Unfortunately it was vague about what sizes it works on so I started searching for others – I found a couple but some of the reviews said they did not fit the size that was needed or they worked for installing, but not for removing, or that they wore out after a few uses. So, I was not eager to blow $30 on something that might not work, but I was able to see a picture of one and thought “I could probably make one of those.” I have previously thought about just grinding a slot into the middle of a flat blade but never got around to doing it.
I took a few rough measurements and determined that the e-clip that I wanted to remove has an outside diameter of 7mm. The pin that it is retaining has a diameter of 4mm and the opening in the clip seems to be about 3.5mm.
I scrounged around the shop for a suitable thin piece of metal and decided that an almost-ready-for-the-recycling-bin hacksaw blade would work. My initial plan was just to drill a couple holes, connect the dots and round off some corners with a Dremel tool and be done with it. First attempt to center punch a mark in the blade did not make a mark, so I whacked it a bit harder and the blade snapped – I never expected a hacksaw blade to be that brittle. New plan – just use the Dremel on my freshly snapped off blade…
My first try was to duplicate what I saw online – like this.
My solution was to add another layer to the tool so that the top layer would slide over the shaft and contain the clip somewhat. It worked!
My 2 layers of very roughly cut hacksaw blade seem to do the trick.
As you might expect with a fabrication of this level of quality, the layers are held together by a wrap of hockey sock tape. I still need to buy some replacement e-clips though…
The challenge:
. You'd cringe if you'd see some ''custom'' tools my machinists colleagues made lol!
magnet to the top to catch the e-clip and they'll never get away again.