Yup, it's actually diy.
The sensible answer is chuck em, but I'm curious about other options. Small wire cutters, the handles close fully but the cutter area isn't fully closed, it needs to rotate a bit further.
Heat red hot & bash: I presume they's bend wrong & jam. Add a bead of weld & regrind: without OEM template its be a mare to get it ground just right. Is there any workable option?
In message snipped-for-privacy@googlegroups.com, Animal snipped-for-privacy@gmail.com writes
The agricultural method. Use a spacer to jam the handles open and then force the jaws closed in your bench vice?
Animal snipped-for-privacy@gmail.com wrote
A Jap would have the decency to disembowel itself.
Never had one do that and its hard to see how that can happen.
Maybe something has got into the hinge and is stopping it closing fully.
Do the jaws end up parallel but not closed or do the jaws end up not quite parallel ?
If they dont close parallel, likely there is a bit of wire left back near the pivot that can be removed with a spike.
Not all cutters do go right through though, to save the bit cut off flying into the works, so to speak and shorting things out. Brian
Sounds like someone has used brute force to try and cut through something way beyond what they were designed for, and bent the handles.
You may find a length of pipe over each handle, and then opening to their max, and then a bit more would fix it.
You would probably just anneal them and destroy the hardening.
You can get "hard facing" mig wire designed for creating wear resistant surfaces and edges on stuff.
Going to be difficult to get in there and regrind though - a flap disk in an AG would probably be the best bet.
Unless this is for entertainment purposes, then a new pair of cutters.
I used to have this problem with a pair of side cutters that I had ground sharp again just too many times. What was limiting them were the two flat faces at the base of each blade which come together around the pivot point when the jaws were closed. I got a few more years of life out of the cutters by using a thin grinding wheel or disc cutter to undercut the metal at that point and allow the blades to move a little further until they closed.
Nick snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.ca
it isn't
read the op
read the op
read the op
That usually happens when someone tries to sharpen them and buggers them up.
Sounds like the handles have bent a bit. Put the cutter jaws in a vice so they can't open and force the handles apart a bit. Nothing to lose.
Cant see that given that the handles never touch.
Over the years I acquired a fairly large number of small (electrical) side cutters and most of them got somewhat abused during their lifetime
- often trying to cut something too hard for them or ,horror of horrors, trying to use them as tin (and other metal) snips. The cutting edge of the blade either rolled or ended up with large chips. The result is that the edge of the blades no longer met.
When I had a clear out nearly all them went to metal recycling and I treated myself to a couple of pairs of good quality cutters and a larger pair that cuts mains cable with relative ease.
My advice - chuck them out
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