P3D Re: Polaroid Film Cutter

["John Goodman" <jgood@xxxxxxxx>]

On 16 Nov 99, JVapor7@xxxxxxx wrote:

> Could somebody please elaborate on this cutter?  I hear it mentioned from 
> time to time.  Is is still available?

Don't know about retail, but there was a recent eBay Dutch 
auction

http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=195981426

where they went for $10. I bid on a couple but the deal's 
not consumated yet (no contact at this point). The seller 
may have a few left.

I got one to see if it was better than the unlit Hama that 
Reel-3D sells. The cutting action of the P blade is nicer, 
but overall they are about equal, IMHO. I didn't like that the 
P's blade didn't swing up more than about 45 degrees, 
was in the way of seeing the cut, so I carved out some 
plastic to let the blade swing up higher and then found that 
the moveable blade departed from the fixed blade when 
swung up higher; the fixed blade isn't any longer than it has 
to be. (If the plastic is carved right, this behavior might be 
avoided.) The spring pushing the moveable blade into the 
fixed blade is nice, but has to be finessed after the blades 
have parted contact. The angled touch knob on the blade is 
smart, as the cutting force is directed into the shear line.

The P's toothed advance wheel is a better idea than the 
H's friction advance, but there's play somewhere that I 
haven't found out how to eliminate, so the film isn't really 
immobilized, which is bad. With the H, the flim is a sloppy 
fit in the slot, so the cut angle can vary (not that this 
matters much). Then there's the sloped portion where the 
cut-away chip falls when using the P cutter, compared with 
the H's easier arrangement. The low cost of the P cutter 
makes experimenting with it relatively painless, though.

JG