Loaf cutters and slicers?

I'm having trouble getting uniform bars from my soap loaves. I'm using a plastic cutter from eBay. I'm ready to move on to something that can give me a 5oz bar, or quite close, every time. I charge the same price for each bar but some are up to an oz more of where I want them. I would never sell anything under what I advertise. So 4.8oz bars drive me nuts.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Y-LINE-HDPE...234?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item232727c18a


What cutters are you all using? Pics?

I have a ten inch mold, so that's how big my loafs are. I unmold, hold a ruler straight across the side of it (one side flush with the bottom to make sure it's straight) and use my dough cutter to make long lines from the inch markings up. That way, when I go to cut, I look from the top, make sure it's completely straight, and push down.

I'd use one of those fancy wire cutter ones but I can't afford $200 to drop on one. This way I can also change the size of the bars if I want much easier.

I have a nice little 4" X 4" graded square that I use to cut my soap loaves.

I have a soap a
Wavy/Straight Soap Cutter
from Creekside Soaps. It runs about $68. It gives you choices on
the size of your soaps, as well as wavy or straight. It accepts any length loaf mold.

You can get a Straight blade only for about $40

It's well made and I've been really happy with the results!

Hope this helps

Here is a link to a great cutter maker post.
http://www.soapmakingforum.com/f30/new-soap-cutter-31185/
Click on the link in the first post. Then on his name for more products. He has a single bar cutter for $75 dollars and it is marked for different thickness. I just bought one well worth the money. Or buy a miter box that has notches for straight and angle cuts. It works well and is cheap, you can get a plastic one at Lowes in the wood tools section. It is made to cut angles for molding and such.

Great! Thank you all. I like the ruler marking until I get one of those harp looking cutters. Thanks for the feedback.

I used to have a Delsie Adjustable Cutter that I loved oh so much. It cut with a guitar wire and you could adjust it to any height you wanted. You stand the soap on end and slide it through the wire giving you beautiful, perfectly uniform slices.

Unfortunately I sold mine. There are plans for a similar cutter on the Tallow Soaps Yahoogroup files section. The actual Delsie was a little different.

I'm hoping to get someone to make me one like the Delsie, but for now I've rigged up a temporary one. I took a wine box and cut slits into each side in the middle of the long side of the box with a hacksaw. I screwed little eye screws in the back of the outside of the box and wrapped a thin guitar wire around one eye screw (i marked a line on each side exactly one inch from the bottom to place the wire in the slits), then I wrapped the wire around the eye screw on the other side. I had to use pliers to pull the wire tight, and I really didn't get it tight enough. But still, my cuts turned out perfect on the soap.

The Delsie was better because you could adjust your height and adjust the tension on the wire with the guitar tuning knob thingy on one side. Anyway, I don't know if any of this made any sense at all.

Has anyone considered a simple cheese cutting board? You can put something against the end to make a steady edge, so you can cut your bars the same size, and also change bar size easily. This model is less then $20.00.

Here's the link:

http://www.amazon.com/Prodyne-BB-120-Butcher-Cheese-Slicer/dp/B000BL1MZA/ref=sr_1_4?s=kitchen&ie=UTF8&qid=1359168983&sr=1-4

Donna said:

I have a soap a
Wavy/Straight Soap Cutter
from Creekside Soaps. It runs about $68. It gives you choices on
the size of your soaps, as well as wavy or straight. It accepts any length loaf mold.

You can get a Straight blade only for about $40

It's well made and I've been really happy with the results!

Hope this helps

Click to expand...

Wow that's a nice looking cutter and not to pricey! I bought a big wire thing it works pretty good but it really cost me! Where were you when I needed you, Donna:wink:

Pretty soap love that color!

I like that Creekside cutter. It's the only adjustable one I've seen other than the Delsie. I also like the cheese cutter. I know a lot of people use those, too.

I use a cutter from Chestnut Farms. It's used like a big egg slicer. It may be a little pricey to some but the resulting bars are uniform and square. I love it and highly recommend it.

http://www.chestnutfarms.com/Soap_and_supplies/cutters/log_slicer/index.htm

melstan775 said:

Has anyone considered a simple cheese cutting board? You can put something against the end to make a steady edge, so you can cut your bars the same size, and also change bar size easily. This model is less then $20.00.

Here's the link:

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000BL1MZA/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

Click to expand...

this is great. maybe i can check out if i can get hold of this.

I just recently made a huge leap and purchased one of Bud's cutters. This one -http://www.etsy.com/listing/1004172...type=gallery&ga_ship_to=US&ga_search_type=all

I would highly recommend his cutters. It is so nice to place the log on the cutter and slice away, within seconds all the bars are cut and the SAME thickness!! :-D

twinmom said:

I just recently made a huge leap and purchased one of Bud's cutters. This one -http://www.etsy.com/listing/1004172...type=gallery&ga_ship_to=US&ga_search_type=all

I would highly recommend his cutters. It is so nice to place the log on the cutter and slice away, within seconds all the bars are cut and the SAME thickness!! :-D

Click to expand...

I bought one, too, and I love it! It's very well made, and it's so nice to have uniform bars. I got the 1.25" one so I could have chunkier bars. It cuts my loaves into 9 bars, plus 2 sample-sized bars.

Yep, I have one of Bud's on my cart right now. He is adding an option to buy one (for another $20) with a wire tightener for each wire, instead of one for 2 wires because getting even tension on both sides of the wire can be difficult.

I really want one of Bud's guillotine cutters (esp after seeing 805 soap demo it) but I think I might take Melstan's idea of the cheese cutter... looking at it I'm not sure the wire will hold... what do you all think?? I did see a youtube video tutorial about getting certain items from home depot and making a diy mitre box of sorts.

danahuff said:

I bought one, too, and I love it! It's very well made, and it's so nice to have uniform bars. I got the 1.25" one so I could have chunkier bars. It cuts my loaves into 9 bars, plus 2 sample-sized bars.

Click to expand...

i bought one too and loooove it!