Demagnetizers?

T

Travis Fry

Joined
Jun 11, 2010
Messages
489
Are there any good, cheap demagnetizers out there that actually work? My latest (first) slipjoint blade and spring stick together, and I'm not cool with that.
 
I have a watch makers demagnitizer sitting by my bench. I will be doing the file work on a blade and see the steel shards sticking out like fuzz. I give it a run through the coil and the steel particles fall on the floor. I also demagnitize all blades after sanding because I use magnetic clamps and have magnets sitting on the grinder bench to catch stray steel dust.

You want the loop style, and not the flat type. They should run about $50-60 new and $20-30 used.

You can build one easily,too. A coil from a transformer or even a motor winding can be converted to a demagnitizer. I know of one made from a motor winding with a piece of PVC pipe inside and outside, and PVC flange fittings on the ends. This completely encased the winding to prevent any possible electrocutions.It is much larger than a watch makers unit.
The winding coil was wired with a push button, a power switch, a red light (Demagnitizing) and a green light ( power on), and a power cord. I'll leave the details of how to build one for your research, but it is as simple as connecting all the parts in series.The only parallel part is the green light.

In my opinion, a demagnitizer is a nearly essential tool for any detailed knife making work.
 
They work fine, but I have had greater demagnetization with the coil types. The 360 degree magnetic field is stronger, and appears to work better than a 180 degree flat field. Another thing that might be considered is that the flat type cost less than the coil units, which may suggest that there is some difference. A $5 head demagnitizer will work,too, but is even weaker than the flat units. It all depends on what degree you need to demagnitize things, and how much steel mass is being demagnetized.
 
If you want to save money, at the expense of a little effort, you can hold the magnetized piece next to a large bass stereo speaker and withdraw it slowly while playing loud music.
 
If you have a soldering gun you can use it,turn it on and just stick your blade between the element loop and pass it through a few times and its done.
 
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