How to Choose the Right Safety Knife
Today companies need to invest in safe knives to ensure a safe working environment for their personnel and prevent goods from being damaged.
Safety knives are becoming more widespread and important for workplaces. Use the safety knives to ensure a safe workplace, take care of your employees and prevent injuries. In addition safe knives prevent goods from being damaged when packaging materials are cut. Today companies need to invest in safe knives and educate employees to ensure a safe working environment for their personnel.
What is a safety knife?
A safety knife is a utility knife with additional features or an adapted design that aims to reduce the risk of the user cutting while using the knife. Such knives are common among workers in delivery and logistics departments, warehouses and stores. Safety knives and cutters are used for opening packages and boxes, cutting strapping material, tapes, tearing shrink wrap, cutting and disposing of packages and much more.
What is a safety knife blade?
A safety knife blade is a sharp tool with a sometimes adapted design, usually used in conjunction with a knife handle, that is used to safely hand-cut various materials. They are usually made of carbon steel, stainless steel or even ceramic. Blades for safety knives are strong, sharp, but also relatively safe when used in a proper safety knife.
Your choice of blades for safety knives depends on what type of work you perform.
Why you should provide employees with safe knives
Hand knife injuries often occur during the work process when the knife slips on the employee while cutting or trimming. In most cases, the blade makes contact with the worker's other hand, causing a laceration to the hand and/or fingers. Injuries can also occur to other parts of the body, such as the thigh.
More than half of all workplace accidents involving manual tools were caused by UNSAFE knives.
We can roughly classify safety knives into 3 types:
- safety knives with automatic blade retraction
- safety knives with fully automatic blade retraction
- safety knives with concealed blades
Safety Knives with Automatic Blade Retraction
Safety knives with automatic blade retraction guarantee a high degree of safety for users. As soon as you take your thumb off the slider, the blade disappears into the handle. Also the good thing with these safety knives is that the blade is always retracted automatically, that is, there is no risk that you leave the knife with the extended blade on the table or in a drawer and you or someone else will get injured accidentally.
All Martor Secunorm safety knives are the safety knives with an automatic blade retraction.
Blades for Safety Knives with Automatic Blade Retraction
Knife blades for these kinds of safety knives come in many shapes and types, each designed for a specific purpose or job.
There are different types of knife blades used with these safety knives with automatic blade retraction:
- trapezoid utility blades ( cutting depth 9 - 20mm)
- snap-off blades (cutting depth depends on the length of blade, approx. up to 70mm)
- rounded-tip hook blades (cutting depth approx. 7mm)
- industrial knife blades with 4 corners (cutting depth approx. 10mm) and others
Safety knives with fully automatic blade retraction
The difference from the safety knives with automatic blade retraction mentioned above is that with fully automatic knives the blade retracts when it comes out of the material to be cut and it retracts automatically into the handle even if the user keeps pressing the slider with their finger or pulling the trigger. This protects your employees, for example, from a possible leg cut when opening a box or cutting a cardboard box with a swing.
But keep in mind that if the material you are cutting, for example, moves or vibrates, it will be difficult to use this type of knife, because the blade will move every time, which will complicate the cutting process
All Martor Secupro safety knives are the safety knives with fully automatic blade retraction.
Safety Knife with a Concealed Blade
Safety knives with concealed blades are generally considered the safest utility knives. Their high degree of safety is due to the fact that only a small part of the blade is visible and accessible for cutting, while the rest of the blade is hidden. This design eliminates all contact between the knife blade and the user. The shape of such an enclosed blade safety knife resembles a hook, which makes it impossible for the user to be injured while cutting or for the blade to be accessible with the fingers. Such a blade also guarantees protection not only for the worker, but also for the goods in boxes and packages. This provides maximum safety from cuts and at the same time protects your goods reliably.
Knives of this type come with replaceable concealed blades, meaning you can replace the entire head with the blade, or solid disposable knives without the ability to replace the blade, but only with the ability to replace the entire safety knife. Safety knives with concealed blades range from very simple disposable safety knives to knives with replaceable concealed blades and food safety knives that can be detected by metal detectors.
The blade shape allows easy and safe opening and cutting with a "pull" motion. The user grips the hook on the material to be cut and pulls it sideways at a 45-degree angle, downward or toward him.
Cutting depth of knives with concealed knife blades varies usually between 4-6mm.
Material to cut with safety knives with concealed blades:
- packaging
- tape
- plastic strapping bands
- plastic film, wrapping, stretch and shrink foil
- safety belt
- coated and laminated film
- textiles
- cardboard max 1-ply
Sollex keeps most spare blades for Martor and Klever safety knives with concealed blade in stock.
All Martor Secumax safety knives are safety knives with concealed blade and the maximum safety guarantee.
Safety Knives with Replaceable and Non-Replaceable Concealed Blades
Knives of this type come with replaceable concealed blades, meaning you can replace the entire head with the blade, or solid disposable knives without the ability to replace the blade. But note that most often this type of knife has non-replaceable blades, meaning that the entire knife is disposed of after the blade has become unusable and dull. Such knives are cheaper compared to knives whose blade can be replaced with a new one.
We recommend the following disposable safety knives with concealed blade:
- Klever Kutter
- Sollex Safety Cutter
- Martor Secumax 150, 145
We recommend the following knives with a concealed blade whose blade can be replaced:
- Klever Xchange
- Martor Secumax 320, 350, Secumax Opticut
- Mure & Peyrot Grepin, Jalle
How to Choose a Safety Knife Depending on the Material You Cut
Choosing the right safety knife for the job is very important to ensure that the worker gets the job done correctly and safely.
- Answer the following questions to find the appropriate knife for the cutting task:
- What material will you cut?
- How deep should the cut be?
- What kind of blade is required does it fit your purpose?
To cut cardboard use the following safety knives:
- Martor Secunorm 300, 380, 500, 525, 540, Secupro 625, Secupro Megasafe
- Sollex Prosafe safety knife
- Slice Box Cutter 10400, 10503, Slice Manual Carton Cutter 10585, Slice Utility knife 10550
To cut layers of foil or paper use:
- Martor Secunorm 500, 525, 540, Secunorm Mizar, Secupro Martego, Maxisafe, Merak
- Sollex Prosafe safety knife
- Mure & Peyrot Craste to rip paper on spool
- Slice Industrial knife 10559, Slice Utility knife 10550, 10554, 10558
To cut plastic film, wrapping, stretch and shrink foil use:
- Martor Secunorm 500, Secunorm Mizar, Secunorm Profi40 MDP, Secupro Martego
- Sollex Prosafe safety knife
- Mure & Peyrot Bordeaux, Jalle
- Slice Box Cutter 10400, 10503
To cut plastic strapping band use:
- Martor Secunorm 300, 380, 500, 525, 540, Secunorm Mizar, Secupro Martego, Merak, Maxisafe
- Mure & Peyrot Pyla
To cut foam and polystyrene use the following safety knives:
- Martor Secunorm 380, 525, 540, Secunorm Profi40 MDP, Secumax Opticut
- Sollex Prosafe safety knife
- Slice Utility knife 10550, 10554, 10558
To cut textiles use the following safety knives:
- Martor Secunorm 500, 525, 540, Secunorm Mizar, Martego,Maxisafe, Merak
- Sollex Prosafe safety knife
- Slice Pen Cutter
Safety knife blades with rounded tips
One way to make blades safer is to round their tips. Such blades cannot accidentally pierce the user's hand, for example. Blades with rounded tips are only sharp along the edge of the blade. The American safety knife manufacturer Slice have almost all blades without tips. In addition spare blades for Slice safety knives are grinded and in a material to reduce cuts in skin making the Slice blades very safe to use.
Why metal detectable knives are needed in the food and pharmaceutical industry
Products in the food and pharmaceutical industry should not contain particles of other materials accidentally ingested during the manufacturing process. Contamination during the manufacturing process can lead to serious damage to equipment, product recalls and, in the worst case, damage to customers. The result: high costs and a potential loss of reputation that should not be underestimated. To avoid this, manufacturers must use special equipment that detects metal. If a small piece of plastic from a safety knife is made of metal detectable plastic, it can be detected in a metal scanner or X-ray machine and removed from the final product.
Food manufacturers, in particular, require that all tools in the hygiene area be metal. It must be possible to x-ray the final product and guarantee that there is nothing but food in the package. This is why metal detector safety knives and plastic handles are used and can be traced.
Sollex recommends the following metal detectable safety knives:
- Klever Kutter KCJ-1MD
- Martor Secumax 320 MDP, Secunorm Smartcut MDP, Secunorm Profi 25 MDP
- Mure & Peyrot Pyla
Basic rules for the safe handling of knives in the workplace
- The key rule in safe knife handling is to change the blunt blade on time! The duller the blade, the less safe the knife becomes, because the user will apply more force and pressure to cut the material. So keep an eye on this and keep a supply of new blades so that your employees can replace the blunt blade of the knife when needed.
- It is necessary to choose a suitable knife for the task to be performed. It may be that several knives will be used on the same job for a number of different tasks. There are different types of work knives, so provide your employees with ones that are adapted to their work processes.
- Utility knives should be checked periodically to make sure they are safe for use and have no obvious defects.
- You should also establish whether your employees' knives are personal or for shared use. It is safer to provide work knives for employees' personal use so that they always have the right tools for the job, rather than having to find the right tool or cut with the wrong tool.
- Provide workers with personal protective equipment ( PPE ) that will protect the user from health or safety risks at work. It can include items such as gloves, mittens, and eye protection.
- Good lighting, safety blade boxes and good housekeeping are important factors in knife safety.
- A serious stab wound can cause severe bleeding. Immediate first aid can save a life. At least one person in the company who is trained in first aid for stab wounds and severe bleeding must be present to provide first aid.
If you need help choosing the right safety knife or blades for your company - contact Sollex, we can help you!
