Dear all
So I have been working on finishing off the torso of Buzz which required the neck ring to be completed. This first required the accurate cutting of the former from 2 mm thick card.
Up until now, to do a curved accurate cut though card like this I had only been able to manage it by using my scalpel. I hold the blade either like this
or like this
Either way, the pressure required to get through 2 mm card is such that my hand can no longer keep the blade in position and so it simply "slides" in this type of position
which is no grip at all and is useless for trying to cut anything.
I then remembered (after some time!) that I little while back I had been given a "cardboard cutter" (as it had been described to me). So I dug it out and had a look at it. It was a Wolf 3.6 V cordless cutter
It came with 3 sets of "easy click" changeable blade heads (all the same) and a rechargeable battery and charger.
Here is a you tube showing it in action
What the video does not get across is it makes a loud buzzing-vibrating sound.
So I wondered if I could use this tool to cut my neck ring former. It could manage 2 mm no problem whatsoever and a small number of practice cuts I quickly got the hang of how to control it and see exactly where the cut occurred
So without further ado I had a go at cutting out the former. Just to let you know (for reference) the shearing blades hardly open and close any distance, but the speed they do it at is incredible. This does mean that (at least for me) that strange tingling vibration feeling going through the hand that is holding the card (though the card itself does not appear to move or shake). So you would not want to do hours of this at a time. Also the card does not "automatically" get drawn into the blades, you have to push it, but it can go through the card like a knife through soft butter so you need good control of the card. I actually found more control by feeding the card into the blades than moving the cutter. Here is the finished former
I think it is really accurate and was certainly good enough for what I needed. Here is a close up of how close you can follow the curved line
In terms of the "clean-ness" of the cut, you want your part on the left hand side of the cutting tool. It then leaves that side of the cut with an excellent clean non-dented/compressed edge. I have tried to show what the cut looks like with this close up
The right hand side of the cut dents/compresses the card, as you can see from this picture of the "off cut" of the neck ring former
I do not know if this always happens or only happens when you cut curves. If anyone needs to know I will test this out cutting a straight line for them.
Needless to say I was very pleased with the result and then made up the neck ring (in exactly the same way as for Neil) and attached it to Buzz's torso. Here is the final result
So that is all the main parts for both torsos done. The next thing to do is sufficiently strengthen them.
Regards and take care
Kevin