Cut rounded corners into your travel documents and medicine blister packs
While there are many more effective ways of saving weight in your luggage — like leaving your petrified wood collection at home – shaving every last milligram off everything does add up. It is also satisfying and fun!
I have in the past removed a kilogram of weight from my packing entirely from things that individually would be considerd absurd. One such absurdity being cutting rounded corners into travel documents, medication packets, and the like.
The average piece of paper when modified to have rounded corners with a 5mm radius saves ~0.02g — doing so to 50 sheets of paper saves 1g — that's measurable!
Cutting round corners into printed-off travel documents doesn't just save weight — it also gives documents printed off at home a more official feel.
Cutting round corners into blister packs may seem silly as they already have rounded corners — but there are two good reasons:
If a blister-pack is already half-blistered, or you know how many pills you'll need for your travels, you can cut away the excess packaging. This saves weight but leaves a sharp corner that could cause injury or damage clothes. This is when you'll want to round the corners.
Corners can be more round.
Rounded corner weight saving calculator
Use this tool to calculate how much weight you can save by cutting rounded corners. The tool takes into account that some items already have rounded corners that you want to make more rounded.
How to cut rounded corners
Creating rounded corners with scissors is difficult, unless you're a pro your documents will look tatty.
A much better approach is to use a tool that punches the round corners in one action. Tools like this exist and can be bought off the internet.
While on my travels with some butchered documents, I found a tool that does just that. I brought it home — wondering how many corners I'd have to round to make up for the weight of the tool itself.
Affiliate link for corner cutting tool
Update — Since writing this article I've found a better corner cutting tool that fits a wider range of shapes and thicknesses:
Amazon — Sunstar Kadomaru 3 Corner Cutter
If you buy anything using this link, I will make a small amount of money at no extra cost to you. You will also be financing the interplanetary dreams of one of the worlds richest men.
I've been using the Sun-star Kadomaru Pro. It works great on paper. Blisterpacks don't fit through the slots on it though! I will update this if I find a better one.
Here's the Amazon affiliate link for the tool I've been using: