Box Cutter

Henry Cambron

Henry Cambron

www.worldclassknives.com
Joined
Nov 30, 2006
Messages
218
No really a knife and I didn't make the box cutter, but I did make the sheath. My son got a part time job at Target. He lost his box cutter twice so I made this sheath. There is a rare-earth button magnet embedded in the back piece of leather for added retention. I made it with a neck landyard but he usually ties it to his belt.


boxcutter.jpg

boxcutter2.jpg
 
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Very nice work! Is that one stamp or a series of them?

I like to use magnets for inverted carry sheaths. With the right ones, there is no problem of retention.

I get very two very thin, very very strong magnets out of every broken hard drive I come across, and embed them into the inside back surface of the sheath using 'Shoo-Goo' to hold them in place. You have to be careful with these magnets as they can really take a bite out of your finger if you let them snap together.

Stitchawl
 
It's a single stamp. One of Tandy's 3-D # 8554-00. It's suppossed to be a "skull cross" but it didn't turn out that way.

I've heard about using the magnets from hard drives but I haven't tried that yet. I'll have to ask a friend who an IT manager to save me some.

I've got a small router bit that's made for Dremel tools that I use to carve out a nice round hole in the leather. Not that anyone will see it but it's sure quicker and neater than using a razor blade.

How do you make the hole for the magnet?
 
Henry Cambron said:
I've heard about using the magnets from hard drives but I haven't tried that yet. I'll have to ask a friend who an IT manager to save me some.
Click to expand...

There are two in every hard drive, located on the mounting brackets for the read/write arm. It's a pain to remove them the first time as they are both glued and magnetically attracted to the steel of the mounting brackets. I use two pair of vice grips and bend the brackets, allowing me to slip a flat bladed screw driver underneath the end of the magnet. You'll need a torx driver to open the case (remember that there is one HIDDEN torx screw under the paper label on the case. Rip the label to get at it,) a flat blade screwdriver to remove the read/write arm, (which won't come off until you remove the screw at the end of the bracket) You'll be able to see the magnets at that time.

How do you make the hole for the magnet?
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magnets1.jpg

Here are four magnets removed from hard drives. This is the configuration I use for large (K-bar sized) knives. It will hold a K-bar upside down securely even if jumping up and down. For smaller boot knives and skeleton blades I only use two magnets vertically.

For inverted carry sheaths I use three layers of leather for the back. Two of thicker (one 8-9 oz backing piece, and the other the thickness of the magnets to hold them. Varies from drive to drive,) veggie tanned leather and one very thin layer of garment leather.

I cut a rectangular hole in the magnet leather roughly the same size as the magnet layout midway along the blade length. I put that on a sheet of vinyl, put the magnets inside, and fill up all the spaces with "Shoo-Goo" liquid rubber. (This won't stick to the vinyl. Find it at Sporting Goods stores, Athletic Shoe stores, etc.) When dry, this forms a custom fit to the magnets and keeps them from shifting around. The thin layer of garment leather goes over the top of this to keep the blade from getting scratched up by the magnets, and all of this gets glued to the back piece with contact cement. Not really much thicker overall than my regular sheaths. I then just continue to make the sheath as usual, leaving off an holding straps. No need. The magnets hold perfectly! In fact, sometimes too well!! :o

Stitchawl
 
Good crap, I don't know how many hundreds of hard drives I've tossed without thinking about the magnets! Never again!

Way to make a solution for a problem, Henry!
 
amcardon said:
Good crap, I don't know how many hundreds of hard drives I've tossed without thinking about the magnets! Never again!

Way to make a solution for a problem, Henry!
Click to expand...

Don't beat yourself up. We've all done it. The only way I found out was one day throwing away a hard drive and wanting to remove all trace of data. I was living in an area where all broken electronics were picked out of the trash to be repaired and resold and I didn't happen to have a good overwrite program. I decided to take it apart and scratch and bend the plates themselves. In the process of getting it all apart I discovered the magnets.

And I learned the hard way just how powerful they were when the two of them snapped together with the tip of my finger between them! :(
Raised a large blood blister! Took several shots of Tequila before I was brave enough to puncture it with a pin. (At least, that was the excuse I used. :D )

Be REAL careful with these suckers. Less than an inch long, a quarter wide, and 1/16 thick, and they bite like a cobra! Some drives have magnets almost 1/8" thick. Not good magnet toys for kids! (Not good magnet toys for Stitchawl either! :o )

Stitchawl
 
Thanks to stitchawl and a lot of other great guys here on the forum, I learn something new every day.
 
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