Hair Clipper And Trimmer Blade Adjustment


Why should you adjust your hair trimmers and hair clippers?


A very important aspect of cutting hair is having your tools cutting at max performance. Having your blades adjusted properly is a vital part of cutting hair. 

Having your tools adjusted, and zero gapped correctly is also very important in order to get rid of any skin line you’ll make when using a close cutting electric shaver.

With proper blade adjustment your tools will operate smoother, and sharper. Learning how to properly adjust your clippers, and trimmers is a very helpful skill to acquire.


Should you adjust your hair trimmers and hair clippers as a beginner?


As a beginner i recommend that you don’t adjust your clippers, and trimmers until you gain some experience using them. See, and feel the way they cut out the box. Not properly adjusting your trimmers, and clippers correctly can cause you to cut, and nick people.

A poorly adjusted trimmer that’s to flush, and sharp can easily cut someone’s neck. You want to avoid cutting anybody, but it will properly happen as a beginner when you first try adjusting the blades, and that s okay it’s all a learning process.

The same applies to hair clippers if they’re not adjusted correctly the blades can snag, and cut people if they’re too flush. Proper adjustment is required so they can cut on point.


When should you adjust your hair trimmers and hair clippers?


After you gained some experience with the standard blade alignment, and feel that you need your clippers cutting sharper. Go ahead, and adjust your hair clippers, and trimmers if you may like. Read til the end of this page it’ll will help you adjust them properly so that you avoid cutting anyone.

Wahl, Andis, and Oster company’s all make different clipper, and trimmer models. Mostly all clippers, and trimmers adjust the same way with the exception of just some models out in the market that are bit more tricky.


How to adjust hair clipper blades


The simplest way to adjust any hair clipper blade is very simple. Below are the steps to adjust your hair clipper blade so it can be zero gapped . Having a zero gapped blade will make your blades cut closer for sharper fade, and blend. It’s important to have your clipper blades adjusted so you can blend skin fades, and skin tapers easier. The only tool you’ll need is a screwdriver.


 Easy 5 STEPS


 

Step 1 – Start by loosening the two screws on the back of the blade of the clipper. Don’t loosen them up all the way, but just enough to move the top blade (guide) up and down.

Step 2 – Now that you can move the top blade up, and down what you want to do next is tighten the screws just a tad bit, but not tight. Enough that you can still move the guide blade up, and down.

Step 3 – Now with the lever in the closed position, or lever all the way up towards the front of the clipper blade you want to set the blades as close as possible with your fingers moving the guide (bottom blade) blade to the cutting blade (too blade) together until there almost horizontal ( almost even to each other) to each other, but allowing a small gap between the blades. Doing this by looking, and moving the blades from the front of the clipper. This requires good eyesight.

Step 4 – Now that you have the blades set, and aligned to your liking. Tighten the screws in the back of the blade. Flip the clipper to back side, and hold blades together with one hand to avoid the blade from moving or getting misaligned, and with your other hand tighten the blades.

Step 5 – You want to tighten them slowly, and one by one by turning one screw a tad bit then tighten the other screw a tad bit until the screws tighten all together. By doing this it reduces the chance of the blades getting miss aligned, or overlapping the top blade when you tighten them to fast.


Overview


When adjusting clippers keep in mind the trick is to leave a little space between the lower blade (cutter blade), and the top blade (guide blade).

You don’t want the bottom blade overlapping the top blade because it’ll cut people. On some clippers you also don’t the blades to be close to each other, or too flush to each other, because when you turn the clippers on the vibration can cause it go over the top blade so allow a small space.

This happens mostly with Wahl clippers. On Oster, and Andis clippers I find that you can set them pretty flush to each other, and they won’t cut people.


How to Fix Hair Clipper Misaligned Blades


One problem that you may encounter when learning how to adjust your clippers for the first time is that when you get the blades adjusted closer to each other to your liking, and then when you go to tighten the clipper blades the clipper blades sometimes don’t align straight. One side of the blade may get slanted, or overlap the cutting blade.


This problem is easily fix by simply loosening up a tad bit of the of the screw of the side where the blade is slanted, or overlapping, and with your fingers moving up, or down the blades  together to get them straight, and the bottom blade just under the top blade.

Then tighten up the blades, and they should be aligned better, and if it’s not repeat the process until you they’re aligned properly. This may take a couple of tries.In this video Ivan Zoot explains how to fix misaligned blades, and demonstrates some maintenance tips.


Clipper Blade Adjustment Video


This video below will show you the simplest method to adjust mostly all the clippers in the market. Some clipper models are able to adjust closer to each other than other models.


How to adjust hair trimmer blades


Adjusting the hair trimmer is the same concept as adjusting a hair clipper. There is some differences how ever as it can be more tricky to adjust a hair trimmer. On most hair clippers you don’t have to fully unscrew the blade to zero gap it, but on hair trimmers you will have to unscrew the whole blade, and then loosen the screws on the blade a tad bit.

Then you’ll be able to move the guide blade up, and down to the desired setting. You’ll want to make the blade setting horizontal as possible, and both blades close to each other as possible without the guide blade(bottom blade) overlapping the cutting blade(top blade).

The easiest way, and best way to adjust hair trimmers is to eye ball it. Meaning that all you use is your hands, and good eye sight to move both blades into your preferred blade setting. It’s very simple to adjust the blades anyone can do it.


Common Problems with Trimmer Blade adjustment


Some troubles you may encounter is that you might set the blades to close to each other that it might cut people or even overlap the blades on accident.

A good way to try out your adjusted trimmer to check if it’s not sharp is on your wrist underarm area. Simply glide the trimmer while turned on below your wrist, and pretend as you were lining someone up. If the blade feels to sharp or even leaves redness on your skin it might be set to close.

You can also try it on someone by first pressing lightly on the area your lining up, and asking the person if it feels to sharp. If it is too sharp readjust the hair trimmer to avoid cutting someone.

Here’s a quick video below on how to simply adjust your hair trimmer


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