Cutting Stock with Bolt Cutters

• Here is something that I picked up from Steve Joslyn, one of the featured demonstrators at MASA’s Metalsmith Conference September 2007. To cut small size stock, you can clamp your bolt cutters in the vice and use it like a shear. I tried this and found that in my leg vice which does not have serrated jaws, the bolt cutters tended to slip, but when I used my machinist vice it worked rather well for cutting ¼” round and square stock.

-- AlbinDrzewianowski - 25 Jan 2008

• If you have the larger 36 inch or 48 inch bolt cutters you can also put one handle on the floor or ground holding it steady with your foot and push down on the other handle with both hands.

-- TpCurtis - 09 Feb 2008