Tin / can openers?

[T i m]

Hi All,

The Mrs is starting to suffer a bit of arthritis in her hands and whilst she still has reasonable strength there it hurts her to use it.

So, our old hand can opener was starting to become hard work so yesterday we treated ourselves to a £10 Prestige jobby. "You can't go wrong with Prestige" said the lady in the shop "but keep the receipt in case you need to bring it back ..."?

So, the Mrs calls me into the kitchen last night because 'she must be using it wrong' as she can't open a small tin of evaporated milk. I have a go and she's right, it just doesn't work (tried it on two cans and both ends). In spite of both the knurled and cutting wheels being driven it doesn't seem to be able to get a consistent grip on the rim. Turning the handle the other direction sees the cutting wheel start to cut a spiral down the can! ;-(

Now, reading around it looks like there can be issues opening small or even large tins but I can't seem to remember it being an issue with our basic / all metal can openers before?

So, anyone recommend a reliable / easy opener please?

Cheers, T i m

p.s. I need to eat so I can do my d-i-y. ;-)

[mike]

OXO Good Grips.

An American brand but available from cookshops in the UK. Well worth the money and effort of tracking down.

This is the can opener we've had for years:

peeler is great too:

this just knocks seven bells out of any other masher:

[Donwill]

My wife had similar problems when she developed Rheumatoid Arthritis, we bought a Kenwood electric opener about 4 to 5 yrs ago and it's been excellent. I found it on the Amazon site ( No connection with them ) it was just the first place that came up when I did a Google.

Luck Don

[S Viemeister]

> This peeler is great too:

> And this just knocks seven bells out of any other masher:

_are_ good. And I liked them even before I discovered who designed them.

[T i m]

as I'm sure these Prestige ones would probably be ok on 'std' cans?

Oooh (looks nice) we do have a (plastic bladed) masher but don't have mashed potato very often (generally have them microwaved in their jackets or steamed).

I'll look out for the opener though. ;-)

Cheers, T i m

[T i m]

>>>They _are_ good. And I liked them even before I discovered who designed >them. So is this the same Co who brought us the 'cubes' then?

What saddens me is the number of old British 'establishments' that seem to have fallen by the wayside. Names one might assume would be there for ever (or still exist but only in name, their products made cheaply alongside all the junk on another continent).

Maybe not unexpected in some cases of course, just a shame etc.

Cheers and thanks for the feedback.

T i m

[T i m]

I found it also slows mine up when she's using the SDS drill to break up old footings. ;-(

Oh, thanks.

though?).

I was looking at a (battery) electric one in Argos and it seemed to have good reviews but again not where non-std can sized were mentioned (like a smaller evap milk can)?

Any idea how well the Kenwood copes under those conditions would you know please?

I think this sort of demonstrates a theme 'when the going gets tough' ;-)

Thanks. It's funny how something, seemingly so simple can turn out to be quite complex. Like, we had no problems with our existing openers actually working, they were just getting worn out and because of other factors (arthritis) more difficult to use. You buy a known and respected brand and whilst it's better to use it seems more restricted on what you can use it on .

Cheers, T i m

[Jules Richardson]

The M-i-L bought us an electric can opener a while back because our hand- held one was old and becoming a nightmare. I call it the "can't opener", because it's utter shit. It's fiddly to get it to engage properly, and when it does it invariably either slips out again or the motor doesn't have enough grunt and it all binds up. Net result after 5 mins of struggling is a chewed-up can with tiny metal particles in the contents...

Anyway, I went out and bought an el-cheapo 'manual' opener from Walrus- Mart for less than $3 - what, a quid-fifty? Cuts like a knife through butter; extremely little force needed for it to work. I'm not sure if there's an easy way of sharpening the cutting blade, so maybe it'll need replacing every year, but for that kind of price I can't really complain.

Part of me wants to destroy the electric opener in some interesting way, but then the DIY side of me keeps thinking maybe the motor will come in handy for something :-)

cheers

Jules

[S Viemeister]

No connection at all. AFAIAA, the kitchen utensil group are US-based. (The designer is a relative-by-marriage.)

[Grimly Curmudgeon]

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember T i m saying something like:

The battery-powered one like this

all over the place - has no problem opening any can I've tried it on, including the evaporated milk ones with a non-existent lip. So far the first set of rechargeables has been in six months or so and it's only now sounding like a recharge is needed.

[Donwill]

>

My wife swears by it, I've just spoken to her, she reckons it's never failed .

We've never tried it on the smaller evap milk tins, The actual motor driven cog looks the same as a bog standard hand operated one, so I would think that you need a lip on the edge of the can so the teeth of the cog wheel bite into it. Does the small evap milk tins not have a lip? If I remember rightly we used to open them by piercing the lid in two places with a hook type piercer which made triangular holes and just poured the milk out.

The kenwood is the best one we've tried, my wife has had the arthritis for approx 15 yrs and she's tried many different types of tin openers and most have been difficult and sometimes painful for her to use, we had a drawer full of them :-( . Anyway they all went to the bin a few years ago. There are some customer reviews of the Kenwood on the Amazon site, hope this helps. Cheers Don

[Jules Richardson]

I just realised that I didn't suggest an AG... must be slipping today! :-)

[mike]

I'm struggling to remember ever opening a can that size (it's been years since I saw those little tins of evaporated milk) but the only thing I can remember that defeated it was either a can of sardines or corned beef that had lost its key/ring pull -- in that instance it did the sides but was struggling with the square corners, and I had to resort to "nibbling" at it to finish it off.

Years ago, we bought an expensive can opener from a department store and ended up taking it back because it did everything well except opening cans --- and IIRC that was a Prestige. It just didn't reach down far enough to cut through the lid.

Anyway, Googling for "oxo good grips uk" turns up quite a few bricks- and-mortar and mail-order suppliers (Lakeland have it for a tenner and I'm sure you could find it a bit cheaper elsewhere). It's not the same company that makes the stock cubes.

There are a couple of interesting pages below about the design aspects and unlike a certain British vacuum manufacturer, these products are not only designed but also work.

[Peter Parry]

For standard cans

is liked by a lot of people with arthritis I come across. Not much use on odd shaped ones though.

[T i m]

Ok, just seemed strange that the logo looked so familiar?

Get you! ;-)

Cheers, T i m

[S Viemeister]

We don't get free samples, though...

[T i m]

A more interesting way to get some of yer 5_a_day, a bit of evap on a (hand assembled) fruit cocktail. ;-)

FWIW, some rim diameters from some tins from the cupboard:

Sainsbury's Evaporated Milk (170g), 64mm

Sainsbury's Basics sliced mushrooms, 67 mm

Sainsbury's Double Concentrate tomato puree, 55mm!

Their basics sweetcorn is 68mm but ring pull. [1]

Now we must have opened all the above with our existing tin opener and not had a problem (hence not predicted there would be a problem)?

And that's fair enough, I might not expect anything designed for round to deal with square but at the same time I think I would hope it would manage (all be it a bit awkwardly).

Hmm, this seems to be sharp enough / set correctly but just doesn't seem to be able to deal with the construction of these tins. Comparing them closer it does seem the evap tins are 'lighter' (thinner rim etc) and I bet that doesn't help, however ...

Ok well if they get the thumbs up from here then they must be worth a look.

Ok ta.

Hehe (I wonder who you could be talking about). ;-)

I wonder if you couldf consider 'design' as just a way of speeding up (tool) evolution? I mean, you see old tools that are for a very specific role and you can imagine how they may have been improved and tuned over the years as maybe different materials and procedures became available. I like to see stuff where most people might not have a clue what it is for but is perfectly designed (evolved?) for it's purpose. [2]

Cheers, T i m

[1] We aren't particularly interested in food so keep a range of 'easy / base' ingredients in stock. [2] I showed daughters b/f a tool my Dad gave me to see if he could work out what it was for. It is about 2' long and consists of a 1.5" steel tube with a pincer like jaw on one end and a curved 'heel' connected to one of the jaws. A rod with a weight on the end could be slid in and out of the opposite end. It made sense when I told him what it was for. ;-)

[T i m]

>>

That's good enough for me. ;-)

Whilst the actual hand cranking part isn't an issue *now* it may well be if things get any worse for her hands so one of the electric jobbies mightn't be a bad idea anyway (even if not to overcome this actual issue).

Ok.

It does indeed, all be it possibly slightly lighter in construction than most others.

Doh! That's why I love this place. You are of course spot on and that's probably exactly the way you are meant to open such cans (although a quick read of the can with a magnifier doesn't mention such). However (and maybe why the Mrs chose to use the new opener on this of all tins) I don't think we still have one of those 'V' type tin openers (as used before ring pulls?) and it was just a (bad) coincidence the first tin she tried to open wasn't an ideal match (and partly why I didn't rush back to the shop with it as instructed before she went out this morning!). We used to have one on the end of a bottle opener (that also did crimp tops and corks) but I've not seen it in ages.

I'm sorry to hear of her suffering. The Mrs is currently awaiting test results (blood tests and X-rays) to see exactly what sort she's got and we may need to have a bit of a change of lifestyle. She was looking forwards to cycling again (since her new knee) and even getting her 750cc motorbike out again but this may change things. It's not just the radical stuff that might be affected (shooting, rowing, bare knuckle fighting ) but (as you suggest) the everyday things like opening bottles and cans.

Shame eh. Some other 'designers' efforts down the pan.

Yep, I read them all this morning. So interesting stuff.

It has indeed . ;-)

Cheers, T i m

[T i m]

No beating around the bush here then! ;-)

I read that of the 'One touch' battery jobby.

Nice, mind you, 'iron' is supposed to be good for you isn't it?

Yep.

Indeed and we don't actually do that many cans considering.

I know what you mean. I've 'finished off' some empty PC cases with air-bombs on a bonfire night. Actually quite frightening (the power of the things). I may have also witnessed a group of (legitimate) clay shooters 'finishing off' their old site caravan (before it was taken away for scrap a few lbs heavier from lead shot) after a Xmas / charity 'fun' shoot.

Ah, yup, and once in a blue moon those things will actually be handy (normally one day after you throw them away though).

Cheers, T i m

[T i m]

>Available all over the place - has no problem opening any can I've tried

Cool ta. FWIW these evap milk cans do have a real lip but comparing it to even a similar sized can it's defiantly off lighter construction (if that's what you meant).

And that's good going also.

I must admit I like the idea of something small enough to sling in the draw as we don't have a very big kitchen and hence work_top_space. However, the mains powered ones look like they might be a bit more powerful (40W I think)?

We'll keep our eyes open. ;-)

Cheers, T i m