Clicker Advise

[awharness]

I am thinking about getting a clicker and I like to research everything before I jump in!~ Used sounds great for several reasons, price being one. New seems like the easier due to warranty, shipping and so on. I am not sure what brand to look for and what size? 10 15 20 Ton? I would be cutting out harness part for the time being! 10-12 oz for the most part! Can anyone shed any light? Ive started to price some options out, but am in NH and would like to find something on the east coast if at all possible!

Thanks

-Andrew

[JLSleather]

From the old days - when I iused to work for a living - the force required is equal to the length of the cut (inches) times the material thickness (inches) times the shear strength of the material (tons). In other words, F=LxTxS

It matters how big a part you have.

If you're cutting 10 oz leather, then your "T" = .160" (or so) and your shear is 1.5. Those won't change much (some leather a little "firmer" than others). So you can combine those two right from the start, which gives you a simpler formula ... now you know that the force you need is .24 tmes the length of your cut. If you want a little "padding" on the force (which is good) you could figure on a press that lets you DOUBLE that, now you have .5 times length of the cut. This is faster, safe, and reliable.

Now, with all that long-winded crap, here's the point about the size of your part.

3" diameter circle: length of cut = 9.42, tonnage = (9.42)(.5) = 4.7 tons

6" diameter circle: length of cut = 18.84, tonnage = (18.42)(.5) = 9.4 tons

Wallet back; length of cut = 25.25, tonnage = (25.25)(.5) = 12.6 tons

9 x 12" notebook (one side): length = 42", tonnage = (42)(.5) = 21 tons

This is an educated guess, and will put you pretty close (keep in mind those numbers are DOUBLE what you should need). Normally, you want to go up one size heavier than you think you need, because of lots of factors. Wear in the slide, firmer leather, dies not dead sharp, all increase pressure.

More down to earth example, if you need to get to the store for a loaf of bread, you could buy a Porsche. The Porsche will work to get the bread, but did you really need to invest $50k ?

Edited December 1, 2010 by JLSleather