My husband, Ari, convinced me to finally help him get the blade out of our secondhand wood chipper. Saying it worked was a strong word. It had been “tested” prior to sale, so it came home with us (A new one costs 2x what we paid). We tried some branches and the larger ones just kept getting stuck. Upon further inspection the blade plate was dull as a conversation with a brick, so out with it! Another task on the honey-do list was my least favorite Xmas present. Ari decided my procrastination was over (*sob*) and stuck me in a chair with a drill and some other tools.
Pro-warning: Always make sure your devices are unplugged before performing maintenance. You should probably also don reasonable safety gear when you’re working on a tool of destruction. Probably.
Luckily he enjoys his bench grinder, so I was off the hook for that one. Take note of the dull dirty (dull) blade (dull) plate. It was very much so designed to NOT be able to get into it, which ruffles my feathers to no end. TBH, I don’t even remember how I got the thing out. So. Many. Screws.
Pro-tip: Pyrex custard cups make excellent small hardware repositories for screws, bolts, nuts, etc. whilst dismantling the patriarchy. And ramekins, FTW!
Needless to say, I got it out with the handy dandy impact driver, a wrench, and a screw driver.
Pro-tip: Use a screw driver to brace things in place like when installing a new starter cord in a lawnmower, or, in this case, a blade plate that is supposed to be sharper than not. This is useful when something that rotates needs to be tightened, wound, or screwed in and it has a slot available to jam a screwdriver into. I do not recommend this technique to the faint of heart. If you do this and break your shit (or yourself) I take zero responsibility. I’m not a doctor and I’ve already got enough of my own stuff to fix.
They really did most of everything in their power when they built this thing to make sure no one would be able to fix it. Joke’s on them. Ari was out of wood before I thought to take a video, and I neglected to take pictures of the blade before and after. Guess that’ll be the star of another post!