at this stage you're probably thinking this looks like a plumber's pipe cutting tool now we're not
a plumbing channel so what have we got this tool for it's actually a steel armored cable stripper
that's what it says on the side of the SACS tool and we we had this teased to us before didn't we
Gary yeah give it to me yeah we had Eddie from Pegasus electrical up and he was using it and
we tried to probably coax it off him so we could have a look at it but believe it or not he took it
back with him when he left i did so we had to get our own and we've got it because we're doing an
armored cable install as part of our EV charger install series check that out because we've used
that tool in this where we actually join this armored cable to a flexible rubber cable with
a new type of cable joint and as a result we passed it over to ross our tame electrician
to do all the hard work but he missed out one absolute differentiator on this tool compared to
what you would think might look like a pipe stripper so what we did was we gave it to you
Gordon and the first one you made off we recorded it to see how good the tool is we like a challenge
so you're in with a 16 millimetre squared 5 core EV ultra cable well that's actually six
cars carries it's got a data cable in there as well and that's got eight cores in it so that's
thirteen Gordon all right well there's always someone who wants to be smarter than anyone anyway
it's at the top end of the range for this cutter so this cable is 28 millimetre diameter the cable
tool itself will handle up to 36 millimetres okay so we're going around now just tightening as you
go or do you stop and tighten now you're a stop and tightener are you yeah and you're going to
tell me you've just carried you just yeah i like smooth operation yeah i try and twist as i go
and it's now got a feel i mean you'll feel it digging into the actual steel wire armors in order
that you know they're cutting so it's a different feel maybe than a hacksaw is that right yeah
different fields of hacks on a different feel from those hacksaw based splitting tools as well so you
can't hear the claws being cut so you've got to feel that that's what i'm getting the feel for and
you'll notice that the actual cut into the armor is incredibly thin yeah compared to a hacksaw base
cutter okay so you're backing it off now or what you're doing oh here's the clever bit obviously
is the second function of two alternate at a right angle and then you can use the rollers in another
way and then just pull it down to remove the outer jacket now looks like i'm doing it slow because i
am it's got to be really firmly into the tool and you know when you've got it right because it feels
like you're going over a rumble strip in your car okay and you're never going to cut through
the steel ramens because obviously they're wrapped around so you're never running down
an individual armored that could obviously damage the bedding material that's come off really easily
none of them have fallen off so we're going to do the breaking off method yeah no yeah in hindsight
probably would have gone a bit deeper so i might revisit that okay but it is the first one you've
done so we have filmed um it to see how we get on with it from straight out of the box i would like
to say i'm an occasional stripper normally in the clean cult territory myself pointing and pointing
at other people doing it but um yeah i found this yeah i like this tool from the first time i used
it that's broke off a treat they're nice and clean so i don't think we have an issue putting the
gland on so we're now out with a knife in order to remove it so we hope you're back back in again
so again just see if we can remove the jacket in the area where we put the armored cable gland on
so again just a quick run rounds don't need to go as deep this time because we don't want to
cut into the armor itself and then we like this don't we when we just turn it round and run it
down yeah just again that little 90 degree turn around to use the uh the rollers the other way
and it just pops off the end and then we break it away and then we can put the gun we're not
going to put a gland on and we've done that in previous videos but there we are so that's ready
and prepared for a gland but we did talk about the bedding material didn't we yeah so i wouldn't use
this tool to run down the bedding material purely because the bedding material changes thickness as
it goes around the cable because it's not really you know something it's insulation it's not it
is just bedding material okay and then you could slice into the conductor and then obviously that's
caused you a problem drop down steel armored sizes now this is this looks tiny this is a three-core
1.5 millimetre armored so the diameter of this is just under 12 millimetres and that's at the
bottom end of the range for this tool okay so same process as we did before we've speeded
it up slightly so we've uh dug into the steel wire armored we're going to run it down again
you see how deep that blade's gone in there and obviously this will be firm when you put
it yeah you can tell that's quite firm yeah and you can feel it sort of bumping along the cores
as you go down there so like a rumble strip and then just that last bit's always important
as you run it off because that's the bit you want to break and split it open
and then we'll see those armors break away nice and easily as well so both ends of the scale here
large one and a small one i always find it more difficult to make off a smaller SWA cable with a
hacksaw than to do a larger one where you get a senior hacksaw and really get some purchase
as you buy into them yeah and i thought looking at the tool that it was more built for larger cables
but actually it's done a pretty good job on this small cable yeah look at that end that's ready
for the glen now to go on so you're back in for another attempt at the five core 16 millimetre
squared one yeah so i just thought i'd try and go a bit deeper this time in terms of the um in
terms of the cutting so you've turned it a little bit more and got it you can see there deeper there
okay so i'll be interested in some feedback from anyone who's using this tool as to how their judge
exactly how far they're capable to go with that when they're
doing that first look at this stuff all right okay so yeah a lot of them have broke off
and that's a lot easier to get because you just gently scuff the bedding material there we haven't
gone through it so that's probably exactly right oh little top tip there yeah just rolled it back
just yeah there's that last bit that causes you all the trouble yeah so you can see there probably
probably just went a touch too deep on it and gone all the way through the course and you can feel
when it goes through the course what's going on here uh plastic conduit okay so some heavy
heavy gauge plastic conduit so the thickest of the plastic conduits available so again same principle
just run it round so we've got one tool to do both jobs now so whereas we might have a slice for an
armored and then obviously some sort of cutting tool for conduit we actually got it out one tool
that means one tool in the toolbox nice clean end as well so that's that coat what's this copper
conduit there copper conduit what size is this copper container comes in 15 and 22 millimetres
again okay so it cuts copper conduit as well which is handy yeah i think this conduit can
also carry water and gas i've been told all right okay that's clever how would you join it together
uh the soldered accessories go with this okay yeah so again you can use it for this copper conduit
and makes a nice clean end on that as well so very versatile this sex i'm sure it hasn't gone
unnoticed the fact that you wore gloves throughout to keep your well moisturized hands nice and soft
but off camera i've also been using the SACS for steel armored and conduits and from my teaching
experience if we would have had these in a college setting it would have made it incredibly easy for
students to make off those still rhymers because actually going around with a hacksaw and actually
re-meeting your starting point is quite challenging especially when you're starting out
making off the first few ends there's no way you'd let students use these Gary they're far
too far too easy uh be interesting to get at your opinion because obviously there's a lot of other
uh preparation tools for uh steel wide armor on the market that do the the scoring of the armoured
usually they're sort of hacksaw based and i've got one and yeah i quite like it actually i
prefer this one actually and and you're not a fan of those tools i've got given one and i just can't
i call it a toffee twister every time it just digs and it doesn't do what it suggests it's going to
do and it certainly doesn't then split the PVC to allow you to get into those armors either
that's that's the useful bit uh then people are probably thinking what about the blades
so you can get replacement cutting blade for this tool uh be interesting this has been
around for quite a while i think it's it's about 10 years it's been on the market we
haven't seen it much on social media hopefully we'll see a bit more now we've featured it here
but it'd be great to get some feedback as to if you're using this how long those cutting blades
last and yes or how often you replace them or any other top tips you've got for using the
tool in particular that tactile bit for how far into the cable you cut to get the perfect cut
you