#HTE

New Tool: Ultrasonic Cutter Lets You Easily Cut Foamcore, Leather, Rubber, Plastic and More

With a static blade, cutting through matte board, foamcore, rubber, felt, leather, upholstery vinyl, etc. can require multiple passes and some skill in how much pressure you apply. All of us have screwed this up at some point and ruined the workpiece. But now a revolutionary tool called the WonderCutter promises to make short work of these materials and more by using ultrasound to vibrate the blade. These vibrations cause the blade to slice in place thousands of times per second, taking care of the cutting while our role is essentially reduced to just guiding the tool.

Take a look, and try not to get distracted by the nonsensical ESL product copy:

At $268 the tool isn’t cheap, but it certainly looks handy, which is why Kickstarter backers have ponied up: At press time they’d reached $107,000 in funding on a $50,000 goal. They’re estimating it will be ready by May of 2018, and the WonderCutter is expected to ultimately retail for $390.