Cut Metal Pins for Mechanical Models

This is a simple and mostly harmless approach to the problem of cutting a metal rod to a given length for mechanical models. I always fear to hurt myself or my environment when using Dremel type machines while fiddling with small or thin parts. So here is my (almost) manual way of preserving inner calmness while doing what I have to do. Well, sort of...

Metal rod

Calipers

Pen and paper

Vice

Metal hand saw

Cordless screwdriver

Measure the thickness t of your saw blade using calipers.

Add t to the desired pin length l. Write down the sum s.

Open your caliper until it reads the exact value of s.

Carefully tighten the lock screw.

Clamp the metal rod into your vice using the depth rod of your calipers as a guide for the length of the protruding part.

Carefully saw the metal rod keeping the side of the vice's jaw in touch with the side of the saw blade.

Deburr and chamfer the pin with a grindstone (ab)using your cordless screwdriver as a lathe.

You can easily get pins of length l with a precision of ±0.1mm. You can further enhance precision by using a fine metal saw blade and cutting grease.

If you are here because you are building the Tourbillon Mechanica Tri-Axial or a similar project, feel free to comment whether this was helpful.

Please drop me a note if you find spelling mistakes or linguistic inaccuracies. English is not my native language. Thanks!