[Babba]

Aargh !

I've gone thru 3 sets of cheap, cast monkey metal nutcrackers this season already & I still have about 2 lb's of the damn things still left to crack.

I have a small CNC mill capability & even smaller capability to design, code & machine a suitable design which will hopefully last longer than 3x Hazlenuts & 2x Brazils.

I've knocked this up in Autocad 2007 & hope to make it from 6082 T6 aluminium, could someone with lots of materials, stress, MTBF etc experience, please take a look & tell me I'm not wasting my time?

I'm hoping that an M6 stainless socket head screw will survive being a hinge, the curved surfaces I intend to machine teeth on (somehow) & the whole lot 'could be anodised if need be.

Will 6082 in this design stand up to the rigours of cracking Hazlenuts & Brazil nuts without straining & finally giving up the ghost?

I'm not worried about Walnuts, only the missus likes Walnuts & if she wants a Walnut cracker then she can bloody well make her own :devious:

[handlewanker]

Hmmmmm, I don't have Autocad so couldn't see the design.

I have a beautifull nut cracker I got way back in 1974, and it's shaped like a small fly press, or actually like a horseshoe with a bottom anvil....the screw is in the top.

The body is made from die cast Zinc, and plated with a satin Nickel finish.

It cracks any nuts known to Man, progressively and without shattering the kernel, and will handle Wallnuts too...Brazils are a breeze.

Before I got the press I tried to use a lathe drive carrier....(anyone turning a job between centres will have one of these), and it worked after a fashion, provided you picked the pieces up as they tend to go in all directions.

I have resorted to a pair of vice grips, but after getting the skin on my finger nipped between the side of the jaws....chucked it.

Wear glasses if'n you are tempted to use a toffee hammer, as Wallnuts are lethal projectiles, and Hazels are finger nippers.
Ian.