JLC Mitre for Circular Profiles - Little-cars

[Mike]

Mitre for Circular Profiles
JLC

This handy tool from Czech company JLC is designed for cutting circular profiles squarely. I'm sure you could have worked that out yourself from its name, but there you go. It consists of an aluminium block with a V-shaped groove running down the centre of the top side. On one face of the groove there are four threaded holes and just off centre of the middle, a narrow cut into the groove, which is where you place your razor saw blade.

To cut parts of the same length, simply place the supplied back-stop in one of the four holes and fine-tune the length by sliding it along before applying a firm tweak of the screw to set it in place. Then you place your rod in the groove, holding it in place with one hand whilst sawing with the other. The groove is very narrow, so you'll need a suitably narrow saw, which I believe JLC also sell, although in my pictures I have the earlier CMK version that I've had for years.

It is easy to use, and will accept stock of up to 5mm, although 4mm is more likely the sensible limit to give your saw adequate seating in the groove. Where it shines is giving you the ability to cut repeatable lengths of rod with perfectly square end profiles, something that is difficult to achieve with the Chopper II, which uses a razor blade as a guillotine, and has a tendency to drift off with larger diameter rods.

Conclusion
This is a tool that you will be glad you have around if you are a scratch builder, or regularly work with rod, and once you have it you won't want to go back to the vagaries of hand-cutting. It is well finished, and the provision of four bolt holes gives you a wide choice of lengths up to around 40mm. One thing I would have liked to see is a slightly deeper blade cut, to give you more leeway before blunting your razor saw on the aluminium block.

Highly recommended.

Review sample courtesy of

[bootneck]

Another excellent tool from JLC. I shall order one as soon as I get back from holibobs.

Thanks for the review Mike

Mike