filing down gyro tabs, any tips?

[Zoidberg]

i think i'm finally going to get round to tidying these up, they came hacked off and i wasn't going to bother unless i was going to paint it but now i think i will

can i just go at them with a metal hand file?

is it worth taking the front end off first or just do it built up?

[Dr. Steve Brule]

Yeah if there's not much left I'd file the meat of it off and use a bit of sand/emery paper to finish it off.

[Sasha]

Use a decent file and it will be pretty easy to get through it all.

[sans.terre]

chromoly comes off surprisingly easy with a decent file. really not much to it. took off my brake mounts back in the day and it almost made me blush.

[tecnic1]

Man, I really anal about shit like this, so take this with a healthy shake of salt.

If you don't have a really nice file, I would spend the $10 or so and buy one. I would most likely buy a new one anyway if I didn't have one that was the perfect size and shape for the job.  I would want a flat second cut or smooth cut, maybe even both.

I would then measure the OD of the headtube, and make some sort of gage out of plastic or metal.  I've found that to me at least, my eyes try to fuck me when it comes to making things round.

Finally, just go to work on that shit. I would try to draw file, and check with my gage to make sure I'm removing material from the right place every 10 strokes or so.

Once it's pretty close, I would hack together a sanding block that matches the head tube OD, and finish it with that.  If it's an externally machined head tube, you could most likely find a sandpaper grit that would match the tooling marks, and make it just about undetectable. 

Like I said though, I tend to nuclear engineer the fuck out of shit like this.

[Brooklynrider]

Your tongue can sense even the most minute differences in texture. After you've finished filing, lick the headtube to make sure it's perfect.

[Zoidberg]

define: decent file

[dude...]

any old shit file will do, just might take a bit longer. even a brand new cheap file should be fine, just need something with a bit of bite. its not going to take much to remove half a mm of material off the side of the headtube

done it loads of times on brake mounts, just gotta put a bit of elbow grease in.

[sans.terre]

i promise you are over thinking this one. lol.
you would have to really, really go at it to fuck this up. hahaha.

you could prolly use a hacksaw and sandpaper if you're on your game.
don't be scurred, kid! 

[weedbix]

Brooklynrider sounds like bluemeate

Start with a bastard file for speed, then use a smooth file for precision