knife

22 Articles

Fail Of The Week: The Little Ultrasonic Knife That Couldn’t

February 27, 2018 by 44 Comments

We all know the feeling of an idea that sounded great when it was rattling around in our head, only to disappoint when we actually build the thing. It’s a natural consequence of trying new stuff, and when it happens, we salvage what we can and move on, hopefully in wisdom.

The thing that at least semi-defeated [This Old Tony] was an attempt to build an ultrasonic cutter, and it didn’t go well. Not that any blood was shed in the video below, although there seemed like there would be the way [Old Tony] was handling those X-Acto blades. His basic approach was to harvest the transducer and driver from a cheap ultrasonic cleaner and retask the lot into a tool to vibrate a knife rapidly enough to power it through tough materials with ease.

Spoiler alert: it didn’t work very well. We think the primary issue was using a transducer that was vastly underpowered compared to commercial (and expensive) ultrasonic cutters, but we suspect the horn he machined was probably not optimized either. To be fair, modeling the acoustic performance of something like that isn’t easy, so we can’t expect much. But still, it seems like the cutter could have worked better. Share your thoughts on how to make version 2.0 better in the comments.

The video is longish, but it’s as entertaining as any of [Old Tony]’s videos, and packed full of incidental gems, like the details of cavitation. We enjoyed it, even if the results were suboptimal. If you want to see a [This Old Tony] project that really delivers, check out his beautiful boring head build.

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The Mother Of All Belt Grinders

April 29, 2017 by 33 Comments

It seems like everyone is building belt grinders these days. You might think [Jeremy Schmidt] is just hoping on the bandwagon, but you’d be wrong. He took a full two years to design the perfect belt grinder for his needs. Now he’s built his perfect beast, and we must say, it’s quite impressive!

[Jeremy] had seen grinders which can tilt, but most of them tilt the entire machine, including the table. He designed his machine with an independent table. This means the belt can be placed at any angle, while the table remains flat. He’s achieved some really interesting finishes with a course grind on a 45-degree angle to the workpiece.

No build is without its problems. In [Jeremy’s] case it was building the box which acts as a receiver for the machine and the tables. Regular square tube stock wasn’t quite rigid enough, so bar stock was the way to go. The first attempt at building the box resulted in a warped tube, due to the stresses of welding. [Jeremy] was more careful the second time, moving from section to section of the four welds. This kept the heat from building up, and the box stayed straight.

The final result is an incredibly rigid machine which definitely will withstand anything that [Jeremy] can throw at it.

If you want to see more belt grinders at work, check out [Bob]’s treadmill belt grinder, or [Mike’s] conversion.

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Knives Hewn From Brake Discs Past

February 14, 2017 by 54 Comments

Knives are tools that rely heavily on material quality to do their job right. A knife made of cheap steel won’t hold an edge well, and blunt knives are more likely to cause injury, or at the least, be more difficult to use. The trick to making a good knife is to start with good material. Disc brakes just so happen to be a great source of cast iron, and are readily available, so [Diesineveryfilm Customs] has machined a knife out of a brake disc.

The first step is to roughly cut out the knife’s form from the disc. It’s easy enough to cut out with an angle grinder, following up with a belt sander to finish up the grip. After sharpening, the sharp blade is taped off for safety while a wooden grip is added. Holes are drilled in the brake rotor, allowing the wooden parts to be pinned and glued together before a trip to the belt sander for shaping. A string and dye are added to the handle as finishing touches.

It’s a great use of high-quality scrap material to produce a useful tool. An earlier disc brake knife video shares some useful techniques of its own – we liked the shortcut of measuring the disc thickness, then using a matching drillbit to mark the centerline for sharpening.

Perhaps your own knives aren’t sharp enough – check out this home-built adjustable sharpening rig.

Home-made Adjustable Knife Jig

September 23, 2016 by 25 Comments

When sharpening a knife, it is critical to have the knife at the right angle. A knife jig handles this for you, letting you focus on getting the edge right. You could just buy one, but where’s the fun in that? [origamimavin] decided to make his own adjustable knife jig using bits he bought from the hardware store for $27, and which you might have in your junk pile. Fortunately for us, he’s written up the process in excellent detail, explaining the how and why of each step.

He used a couple of tools that you might not have lying around (a bandsaw and a belt sander), but these could be easily replaced with their manual cousins, or your local hackerspace will doubtless provide you access to them. Either way, it’s a simple build which could help your knives keep their clean, sharp edge for years to come.

Arduino Powered Knife-Wielding Tentacle Will Leave You In Stitches

November 30, 2015 by 31 Comments

Writing articles for Hackaday, we see funny projects, and we see dangerous projects. It’s rare to find a project which combines the two. This one somehow manages to pull it off. [Outaspaceman] is familiar with LittleBits, but he’s just starting to learn Arduino programming. He completed the blink tutorial, but blinking an LED just wasn’t enough fanfare for the success of his first Arduino program. He connected the Arduino Mega’s LED output to a pair of LittleBits which then switch a servo between two positions. A bare servo wouldn’t be much fun, so [Outaspaceman] connected a tentacle and a small Swiss army knife. Yes, a knife.

The tentacle in question is designed to be a finger puppet. There’s something about a tentacle waving a knife around that is so hilarious and absurd that we couldn’t help but laugh. We’re not alone apparently, as this video has gone viral with over 1 million views. It’s almost like a violent revenge of the most useless machine. For the technically curious, the tentacle’s seemingly random motion is analogous to that of the double pendulum.

Our readers will be happy to know that [Outaspaceman] has made it to the Arduino servo tutorial, and is now controlling the servo directly, no LittleBits needed. We just hope he has a good way to turn his creation off – without the need for stitches.

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Assassin’s Creed Hidden Blade

November 2, 2013 by 38 Comments

The youngins in the crowd may not remember Taxi Driver, but [Matt]’s fully functional hidden blade from Assassin’s Creed finally does justice to the hidden weapon on a drawer slide idea. It’s got everything you would want – immaculate craftsmanship and a video game reference for that every so necessary blog cred.

[Matt] started his hidden blade build with a drawer slide, mounting an old WWII replica blade to the slider. The blade retraction is spring-loaded, and with a small ring and a bit of wire, the blade gets its automatic draw and retraction.

The arm brace is where this project really shines. [Matt] crafted this out of two pieces of leather, tooled with the Assassin’s insignia and dyed to a deep, jet black

This isn’t the first time we’ve seen an automatic hidden blade from Assassin’s Creed, but [Matt]’s effort is really top-notch. He’s got beautiful leather crafting down pat, and we can only hope his Halloween was filled with parkour and stabbing.