Not as good as I expected for the price
I’m experiencing post-purchase dissonance for this item! I wanted to like this trimmer, I really did! I’m giving it 3/5 because the good qualities do outweigh the bad, but for the price, I was hoping it would be all good! Thank goodness I used a coupon.
I’ll start with the good:
-The feet are nice and grippy and for such a light-weight trimmer, it really does have a solid feel to it when you’re using it.
-It is lightweight which would make it great for bringing to crops (although see my point below about the “locking” rail)
-Replacement blades are available at M’s, inexpensive, and there are some decorative blades, like wavy or pinked.
-It does slice very well (smooth and precise) if you get used to its quirks (see below). In fact the quality of the cut does make up for some of the flaws I’m going to outline below.
The bad:
-Although the rail does lock in place for storing and transporting, the blade carriage itself does not lock. Mine actually slides quite abruptly as I take it down from the high shelf I store it on (I have preschoolers). This isn’t a huge problem, but if you consider the locking rail a pro, then I would think you would want the carriage to lock in place as well. I don’t transport mine, so it doesn’t really matter for me, but I thought I’d mention it.
-As other reviewers have mentioned, this trimmer in only 8 inches wide, making it difficult to measure cuts for pieces bigger than this. Yeah, I can do the math… but for almost $70 it could have had a swing out arm for measuring longer cuts. Much cheaper models have swing-out arms.
-This might be just a flaw on mine, but after much head scratching over slightly angled cuts, I’ve finally figured out that the raised plastic ledges for lining up your paper (the ledges you butt your paper against) are slightly off on mine. This means I have to use the grid lines on the flat part of the trimmer (underneath my paper) to line up my paper, rather than the ledges. This problem makes the 8 inch width of the trimmer an even bigger problem because those grid lines aren’t there if you’re cutting paper greater than 8 inches. Like I said, maybe it’s just a flaw in mine. I’m going to email Fiskars and see if they can do anything about this. If it weren’t for this flaw, I would probably give this item 4/5.
Other points:
-I have found that the trimmer works better if you position it so that you’re moving the blade carriage up and down rather than across. Because the blade guide is plastic rather than metal, it cuts slightly wavy if you cut side to side with it, probably because the pressure on the blade changes as you move your arm across your body. Maybe everyone knows this already, but as a newbie, I had to figure this out myself, so I thought I’d pass it along to others :)
-The orange plastic strip that the blade runs across can be changed out 3 times before replacing it. You can flip it around, then turn it over, then flip it around again. If you use a decorative blade with it you should reserve one portion of the plastic strip for that blade, as I found the straight bade didn’t cut as evenly once there was another ridge in the replaceable plastic strip.
Summary: I'll live with it, and it does give good cuts. But I really wish I had held out for the MM one. Recommended only if you get it on sale or with a coupon.