Hand-held Key Cutters

[escher7]

Lishi and I think Klom make plier type key cutters. I know they probably don't adjust for angle but can you cut a regular brass blank with them? How good are the results? I have seen them for sale on Dhgate and Aliexpress for around $40 which seems reasonable, even if you have to dress the key a bit after.

[AULockpicker]

I wish I could tell you. I sent away for one of these and never received it, got a refund thankfully.

I am a little concerned about using them for brass keys as I think the key cutter may be a little overworked cutting those. I'd be thinking you'd have to take very small snips at a time if they did work on brass. I'd still like to know as well. They are really designed for cutting those flat keys aren't they? Auto keys if you like moreso than house or padlock keys? I'm still eager to find out though.

[mdc5150]

The Lishi snips are special purpose. There are 3 piece keys that you can buy. One piece you never cut and you maintain to use over and over. The other pieces are the same and you snip those to form the side cuts of a laser cut key, then place them both onto the main piece you never throw away and use them to duplicate onto a permanent key and to test to make sure you decoded properly.

There were some other keys when I bought some standard Lishi tools that were marked out with lines for spaces and depths. But that was so you could cut it by eye sight on a standard key machine.

[MacGyver101]

I have the Lishi one, and it works not badly for what it is. No professional locksmith is going to use this for regular key cutting, but it does make nice clean cuts in brass blanks.

Because everything is free-hand, I usually end up using a set of calipers to lightly scribe some marks onto the blank, as a cutting guide. On the downside, it's an extra challenge to work with any key profile that isn't reasonably flat on at least one side; Kwickset keys cut pretty easily, for example, but Schlage can be a challenge to line up, as they twist a bit as you apply pressure. On the upside, there's no slop / wiggle in the pliers: you can very easily go back and trim a small shaving off if you misjudged and cut something slightly shallow, for example.

Bottom line: I've owned them for three years, and have probably only cut a dozen keys on them, in order to make working keys for a few locks in my collection, and a couple of house keys once when I was going on vacation and realized late one night that I needed a spare for a house sitter.

I find them handy, and they're worth $60 to me... but I wouldn't value them (personally) at much more than that

On a related not, I was curious to see how well it worked, and just ordered and received a Roto-Smith assembly for duplicating keys using a Dremel; I'll see if I can get a review posted this weekend.

[escher7]

I have the Lishi one, and it works not badly for what it is. No professional locksmith is going to use this for regular key cutting, but it does make nice clean cuts in brass blanks.

Because everything is free-hand, I usually end up using a set of calipers to lightly scribe some marks onto the blank, as a cutting guide. On the downside, it's an extra challenge to work with any key profile that isn't reasonably flat on at least one side; Kwickset keys cut pretty easily, for example, but Schlage can be a challenge to line up, as they twist a bit as you apply pressure. On the upside, there's no slop / wiggle in the pliers: you can very easily go back and trim a small shaving off if you misjudged and cut something slightly shallow, for example.

Bottom line: I've owned them for three years, and have probably only cut a dozen keys on them, in order to make working keys for a few locks in my collection, and a couple of house keys once when I was going on vacation and realized late one night that I needed a spare for a house sitter.

I find them handy, and they're worth $60 to me... but I wouldn't value them (personally) at much more than that
On a related not, I was curious to see how well it worked, and just ordered and received a Roto-Smith assembly for duplicating keys using a Dremel; I'll see if I can get a review posted this weekend.

Thanks for the info. I did see a video of some English guy cutting a brass bump key with one and it seemed to work OK. As mentioned, I have seen them for around $40 Canadian, delivered so I will likely order one.

I took a look at the Roto-smith online. It looks OK for light jobs, but I can see problems long-term with the light construction of some of the parts. Certainly not for heavy use by a pro, but a cheap alternative for the locksport community.
As usual, we Canadians get stuck with an extra $40 for postage which sucks. The site also shows a key vice which looks OK. I'll look for your review.

[MacGyver101]

As usual, we Canadians get stuck with an extra $40 for postage which sucks. The site also shows a key vice which looks OK. I'll look for your review.

He's selling them on eBay now, for "only" $19 shipping.