Dahle867 Guillotine with Lever 365 x 513 mm Cutting Length 460 mm 3.5 mm

This is not a cheap piece of equipment but it is built like a battleship with paper sizes marked out for guidance and a solid cast alloy adjustable alignment stop for repeated size cuts. If you need precision cutting of multiple sheets of paper or a thick piece card up to A4 size for picture mounting etc. this is the machine. I never liked rotary guillotines where it was easy for the cutter to lift off the material unless careful pressure was applied all the way along the cut and our office had some expensive A0 sized models. This beast clamps the work piece firmly and does not let go until the cutter blade is fully raised again. Safety is superb too with the rotating spiral guard. The old vertical plates type guards were a hindrance, getting in the way of your view when setting up and making storage awkward if height restricted. The thin sheet metal plates standing upright for 12 inches or so with no support could so easily be bent. This guillotine can also be fitted with a laser alignment, the heavy duty steel housing for this is already installed, I now just need to find a supplier of the internal part. I was a little shocked by the weight when it arived but having used it I realise that lighter, flimsier models would not do such a good job especially if you are a professional artist or photographer and a quality finnish is important. It was definitely worth paying the extra money as it should last for years.A slight adjustment to my previous review and a reduction of one star. The guillotine still functions well but we are a bit concerned over the paint finish durability. Some small patches of paint have broken away on the edges of the grooves for locating the sliding edge stop and there is rust discoloration on the bare metal thus exposed. In addition to these admittedly very small patches, the paint is showing a line of blistering all along the surface of the left side of the base just before the metal bends over the edge. The paint surface has not been damaged or scratched in any way to allow moisture to get underneath this painted area.