Homemade Scriber

In my opinion, the best scriber is the back of the blade of a craft knife. But the blade gets dull too fast if I use it often. So I decided to make my own scriber from old blades and some popsicle sticks.

Step 1 Materials

Here are the materials you need:

1. 2 popsicle sticks
2. craft knife blade / 1 piece of box cutter blade
3. glue that can be used in metal and wood. Read the back of the glue to make sure it can do the job.
4. pencil / marker
5. craft knife or box cutter
6. rubber band - optional
7. cutting mat - optional

Comments

[Ray from RI]

Am I correct that you are using the dull end as a way of showing how to recycle a dull blade? Also do I assume correctly once you have made the craft knife you are re-sharpening the dull edge so you can use it?

My next concern is since the blade is so short, popsicle sticks may not be a good choice of wood to use as a handle material. If you put too much pressure on the blade especially a dull one it would either get push into the wooden handle or it could break out of the handle entirely.

A better choice of wood would be a local hard wood of some kind. You could split a 3/4 to one inch diameter hard wood tree lime and let it dry, while you put some boards and weight on the 2 halves so they do not warp as they dry. Or if you have some hardwood fire wood split out some already dried pieces of wood and flatten the side you plan to glue together before you mount the blade and glue the wood together.

Otherwise I think this is a decent project. It shows how you can a smaller handled knife for finer detailed type engraving work. A smaller rounder handle allows you better fine hand control that you cannot necessarily get with a larger clunkier blade. Also this kind of knife would make a great carpenters marking knife.
Excellent idea!!!

[kayu05]

Hi Ray! I'm actually using it as a scoring tool for paper modeling so I don't need to sharpen it. I've been using it for a while now and it's holding really well. I think the glue is protecting the blade from cutting through the popsicle stick.

Thanks for the suggestion to use hard wood! But sad to say I don't have any tools for woodworking. I'll keep this in mind when I need to make a new one.

[heavyfire88]

... You kidding ? Approximately 50 blades cost 6 bucks in my country ( its about 10 liras )
With those 50 blades you will probably cut anything you like for about a year. I can make up to 30 RC planes with 50 blades.
Nice and cool instructable but not very effective.

[kayu05]

In my country, 1 X-acto blade costs about 1 us dollar in a popular store. If you can get lucky you can find 25 Olfa blades for 5 dollars. Finding another use for an expensive dull blade makes sense to me.
BTW, I’m really envious that you can buy such cheap blades. Anything hobby or craft related is expensive here. sigh~

[meddler]

I've been getting tools together to start some scrimshaw work and this might be a really good tool for that. I'll have to give it a try and see.

[xenor]

Prisoners the world over thank you. ;)

[embochner]

cool idea, i did something similar only i used a toothbrush instead of popsicle sticks, i didnt think of that

http://www.instructables.com/id/Toothbrush-X-Acto-knife/

[kayu05]

Thanks! I guess mine would be just cheaper to make. :)