Home Forums Hunting & Shooting AR and Tactical Rifles Made myself a hot wire foam cutter

Was wanting a couple hard cases to care a couple of my AR's PD hunting this summer so I made myself a foam cutter here's how it turned out.



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Nice.

Sweet!

VERY well done!

As someone who's tried to get by with sharp knives, your project truly inspires.

Specs? Instructions?

Very nice, I've always wanted to try that.

Whatcha got hidden in the power supply box?

Ni chrome wire for the cutter?

What voltage to the cutter wire?

Curious and nosey folks wanta know and duplicate your success

Thanks guys yes Ni chrome wire so it can handle the heat and the box contains a transformer that will produce 24volt and up to 10amps then I used a light dimmer to regulate the amount of power that is sent to the transformer and that also control's the wire heat.

Here's some other pictures


Here is the transformer.

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This is a 1/4" J bolt and compression spring I bought at the hardware store.
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This is the bottom and I used a
2 1/2"X1/4" carriage bolt to hold the wire in line.
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Here is what I made to trace the guns.

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Then I used poster board from the Craft shop to make template to cut out the foam.

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Hope this answers some of your questions.

That's awesome, thanks!

Do you use regular steel wire?

The templates are brilliant.

Nicely done!

No nickel chromium wire 26 gauge you can buy it on eBay for about $5 shipped.

I just pinned the template to the foam and ran the wire alongside it to cut it out.

Nice. Just don't change scopes...

looks pretty handy to me

Maybe you could post a parts list and drawings?

Is that actually an AC transformer or a AC to DC power converter?

Dang, SORRY I forgot to tell you how good that looked in my first post.
Great job, unlike the knife work that most of us attempt, that usually ends up looking like it was done by a rabid beaver your case looks great.

Thank you for the cutting equipment design information also.

Yes it's an AC transformer.

Sorry I didn't have any drawings I just built it as I went.

There is a place called Jacobs online that sells transformer's for foam Cutters.

Thanks. It looks like their transformers are big!

You did a very nice job!

Thanks. I believe they carry smaller transformers also. But if you don't use one that is big enough it will not be able to heat up the wire.

Ray Brandes of Ray-Vin used to have a schematic and instructions for a foam cutter. I'll see if it's still up there.

If I may, my son and I made one for a school project. Not as nice as yours, but it worked fine. We used an HO train speed control for a power source and music wire.
Hope it helps.

Well now, that's mighty slick! Thanks for sharing.

(Ok, now there's another thing on the list to build...)

Yes alot of guys use the train controller I didn't have one. I also have heard of guys using guitar strings but they supposedly don't last as long before they burn through.

I build hammered dulcimers, so I have several sizes of music wire on spools.

Nice plan there. A cheap Harbor Freight battery charger, a dimmer switch = power supply.

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