, grab your steel wire brush, and clean off all the debris and rust that have accumulated on the mower blades. Having this dirt also affect the weight or balance of your blades, so it is essential to remove those thoroughly.

However, if you think your mower blades are already rusted, extremely bent, and beyond saving, it might be time to replace them with new ones.

5. Hang and Assess the Balance of the Blades

Now, set the newly cleaned blade on the lawn mower blade balancer using its center hole. Assess carefully to determine which side is heavier. If it sits on the balancer equally, then your blades are balanced. Meanwhile, the heavier side or the side that dips is the side you have to alter.

6. Sharpen the Blades

Using either an angle grinder or a flat file, sharpen the lawn mower blade to reduce the material on the heavier side. After sharpening, try to recheck the balance again using the lawn mower blade balancer, and continue to sharpen until it sits perfectly.

7. Reattach to the Mower

Before reattaching, make sure to clean off the blades again.

Bolt the blades back to the lawn mower, reconnect the battery and spark plug, and it’s ready to perform and help you with some of your lawn care and maintenance activities.

How Do You Balance a Lawn Mower Blade Without a Balancer?

If you don’t have a lawn mower blade balancer, remember that you can always be creative and use the tools that you have at hand around you. Here are the different ways to end your problem with balancing lawn mower blades.

– Nail in the Wall Method

This method is simple and easy to perform. You will just need a nail, and a hammer to pound the nail into the wall. Once done, set your mower blade using its center hole on the nail, and voila!

You have a DIY blade balancer. Now, you need to observe which side of the blade dips, meaning that is the heavier side that needs grinding.

– Pliers Method

In this method, you will need needle nose pliers. Hold it upright just like benchtop balancers. Place it through the center hole of the blade and see which side of the blade dips.

– Screwdriver Method

This method could be the easiest for you. Simply hold a screwdriver, set the mower blade’s center hole on it, and assess if your blade needs balancing or not.

If you are hesitant, you can fix it in a vice to see if your blade is balanced.

How Do You Balance Lawn Mower Blades With Star Holes?

If you have a lawn mower blade that has star holes in it, you can use a blade hole adapter. This is specifically made for mower blades that have no circular holes. You can use it to mount your mower blades on a lawn mower blade balancer.

What’s best about it is that it can fit with different brands of blade balancers. Just make sure that you have the right dimension of your blade.

Frequently Asked Questions

– Why Is it Important to Make Your Lawn Mower Blades Balanced?

As you know, your lawn mower blades spin thousands of rotations per minute. To be specific, it ranges from 2,700 rpm to 3,000 rpm. So, imagine if that rotation happens and you have an unbalanced blade – what will happen?

It ends up releasing more energy on one side than the other, which creates stress on the blade shaft, spindle, and engine that soon leads to the degraded performance quality of your lawn mower.

You will also notice that after you mow your yard with unbalanced blades, the grass will turn brown for a day or two because the blades did not cut them neatly but instead tore them apart.

So, as soon as you notice the symptoms of an unbalanced blade, you may want to sharpen and balance them immediately to avoid more severe side effects to your lawn mower and to your lawn.

– Does Each Brand Have a Different Way of Balancing Lawn Mower Blades?

Some homeowners worry that balancing lawn mower blades will vary according to brands. One of the most popular would be the John Deere mower blades. If you are one of those concerned about this brand having special requirements, you need not worry.

Balancing the mower blades is the same all throughout most brands. As a precaution, you should always consult your owner’s manual or get in touch with the manufacturer on how to balance the mower blades, especially if they are different from most mower blades.

– Do New Lawn Mower Blades Come Pre-balanced?

Most new lawn mower blades are balanced, which is why you should not sharpen them. However, it doesn’t hurt to see and check it, especially if you are experiencing some of the unbalanced lawn mower blade symptoms that we have mentioned above.

– Are There Mower Blade Balancers That Are Better Than Others?

Almost all mower blade balancers are actually quite similar, with very little difference between each type. For instance, Smith’s 50603 mower blade sharpener is a manual balancer that uses sharp carbide parts to sharpen blades without it getting dull quickly .

If you’re looking for something smaller, the All American Sharpener Model 5005 15°–45° Adjustable Lawn Mower Blade Sharpener might just fit your needs. It is highly adjustable and is able to sharpen high lift blades and mulching blades with ease.

The Arnold 490-850-0006 Blade Balancer Sharpener Kit has a high-speed blade sharpener and static blade balancer. If performance is your priority, you can try this one because it works incredibly well with different mower blades, including zero-turn riding mowers.

Finally, another crowd favorite is the Blade Sharpener/grinder Wall RBG 712, which features unlimited sharpening depth. Most homeowners find this model very easy to use, even if they are still new to balancing mower blades. This balancer is ideal for standard and reverse blades in most lawn mowers.

There are no set brands or types that can claim to be the only one that can do the job. However, you should always shop around with a reliable buyer’s guide if you are intent on looking for a good and high-quality blade balancer. Better yet, check with the manufacturer of your lawn mower for their opinions and recommendations.

Conclusion

Keeping the balance of your blade as a part of your lawn mower maintenance is as important as keeping the blades sharp. Here are some key points you should not forget:

• An unbalanced blade occurs because of grinding off too much metal on one side.
• You can check whether your blade is balanced using a lawn mower blade balancer, which you can DIY or buy online.
• Follow the particular steps we have mentioned above, and keep in mind to be careful in doing the procedure.
• Your unbalanced blades can cause premature destruction to your lawn mower, so fix the balance immediately as soon as you observe the symptoms.
• Lawn mower blades with star holes can be balanced using a blade hole adapter.

As a lawn mower owner, you usually think that having sharp blades is the only thing that is important, but now that you have learned the importance of having your blade balanced as well and how to do it, it will save you and your lawn mower from future difficulties and troubles.