A self-healing cutting mat is good for almost all the work I do, but sometimes the pieces being cut are little wider than the thickness of the paper. For instance when cutting spokes or engine linkages for micromodel size locomotives.
When this is the case, the paper tends to twist because of the downward pressure of the knife, and I find that very thin pieces will also move away from the blade while the cut is being made. Not a good situation.
A sharp knife and gentle touch are very helpful, but sometimes even this is not enough. I have tried harder plastics such as Lexan but the blade still disturbs the surface some and it is far from ideal.
Cutting on a piece of glass there is no distortion. Ordinary window glass works fine, but if you can get something a little thicker there is less worry about breaking it. I use a tempered glass shelf from my refrigerator. (I took it out to make room for more beer.) And if you scratch it, you can just turn it over or move to a different spot.
To avoid the work moving away from the knife, it is helpful to stick the piece onto the adhesive portion of a Post-It (TM) note with the adhesive turned up, and not to remove any of the waste until the whole thing is cut.
This little "N" guage Mallett compound locomotive is from Ray Morris. I made several pathetic attempts to cut the engine linkages before finally hitting on the cut on glass technique. And yes, it's pretty rough on the knife blades.
Last edited by Thomas Meek; 09-18-2009 at 03:21 PM.
Reason: Left out photo
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