Use paypal if you purchase thru this website. Somebody on here had trouble with banggood.com months after a purchase it was written in a previous thread.
I’d like to give my personal rating for this tool. A+
It kicks the living $h*t out of omega grafting tools. It’s simply wonderful. My 450$ Fieldcraft Topgrafter is what this is modeled from. After having used this Chinese version today, I couldn’t believe how well they did replicating it for 1/15th the price. Some pins on it are not as good as the threaded bolts on my tool, but I say who cares. Put a ring of electrical tape over the pins. You’re then in business.
It took every bit of twelve days for it to arrive.
Amazon has many sellers selling this between 29$ and 70$. The 29$ sellers won’t get it to you for 6-8 weeks. I think I saw it for 31$ and a few other lower prices. I typed in “Aluminium Professional Grafting Tool” at Amazon to find these other sellers. So above for 31$ which included shipping, my friend had it in 12 or something days.
I have come to really like doing my own graft cuts, there is a sense of pride and ownership (which may simply reflect me needing a new freaking hobby) but that is an insane price if they work. Plus, I like whip-and-tongue…but just yesterday my box-cutter slipped. I got lucky, it never even broke skin, but it put a whole new appreciation in me; I wouldn’t get the Zenport now (unless for family) but I might only be a finger-cut or 2 away from doing so…
A question for Barkslip. Since you have both the original 450 dollar model and the 31 dollar model, does it look like the knives interchange?
do the knives look similar quality? I ordered the tool after you mentioned it recently and was thinking of ordering a set of knives for the original to try upgrading. I tried it for the first time today and it did an incredibly smooth cut right out of the box. _ thank you for mentioning it when you saw it on sale._
I was away from home when my friend called so I ended up at his place to try it. I didn’t have my Fieldcraft tool with me… I was going to the grocery store, 40 miles away. Anyway guys, I stopped at his place and that tool above is plenty heavy/not as heavy as mine, doesn’t matter. The blades appear stainless steel. They make a cut slightly different from my tool. What that makes is pretty well a perfect V whereas mine makes more of rounded v-cuy. Mine makes the perfect v at the end but rounds off at the back.
Holding this tool… it’s the same size as mine… the same feel… the same wonderful action… the same everything. I was taken way back at the same time thinking it only cost him 31$.
I paid I believe around 90$ for replacement blades for mine. These are 12$.
Like I said… there are pins:
Take electrical tape and wrap around the rectangle assembly. Those pins will never move then.
It also comes with a allen wrench. You can tape that perfectly here:
"Last season I made many grafts on almonds, plum, peach, nectarine, apples and pears with this tool. It works reasonably well for me.
This tool makes a nice clean cut on the side of the wood that touches the blades but the bark on the side of the wood that rests on the anvil is frequently crushed and poorly cut. This damage to the bark is worse with harder woods such as plum due to the crushing force required to make a cut. I tried adjusting the blades to solve this issue but to no avail. I believe that this is a deficiency inherent in the design of the product. For best results I would suggest that when setting your graft for taping, match the clean cut sides of the scion and rootstock. Even though one side of the graft is a bit ugly with some cell crushing and tearing damage, most of my grafts take on both sides.
On the upside, the “V” shape graft union is very strong and easy to tape without displacing the scion. If you don’t like playing with knives but want to do some grafting, this tool may be a good choice for you. My success rate for grafting with this tool has been the same as traditional grafting techniques however it is fairly fast and easy to use with less chance of slicing your hands."
I would add to this review that when you cut large diameter scions with this tool, the top “U” above the blades will hit your material causing a fair bit of damage to the wood. Not a problem with pencil size scions though.
Yeah, I didn’t mess with big stuff yesterday. My 450 dollar tool has a smooth cut on one side of each scion/each rootstock & if just off a hair on calibration it will significantly rip the bark off the other side. I don’t always feel like calibrating so I continue…
I was also cutting Weigelia yesterday. I cut 3/8th smoothly… I may have cut (1) half inch but I don’t recall for certain. I was highly impressed, that’s all.
I did wonder how it would cut pecan.
I will certainly let everyone know how that goes, later.
I jut got mine. I had ordered it from Bangood before I read that there was a problem with the site.
i used my Visa and $31.00 and three weeks later it arrived. It is a solid and hefty tool.
See the photos below.
For sizing reference I put a BIC pen in the bed and the pen is a touch more than 3/8 inch. The bed itself is 3/4 inch and the spread of the blades is one inch so using wood up to 3/4 inch should not be a problem.
Although that Bic pen fits nicely in your photo, you can put much thicker material in it. You’ll learn what it’s capable of doing and what it cannot do. It’s going to be determined from wood density and from caliper. You’ll learn…
Is this tool only for bench grafting or can you use it in the field? It seems like it would not be very convenient using it on variously oriented tree branches without any support. Also, would it be of any use when understock and scion diameters do not match?
I guess it would depend some on size of a person’s hands but f find it very easy to use in field. The blades are very sharp and slice with little effort.
Also what I like is that the cutting is accomplished as a “bypass” cut as the blade travels past base on which the scion rests so there is no “crushing” of the wood on the underside.
And since the blade is curved the blade slices through the scion as it goes lower and lower rather than chopping through the wood.
One thing I’m wondering about is how well the grafts stay together in high wind? I notice (sort of like the omega tool) there isn’t much long contact where the scion/rootstock meet. When I make grafts, I depend on the “longness” of the graft union to offer some stability in wind. Any thoughts?
Also can you share what kind of success rates you’ve had with the top grafter? And whether these rates would be inside vs. outside field grafts?
Wind won’t be much of a problem if you use electrical tape and add a bird perch. I hear you though. Wind will take more of these grafts than bark grafts.
Success rates are super if you do the aftercare right for bench grafting. We’re easily talking 80% on the low end but 90% is more towards the correct #.
Field grafting more about 75% I would guess. Now I’m grafting trees near 1" caliper with my tool many-many times. So I’m accounting for that. My tool isn’t made to handle that caliper of pecan/hickory - really dense wood’s. If I was using it solely for 1/2" or 3/8" I’d believe I’m back to 85-95%.
I don’t know if I agree that this graft would be any weaker. No graft is physically strong. Difference in graft strength, if any, would be minimal at best and of no material difference (imo )
It’s the wrapping and any supporting “splint” that we choose to use that gives any strength to the graft.
The clean precise cut and the fit we get with the tool should more than make up for any weakness.
The cut is straighter and cleaner than most of us can get using a grafting knife . The angle of the cuts on both scion and wood it’s being grafted onto are a perfect match.
Also, the tool’s perfectly clean cut makes for much better cambium contact than we get when we cut manually. I’ve become a better whittler as I’ve learned to graft.
So… I would not let fear of graft weakness keep me from using this tool.
I can’t say I know for sure my percentages outdoors. I’m always grafting at peoples farms/forestry projects where my friend and I are turning their seedling trees into cultivars of pecans/hickory mainly and a few persimmons along the way.
At a lake that’s open/subject to extreme winds, grafts of all kinds have blown out. When you’re messing around with big scions and doing 3-flap or 4-flap or bark grafts… I would say the strongest grafts up high are going to be bark grafts before 3 and 4 flaps.
For sure electrical tape helps. Grafts wrapped with heavy duty budding strips will blow out more frequently. Mike makes a lot of valid points about this cutting instrument. It’s quite excellent…
Furthermore, If I was going to start an orchard with 1/2" caliper stock or less of densely wooded species, I would use this tool, solely except where I could do a quick whip and tongue on more thin stock. I really like to use whip and tongue on pencil or less pecans. It’s fast, efficient, and actually faster than using that tool to me.
A guy from South Africa wrote to me years ago and was in the process of beginning a Macadamia orchard. He had all his seedlings in place and asked if I recommended either the Fieldcraft Topgrafter or those scissor tools I like to call them from Scionon. I told him to get a Fieldcraft Topgrafter. He had I think somewhere near 1000 trees to graft. All must of went well. He had never grafted a single tree in his lifetime. Somehow he found me and I believe it was thru youtube.
It’s a great tool. I can’t say more good about it.
One more modification and this tool will be at it’s best.
If you cut thicker than 1/2" wood the square opening above the blades will crush the top of the scion/bang it up good. I’m posting a photo how to remedy this. A Dremmel or some other grinding tool to make a rounded arch just less than 1/4" will do it.
