Knife set

I notice every Christmas several of the building supply/hardware chains, such as Menards and HD offer low priced kits of knife sets and rotary tool accessory sets.  They are a great way to stock up on blades and rotary bits/tools.

Goldhammer, on those low priced sets, look at the handle, right where the blade attaches.

If you see a sort of "bulge" of what looks like colored rubber right there, that is because it really is rubber.

Those don't hold a blade firmly enough to do precision work if you put the slightest pressure on your knife.

Now, if you want to have a few handles around for "light work", like curling an area of flash off a model, those will work for that,,,,,,but, if you do anything heavier, the blade will move back in that handle.

One thing they do very well is give us a place to chuck "odd" things into blade handles to create our own tools, such as locking tweezers, stir sticks, home made scribers, etc.

I have two sets of the Micro Mark "on sale" large sets of knives from well meaning friends, those are the same thing, just rubber pinched in around the blade as it is tightened.

Rex

I opened the package to see if they are that way.  Suprise.  Full alum. collet that threads into metal way down past the finger hold.  Looks to be OK at least for now.  This is their new Hyper-Tough line.  Granted, made in China, but what isn't these days......

Cool, glad to see that they are not the Micro Mark sets.

I'll bug Ms Santa to get a set or two for my stocking.

Sounds like a nice little deal. Will have to go check them out.

I bought a little box of knives once at Harbor Freight, for about $2.00. There were three X-acto-like handles and a bunch of blades, in a little hinged plastic box. They were utterly worthless. The handles were made of cheap aluminum tubing, and the blades were so dull that they wouldn't cut paper. I threw the whole thing out.

A contractor once made an observation that I thought was pretty profound: "Harbor Freight is an ok place to buy a tool you're only going to use once." In the case of that knife set, I couldn't even do that.

I think several distributors buy those blades and handles from a few different manufacturers (probably in China). Sometimes the cheap brands seem to be identical to what X-acto and X-cel sell; sometimes not. I guess you pays your money and you takes your chances.

my first "X-Acto-type" knife was an off brand that included a few various styles of blades in a handy little holder. It didn't hold a blade at all. Slipped right out when doing anything remotely under pressure.

I've got a black rubber handled X-Acto knife that has a bulge that keeps it from rolling away and a clear plastic cap. It's a good tool. Stack of 15 replacement X-Acto #11 blades for $3.99 at Michael's so I bought two. Thirty blades should last me a good long time.

I'm lucky I guess as I haven't bought a knife or set since I got one for Christmas in the '80s, back when Xacto and USA were on the same handle.