Hey guys, I've gotta fabricate a patch panel for the inner quarter; where the inner fender meets the floor of the hatchback- and realized I should get some aviation snips. Can't find a full set (straight, left cut, right cut) from Sears that's compound leverage- their only set has a left cut and right cut- no straight. Okay... straight's not That important, but I'd rather pay $5 extra than $15 extra to get a full set.

So... I found that Home Depot has a set made by Rigid. But, in the description, it says the snips have 40 serrations per inch on the cutting blades. The Craftsman site says nothing about it, and the few Vise Grip ones I've found online don't say anything about serrations.

So, do your snips have serrations? If so, are they Craftsman? And if they do, has it messed up the making of a patch panel? I'm really not into the "extra work" of tapping them flat or grinding them away... now technically, this is on a panel that nobody will ever see- but what if I need to use 'em on an exterior panel one day? Then I'm out buying another set. (ugh)

'Course if everyone's does have serrations, then I'll just drive 5 minutes away and get the Home Depot set and not worry about it. Otherwise I gotta hike to the mall - and if the Sears set has serrations on the blades, that'll be an hour wasted (labor day traffic).

Thanks guys!!!

 

Mine is a set that I got from lowes and it does not have the serrations on the blades. I think that what you are seeing is a new design about like the knives with the serrated blades.

 

Thanks Trickster; I didn't even think of Lowes! (They're 6 minutes away, haha, right next to Home Depot) Did you get them in a set, and were they compound leverage? How do you like 'em? Their website (which has the exact same zip code page that home depot used to have, hmmm) just shows ones made by Wiss with serrated jaws- hopefully Lowes still has the ones you have.

One thing I just noticed too; HD says their upper AND lower jaws are serrated; and Irwin says only their lower jaws are serrated... looks like Home Depot's would do the worst damage.

 

serrations or not they will work fine. any marks left by serrations will be minimal. especially compared to the marks left by welding, i assume you will be welding and grinding smooth??

why are you looking for snips anyhow? didn't you get a plasma cutter?

 

Yeah, I did... but my workbench is in the basement, and I don't want to start a fire! (I'm using the plasma cutter on the quarter panel itself, tho.) Plus I figure snips is the easiest for such a small "quirky" panel. So the serrations aren't a big deal then... that's cool. For this panel I won't really be grinding anything completely smooth (it'll be hidden under undercoating), but that's a damn good point... for any "future" outer panels, I would be welding and grinding, which would get rid of the serrations. Thanks!

 

The serrations are there to counter the tendancy of the shears to slip backwards as you apply pressure.

 

mine are weiss (sp?) plain edge i got when i was still in school, very long time ago. only differance i see is the plain edge ones leave a clean edge cut and the serated ones leave little marks along the cut line. most of the time it wouldn't make any differance. have weiss at work with the serations and couldn't have the marks in cut piece so had to buy smooth ones. got them from snap on.

 

Snap-on eh? Good to know that someone still makes plain jaws! (Too bad they're out of my price range for something I won't use all the time...)

Okay, so, I made my rounds on Labor Day. All of Sears' aviation snips have serrated jaws- including the "Midwest" snips they carried, and Sears's "Companion" home series tools. (Altho the three-set of Companions was only $9.99!) Lowes only sells Wiss w/serrated jaws. Final stop- Home Depot! Their Rigid set had serrated jaws, and so did the Wiss ones.

Also- it was hard to find offset jaws! Sears had a set of two Midwest snips with offset jaws, but some dummy had swapped out all the left cut snips with regular straight jaw'd snips. I was going to tell one of their employees that all of those sets were basically worthless now- but I guess they were all at lunch.

Lowes didn't have any offset ones, either.

Home Depot's $30 set (by Rigid) had straight jaws- and it was the only set they carried. But, they did sell individual Wiss ones with offset jaws.

So for $15 each from Home Depot I got a left-cut and a right cut Wiss snip- both were offset & compound leverage.

Thanks everyone!!

 

what do you mean by offset jaws?

FWIW, I hate the ones with serrated jaws... it helps somewhat when going fast through something, but makes it almost impossible to cut out any fine details.

 

You know how a pair of scissors is? How the cutting end is "even" with the handles end? Well picture scissors with the cutting end twisted about 45 degrees... that's offset.

Like, when you cut a lonnng piece of paper with scissors. Eventually you're midway thru and your hand (working the scissors) is in the middle of the paper. The offset will raise your hand above the middle.

Ah... here; this should help. I shoulda thought of this first.

These are straight-cut snips, from craftsman.com. First is regular blade (tool # 942713 using the part number search from the website), made by craftsman. Second is offset (tool # 942893), made by Midwest. Both are sold by sears...

 

i have 2 sets of 3... one set has serrations, the other doesnt. i didnt notice until i looked at them. they both seem to cut the same.