Building A Custom Swiss Army Knife

The Swiss Army knife is the most well-known multitool, combining a bunch of functionality into a compact package. [Jeff Gough] decided to build a custom example featuring a selection of his favorite tools.

He documents the build in a video series on YouTube (see below). [Jeff] decided to take on the project as a gift for his mother after she’d mentioned she’d wanted a Swiss Army-style knife with a horse’s hoof tool and finished in the classic shade of British Racing Green.

[Jeff] starts by disassembling an existing knife, taking care not to damage it in the process. He then makes and installs multiple custom tools, including the aforementioned horse hoof tool and a RADAR/NKS key for opening disabled toilets in the UK. He even crafts a bespoke Philips head screwdriver, too. Finally, he assembles everything back together and gives the build a beautiful green finish.

A Swiss Army knife can be a neat gift, but it’s even nicer when it’s got a personal touch like this one. We’ve featured some other nifty multitools before, too. Not all Swiss Army knives actually contain a, you know, knife. No kidding.

14 thoughts on “Building A Custom Swiss Army Knife

  1. maybe swiss pocket knife is too small, but if you add an ethernet rj-45 crimper to leatherman wave it would be something useful. Something I would like. Many times I wrote to them to add it, there are multitools for electricians but for computer people no more.

    1. Decent crimp tools are pretty challenging already, ones that would fold into a leatherman type formfactor seem very very tricky to get right. No doubt possible, though I think the best route to get that sort of concept would be a set of parallel pliers that lock together closed only when no die is fitted but can fit crimping dies. And the more practical route is probably to add multitool features to a decent crimp tool in the first place – less pocket sized but actually a decent crimper.

    1. I had to look that up.

      A disabled toilet is a toilet for disabled persons, which are typically locked and the disabled person is given a key.

      English is hard to get right. The article implies a different meaning.

  2. I’d like some sort of recessed push latch on each pivot pin so that it can be pressed and the blades/tools swing out with less effort, rather than the break-your-fingernail approach trying to pull out the scissors or whatever.

  3. Fantastic ,jus what every victorinox fan wants ,a tool wiv exactly want u want on it ,and nothing else ,else ,customised to wot the customer wants ,plse take note victorinox ,this is ur way to stay as a market leader…..

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