Patents: Knife with a guide arm
In 1960, two Swiss gentlemen got a patent for an adjustable guide for a bread or meat knife, which could be used to cut even slices.
The perfectionists among us not only love a good knife, but also like to cut even slices of meat with it, or equally thick slices of bread. A sharp eye and a steady hand will get you a long way, but sometimes a little help comes in handy. Such an aid was indeed invented, in the form of a guide next to the blade - similar to the adjustment mechanism on a machine for cutting slices of meat, but for a kitchen knife.
We don't know if those knife guides are still made. In fact, we have never see them, and maybe people don't find nice straight slices or cuts that important anymore. Anyway, things were different in the 1960s, which explains Swiss patent 379704 by Maximilian Ember and Dr. Alexander Ember of Zurich, applied for on July 22, 1960, and granted on July 15, 1964. Hardly anything is known about the two Embers. It seems logical that they were related, but we don't know in what way.
One of the things that apparently greatly interested both men was cutting even slices. Maximilian Ember received a patent for a first attempt as early as October 1952 (Swiss patent 300518), but the idea was not perfected until eight years later, in Swiss patent 379704 pictured here. It is not until the latter patent that Dr. Alexander Ember is mentioned.
The drawing shows what it was all about: a knife (in this case probably a bread knife, because of the serrated blade) with a guide. But that was not the essence. In the earlier Swiss patent, the guide was attached to the blade with an adjustment screw, which complicated manufacture. For that, the Embers had now come up with something better.
The handle of their knife featured a dovetail-shaped slot, transverse to the longitudinal direction. The guide had a dovetail-shaped cam, with which it could move back and forth in that lock, increasing or decreasing the distance between the guide and the blade. To tighten the guide, the set screw had been replaced by a spring-loaded pawl (7), which rested against the top surface (9) of the guide. When the button of the pawl was pressed the guide was free to move; when the button was released it was blocked. Optionally, the upper surface could be fitted with recesses for better arrest, or even a millimeter scale to measure the thickness of the slices.
The perfectionists among us not only love a good knife, but also like to cut even slices of meat with it, or equally thick slices of bread. A sharp eye and a steady hand will get you a long way, but sometimes a little help comes in handy. Such an aid was indeed invented, in the form of a guide next to the blade - similar to the adjustment mechanism on a machine for cutting slices of meat, but for a kitchen knife.
We don't know if those knife guides are still made. In fact, we have never see them, and maybe people don't find nice straight slices or cuts that important anymore. Anyway, things were different in the 1960s, which explains Swiss patent 379704 by Maximilian Ember and Dr. Alexander Ember of Zurich, applied for on July 22, 1960, and granted on July 15, 1964. Hardly anything is known about the two Embers. It seems logical that they were related, but we don't know in what way.
One of the things that apparently greatly interested both men was cutting even slices. Maximilian Ember received a patent for a first attempt as early as October 1952 (Swiss patent 300518), but the idea was not perfected until eight years later, in Swiss patent 379704 pictured here. It is not until the latter patent that Dr. Alexander Ember is mentioned.
The drawing shows what it was all about: a knife (in this case probably a bread knife, because of the serrated blade) with a guide. But that was not the essence. In the earlier Swiss patent, the guide was attached to the blade with an adjustment screw, which complicated manufacture. For that, the Embers had now come up with something better.
The handle of their knife featured a dovetail-shaped slot, transverse to the longitudinal direction. The guide had a dovetail-shaped cam, with which it could move back and forth in that lock, increasing or decreasing the distance between the guide and the blade. To tighten the guide, the set screw had been replaced by a spring-loaded pawl (7), which rested against the top surface (9) of the guide. When the button of the pawl was pressed the guide was free to move; when the button was released it was blocked. Optionally, the upper surface could be fitted with recesses for better arrest, or even a millimeter scale to measure the thickness of the slices.
The two drawings of Swiss patent 379704, granted in July 1964. The numbers refer to the knife handle (1),
the blade (2), the dovetail-shaped slot (3), the corresponding cam (4), the guide head (5), the guide arm (6),
the spring-loaded pawl (7) and its end (8), and the top surface of the guide (9).