Best Stripboard Trace Cutting Tool?

[JenniferG]

I see this Duratool one on Amazon.  Don't know how good it is.

https://www.amazon.com/Duratool-21-17250-Track-Cutter-by/dp/B00DJZGZK2

I need one. 

[jpanhalt]

I don't know either.  I have used a #11 X-Acto blade, and it works, but my preferred method is a very small, half-round, burr cutter in a Dremel.  Quick, easy, and very little chance of the knife going way too far. 

I have also used an ordinary drill bit with an wider included angle than the standard 118°; although, a 118° drill will work.  135° is what I have.  Put it in a pin vvise and drill by hand.

[Andy Watson]

The handle looks to be too big. With those style track-cutters you have to rotate your entire hand several times for each cut. I have an official "vero" cutter with a smaller handle - and it's still too big. I prefer to use a 1/8" drill bit in a pin-vice/ type of chuck. You don't need much torque and very little pressure to make the cut. The pin-vice can be turned severlal times between your thumb and finger - no need to keep re-adjusting your grip.

[mag_therm]

It needs to be slightly wider than the track.
I have used those, and agree with jpan, Andy, not necessary, and the alternatives are just as effective

[BILLPOD]

On the Amazon reviews there are as many bad reviews as good ones.  personally, I would stay away.

[Ian.M]

That tool looks like a PITA to use.  You want one with a much slimmer rounder handle, and a much shorter tip so you can easily twiddle it between fingers and thumb, as its easier to cut the tracks controllably with several twists of a *sharp* cutter with light pressure, rather than trying to do it with one twist and heavy pressure.  See https://verotl.com/enclosures/verowire-accessory-spot-face-cutter-part-number-22-0239 for the original Vero tool, but even that is a bit bigger/longer than I like.

Personally I like a 3.5mm drill bit epoxied in a hole drilled down the center of a 10 or 12mm dia wooden dowel approx. 50mm long as a handle, with its end edges chamfered enough to be comfortable to grip.  Use a sharp brand-new HSS drill bit and leave it protruding approx. 15mm to 20mm from the handle, then when the epoxy has set, apply heatshrink or plastidip over it to within a few mm of the cutting tip for a better grip.

Hint: Use brightly colored heatshrink or plastidip so you can actually find it again after it invariably rolls off your bench! 

[themadhippy]

How much?? talk about mark up
https://cpc.farnell.com/duratool/3360568a/cutter-track/dp/PC01227?ost=track+cutter
get yerself some 2.5mm  brad drill bits,job done.

[EPAIII]

I just use a 1/8" drill bit in my drill press. I set the depth stop to allow it to cut through the trace and not through the board. The holes in the board guide it nicely and by using the depth stop you can do a several dozen holes in no time at all. I use a Sharpie marker to mark the locations in advance. As for the angle of the drill bit's tip, I never worried about it but the ones I used were the more common 118 degree ones.

Oh, Vero makes a hand tool for this:

https://www.newark.com/vero/22-0239/cutter-spot-face/dp/10WX4170


Note: My drill press is one that I paid about $50 for many years ago. I modified the depth stop with what is called a push-button nut. It allows the depth to be adjusted quickly: you push the button on the nut and just move it straight up or down to the approximate position without turning it. Then you fine tune it by rotation. You can get a setting that's accurate to a thousandth of an inch (0.025mm). And the spring on the button holds it in the set position so you don't fumble with a lock nut. The time and difficulty of setting the depth stop is the big reason why no one ever uses the OEM ones. These push-button nuts completely solve that problem. McMaster has them: see the link below. There are a lot of modifications for drill presses on the web but, in my opinion, they are the one ABSOLUTE MUST for any drill press that is used more often than once a century.

https://www.mcmaster.com/nuts/nut-type~push-button/

I don't know either.  I have used a #11 X-Acto blade, and it works, but my preferred method is a very small, half-round, burr cutter in a Dremel.  Quick, easy, and very little chance of the knife going way too far. 

I have also used an ordinary drill bit with an wider included angle than the standard 118°; although, a 118° drill will work.  135° is what I have.  Put it in a pin vvise and drill by hand.

[jpanhalt]

The disadvantage of a drill that many of us use is that when applied to a hole, you lose the hole as a solder joint.  I do it and have done it on boards with non-specialized tracks, but when using something like a Sparkfun board that is laid out in the typical solderless breadboard fashion, that extra hole may be needed.  Thus, I usually cut the trace with a Dremel like tool. 

I will try again to find a picture.

[Calambres]

Many years ago I bought this tool. I bought it from RS components. It works really well, it's easy to use and have used it a lot...

[Ian.M]

The disadvantage of a drill that many of us use is that when applied to a hole, you lose the hole as a solder joint.  I do it and have done it on boards with non-specialized tracks, but when using something like a Sparkfun board that is laid out in the typical solderless breadboard fashion, that extra hole may be needed.  Thus, I usually cut the trace with a Dremel like tool. 

I will try again to find a picture.

Yes.  Its also difficult to tolerate the loss of a hole when mounting IDC headers (or any other parts with adjacent rows of 0.1" pitch pins).

My usual 'goto' method for those situations is to use an Xacto knife (or similar) to score across the track twice very close together midway between two holes (using a steel ruler to guide the blade if cutting more than one track) then to use a sharp pointed probe to peel up the sliver of copper between the two score marks.  Check under magnification that there's no whiskers of copper remaining bridging the break.

However this needs to be done with the board flat on your bench, preferably on a non-slip cutting mat *before* you mount any components as it very difficult to make the cut accurately and safely once there are any parts on the board.

[jpanhalt]

I found pictures to illustrate what I said said earlier about saving holes.

1) Top shows a typical situation (column 42)
2) Bottom shows the cut that allows that
3) I gotten better at doing it in the ensuing years

[BillyO]

The handle looks to be too big. With those style track-cutters you have to rotate your entire hand several times for each cut. I have an official "vero" cutter with a smaller handle - and it's still too big. I prefer to use a 1/8" drill bit in a pin-vice/ type of chuck. You don't need much torque and very little pressure to make the cut. The pin-vice can be turned severlal times between your thumb and finger - no need to keep re-adjusting your grip.

+1

I too use a pin vice.  Mine is double ended with a 1/8 in one end for cutting and 3/64 in the other for making holes a bit bigger for components with thick leads.   It is much, much faster, cleaner and more versatile than working with a knife.

[BillyO]

The disadvantage of a drill that many of us use is that when applied to a hole, you lose the hole as a solder joint.  I do it and have done it on boards with non-specialized tracks, but when using something like a Sparkfun board that is laid out in the typical solderless breadboard fashion, that extra hole may be needed.  Thus, I usually cut the trace with a Dremel like tool. 

I will try again to find a picture.

Why not just apply the drill to the trace between the holes?  That's how I do it and it works just fine.

[Kasper]

When I did a lot of track cuts, I used a dremil with ball head.  I liked that because I could cut trace quickly and remove solder mask to solder component over cut trace.

Now that I rarely cut tracks I use a tungsten carbide metal scribe.  Similar to the link below.  Faster to grab this from my soldering kit than pulling out the dremil.  I make 2 cuts and pick out the copper between them.

Scribing Pen Tool Tungsten Carbide Point Tip Scriber Craft Tool Metal Engraver Carving https://a.co/d/j65bgmP

[TimFox]

Has anyone tried a brad-point carbide drill bit, say, 1/8" diameter?
They are expensive, but I prefer brad-point bits for drilling reasonable-size holes in FR-4, with or without copper.
McMaster-Carr charges $21.16 for a 1/8" uncoated carbide brad-point bit.

[themadhippy]

Its also difficult to tolerate the loss of a hole when mounting IDC headers (or any other parts with adjacent rows of 0.1" pitch pins).

you sound like an ideal customer for my bodgacon adaptors

[Mechatrommer]

a while a go, i bought few of this... each blade has few segments... cut left and right, peel and done. also can be used on paper and overgrown nails...



also i have this, but the blade only one segment and worn out quickly, so its my less favourite tool...



i also keep one x-acto style knife, still in a box unused for years, i'll keep that for if i want to do some kidney surgery... if i want to do heavy duty pcb cutting, my steel handsaw with mini table clamp is ready... learn from a man and work like a man ymmv.

[ledtester]

Does anyone have recommendations for a tool to cut lines in copper clad like this:




This image comes from the video:

Techniques and Strategies for Building Electronic Circuits -- Leo's Bag of Tricks
https://youtu.be/vq968AFgPhg

Leo suggests fashioning a tool from an Exacto blade using a Dremel and a grinding wheel (see at 1:55 in the video):



but I'm curious if there is some other tool like the tungsten scribe which would also work.

[jpanhalt]

CNC engraver.  If you are OK with the cut lines going to the edges, I have used my miniature table saw with a thin kerf carbide blade to do it.