Since the rear clearance face of the cutter has a certain small clearance angle this will lower the edge, requiring lowering also of the depth gauge by filing, which is difficult to do with sufficient precision.

Special chains have been previously suggested, designed for automatic resharpening and height adjustment of the depth gauge with high precision by grinding devices without removing the chain from the chain saw. According to the patents US 3,147,644, US 3,502,122 and others, a grinding device has been located immediately behind the drive sprocket of the chain, and will grind both the cutter and the depth gauge simultaneously as the chain is running around the drive sprocket. Relative to the cutter link, the grinding device will follow a circular path, the highest point of which is located where a radius from the center of the drive sprocket center meets a line through the rivets at 90 degrees angle. With normal links and sprockets this occurs at the center of the links.

To keep the depth gauge as far lower than the cutter edge as corresponds to the desired cutting depth, the depth gauge must be located at a greater distance from of this radius than the cutter edge is, and to get a positive clearance angle the edge must be located behind the radius, as is shown by the patents US 3,147,644, US 3,170,497 and others. For hand-held chain saws a positive clearance angle is necessary since the available feed force is limited, which means that even with a small diameter of the drive sprocket the distance between the depth gauge and the cutter edge must be rather large. This increases the risk for kick-back and violent jerks when sawing thin branches or when a tree moves.

Safety requirements have thus excluded such grinding devices from the market.

For vehicle-born chain saws the problems are different. The drive sprocket diameter must be kept rather large to keep the motor velocity and the sprocket wear low. To utilize the motor power the cutting depth should be larger than with hand-held chain saws, which would require very long distance between the depth gauge and the cutter, in actual cases far in front of the front rivet, which in turn might cause severe vibrations in service.

The present invention utilizes the non-existant risk of kick-back and the availability of higher mechanized feed force for vehicle-born chain saws, allowing smaller or even negative clearance angles. With a built-in grinding device according to the invention, saw chain with known and generally approved cutter links can be used.

Description According to the invention, the chain saw is provided with a grinding device immediately behind the drive sprocket as is previously known. The drive sprocket, however, is made in such a way that the front rivet of a cutter link rides around it at a greater diameter that the rear rivet. The radius from the sprocket center which meets the line through the rivets at 90 degrees will then pass behind the center of the link, and the required longer distance from the depth gauge to the radius can be achieved with stable links, in principle like those described in US 3,170,497. The difference in diameter is chosen to make the radius pass close to the cutter edge. Should it pass behind the edge the clearance angle will be slightly negative, which is acceptable for vehicle-born chain saws. For such a chain, all sharpening is done with the built-in grinder.

The invention can also be used with traditional chain with L-shaped cutters. These are normally made with a hard chrome plated clearance face and are normally sharpened by filing of the non-plated rake face. The chrome layer is then fractured at right angles to the clearance face, which causes unnecessarily large cutting forces. Local polishing or whetting of the chrome layer after filing may make the clearance angle very small or slightly negative, but will still improve the durability and reduce the cutting force.

According to the invention the front end of the cutter link with the depth gauge is raised, when the grinding device acts as whetting the chrome layer. The part of the chrome layer which then becomes thinner is shorter than if the front end is not raised, which improves the durability. Whetting with a device according to the invention is especially suitable for cutter links with curved clearance face according to patents US 3,144,059 or 3,176,733, where the whetted surface is mall even when repeated filing has moved the cutter edge close to the rear end of the cutter.

Figure 1 shows one preferred embodiment of the grinding device including a drive sprocket, and figure 2 an alternative form of the drive sprocket. Figure 3 shows how the cutter link of a top sharpened chain according to prior art must have the depth gauge very far forward, figure 4 shows how a corresponding link according to the invention may have the depth gauge closer to the center to improve staability, figure 5 shows how the invention can be used for whetting the cutter edge of a link with L-shaped cutter after filing.

Figure 1 shows a saw chain comprising drive links (13), cutter links (11) and side links (12) without cutters. The saw chain runs around the edge of a guide bar (16) and at the rear end of the guide bar around a drive sprocket (14). Behind the drive sprocket there is an abrasive block (15) which can be pressed against the top surfaces of the cutter links (11) to touch and grind the cutter edge as well as the depth gauge.

In grinding devices according to prior srt, the cutter links run with both rivets at the same distance from the drive sprocket center (21), and as shown in figure 3 the radius (19) at 90 degrees to the line (20) throug the rivets will pass through the center of the link. This means that in order to grind the depth gauge (31) so much lower than the cutter (32) that corresponds to the desired chip thickness, the depth gauge (31) will have to be located very far forward, and the edge of the cutter (32) close to the radius (19) at the center. If the drive sprocket diameter is not very small, the depth gauge will have to be located in front of the front rivet as shown in US 3,170,497, causing vibrations and instability when

sawing. There is especially in vehicle-born chain saws a strong preference for use of large diameter drive sprockets, however.

According to the invention, the drive sprocket (14) is made as a rim sprocket with two side rims which support the cutterlinks (11) and sidelinks (12), and between the rims laterally open drive recesses (18) into which the drive links (13) extend. The drive sprocket rims are made with raised steps (17) which keep the front end of the cutter links (11) uplifted during grinding, and the rest of the rims are cylindrical. If the number of drive recesses (18) is even, it is suitable to make one raised step (17) for every second recvess, and if the number os recesses is odd, there should be one raised step for each recess, since there is normally one cutter link (11) for every second drive link (13). The raised steps may have even height as in figure 1, which makes the device less sensitive to wear and dimensional inaccuracy of the recesses, but causes concentrated point loads on the cutter links when grinding. The drive sprockets (24) can also be made with evenly sloping raised ramps (27) fully supporting the cutter links during the grinding, and cylindrical sections (28) between the ramps. The raised steps or ramps (17,27) should be made symmetrically on both side rims of the drive sprocket to support the cutter link (11) as well as the side link joined to it with the rivets.

Since the front end of the cutter link is uplifted by the raised step or ramp (17,27), the line (20) between the rivets will be sloping and the 90 degree radius (19) will pass close to th rear rivet, as shown in figure 4. This allows a more symmetric positioning of the cutter (42) and the depth gauge (41) relative to the rivets and the center of the cutter link, compared to what was shown in US 3,170,497, resulting in a stable motion of the saw chain even with greater cutting depth. This is especially valuable for saws driven by hydraulic motors, for which large diameter drive sprockets are desirable.

The cutter links shown in figures 3 and 4 have been of a type sharpened only through grinding of the clearance face on top of the cutter as described in US 3,170,497, where the cutter edge is is insignificantly moved in a longitudinal direction by repeated grinding. Devices according to the invention can also be used with saw chains with L-

shaped cutters for whetting of the clearance face of the cutter edge between or after filings of the rake face. These saw chains have usually a thin hard chrome layer on the clearance face, and to avoid removing of too much of this layer when whetting, the clearance face should be sloping enough to let the whetting occur only at a narrow zone near the edge, and preferably be slightly curved as shown in US 3,176,733.