[HCARC] Cutting COAX Cable

[Gary J - N5BAA]

Kerry,

It's not getting the coax ready for the connector I was having trouble with. 
I was just wanting a good clean square cut when cutting the coax off of the 
spool, or cutting it to length.  All of the "wire cutters" I had tried were 
crushing the end of the Coax down to an oval and messing up the dielectric. 
I was looking for a tool to give me a nice clean sharp cut all the way 
through the coax.  It turns out that my PVC pipe cutter has a sharp enough 
blade to slice right through the coax without mashing it into an oval.  I 
have had for some time on of the gray, multi bladed coax end preparation 
tools that Arlene got for me as a birthday present for prepping the coax 
ends for attaching the fitting.  All one has to do with that is adjust the 
blades cutting depth properly for the kind of coax being used and then 
insert the coax (LMR-400 in my case) and it cuts the right depth and length 
each time all at once.  I think it cost her about $10.00 on Ebay.  What 
hasn't been working well with it is to have the end of the coax be out of 
round so that the blades cut differently as it is twisted around the coax - 
hence my search for a tool to keep the coax round vs oval.

Gary J
N5BAA

-----Original Message----- 
From: Kerry Sandstrom
Sent: Thursday, December 18, 2014 3:34 PM
To: Gary J - N5BAA ; HCARC Reflector
Subject: Re: [HCARC] Cutting COAX Cable

Gary,

When I had a test team 40 years ago, I remember my NCO's (Ground Radio
Repair types) had a little thing that looked like a pipe cutter but for
soft metals like copper.  It really only had to do a couple sizes, a
little under 1/2 " and a little under 1/4 ".  We used mostly RG-223/U
(similar to RG-58/U except double shield) with some RG-214/U and RG-9/U
(similar to RG-8/U except double silvered shields).  I think it had some
kind of a thumb screw to adjust the size, but that was too many years
ago.  I've never looked for something like that but I bet there might be
something like that around.  As I said I would be more concerned about
cutting the jacket and the braid.  When I want a nice even square cut, i
use a single edge razor blade to cut the inner insulation.  I often
still have to use a wire cutter to pull the insulation off the center
conductor, especially for RG-8 and larger sizes.

Kerry


On 12/18/2014 2:17 PM, Gary J - N5BAA wrote:
> I think I will try using my PVC cutter.  It ratchets sort of like the one 
> I posted from Ebay.  I use it all of the time for doing PVC pipe and 
> hopefully it will also do soft wire (copper/aluminum) Coax cables.  It 
> would be nice to have one tool that is multi-purpose.  I agree Kerry, 
> there is an ART to cutting the outer insulation without doing in the wire 
> braid.  I usually have to try a couple of times to get it right.
>
> Gary J
> N5BAA
>



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