I like your practical style!

Yesterday, I watched clickspring (u-toob) making a card press. I thought it very nice but mine would have been much much simpler.

I have had zero success using that tool to catch moles so there is validity in re-purposing it.

My original suggestion to Neil came from this year's abundance of hazelnuts in my hedgerows and a tremendous variation in size. An ideal nutcracker would be rapidly adjustable for size, limited in closure to avoid crushing (both of which the above tool is capable of) but also aesthetically pleasing, easy to clean and keep hygenic and ideally avoid bits of shell littering the living room carpet. Indeed it should also cope with everything from Brazil nuts through almonds to hazel. A plastic bag and hammer does most of those things quite well too.

Perfection would be pocket-sized and usable as i stroll around the farm.

pgk

That has been a problem in the past but this year the nuts are outnumbering squirrels by enough multiples that I have collected a few kilos – currently spread out on newspaper to stay dry without going musty.

AS machinists, should we not design one with a tool to cut the shell, rather than just crush it (Brute force and Ignorance, etc) Sort of: hold it a 4 jaw and part off the outer end of the shell?

Conventional nut crackers, because of the sudden failure mode of nuts, can result the kernel being crushed into tiny pieces as well as the shell. Eating miniscule bits of kernel, with attached bits of carpet, is not the healthiest diet!

Should this be tongue in cheek?

Howard

Thanks to grey squirrels I haven't seen a wild ripe hazelnut for twenty-plus years.

Neil

P.S. I'm sure Finbarr Saunders would have something to say about this thread…

.

Something along these lines [suitably scaled] would be better than the 4-jaw

**LINK**

https://www.ebay.com/itm/392423399783

MichaelG.

pgk – seriously, for hedgerow nutting, I have great success with a middle-sized (9"-10&quot pair of water-pump pliers – whilst slightly too big for the back pocket, they do fit comfortably in a waxed cotton jacket, have a cut-out in the jaws, and the long handles give such control that the shell can be cracked without crushing the kernel, particularly once one gets a feel for the adjustment. I've never looked back!

Like the serrations – cast-in, filed or shaped?

Does it retain the kernel when the shell cracks, or does it all fall into the dish?

This was my version of a nutcracker which I designed and prototyped to be injection moulded in polyacetal. Several metal parts formed the mechanism.

I based the action on a typical mastic-gun mechanism. The (fly-back) release was spring-loaded using the same lever seen at the front of this picture.

Please excuse the poor quality images, they are rephotographed (digitised) from paper prints.

Although parts were eventually injection moulded (and could be snapped together with integral 'undercuts' minus those crude 'U' shaped clips), I never got to see the finished article. I was informed by a colleague however, that they were 'perfect' for cracking lobster claws.

The acid test for a nutcracker would surely be opening macadamia nuts?

BTW, there are more even poorer images in my nut-cracker photo album.

Sam

That reminds me of the old “Crackerjack” design – only they used a ratchet bar that eventually failed (before I had the wherewithal to replicate it in better than die-cast form. Now called a ‘bar craft nut cracker by kitchencraft (but currently unavailable). The crackerjack performed superbly unless worn out or over-loaded. I would buy one if I saw a decentbone at a car boot, now that I could make spare parts. Quite a lot on epay.

The above design seems to largely replicate that design in most ways.

Hi, I've never been able to get any of the Hazelnuts from the tree on my patch and the squirrels don't get a look in either, because the birds peck them off while they are still very green. The birds must find something they like in the bit where the nuts joint the tree, because they are not interested in the nuts, as they all lay on the ground still in their just opening husks.

Regards Nick.