Is this possible? or am i just resigned to outsourcing laser

[skuta]

Hi all, first time poster. Thanks to the community for such an informative forum.

We outsource a lot of stainless cutting to a couple of our local laser cutting companies (I am in Australia) sizes cut are generally (sorry for the metric) .5mm, 1mm, 1.5mm and 2mm. I am hoping to buy a plasmacam with a HT45 that will suit my needs hopefully, I'm just about ready to bite the bullet and have been researching for almost a year. I have attached a file that I figure would probably rate up there as the most challenging for a cnc plasma and i'd just like as many opinions on whether it is achievable at a decent quality or am i kidding myself and i should just stick to outsourcing laser cutting.

My background involves about 6 years programming and operating industrial laser cutters and from there i have spent the last 10 years operating my own signwriting business that has evolved into producing printed and engraved labels for the manufacturing, mining and agricultural industries. So my need for stainless tags has grown quite significantly, costing me thousands and thousands per year in laser cutting.

I also understand that the general rule of thumb for cutting holes is about 1.5 times the material thickness but does that also apply on thin stainless steel or only thicker mild steel?

I look forward to everyone's opinions and hopefully Jim Colt chimes in with some advice (yes Jim I have been stalking your posts on many forums for months)

Thanks
Scott

[muzza]

G'day Scott,

I assume the file posted is the actual size you require the finished item to be, ie 160mm wide x 67mm high. At that size that makes the letter "E" in "BEST" 5.47mm wide x 7.14mm high with a letter thickness of approx 1.4mm.
My kerf width cutting 1.5mm stainless is 1.4mm with a pierce hole probably about half of that again using a Hypertherm PM45.

Another consideration is cut quality on stainless. I've found that stainless doesn't cut as smooth as mild steel.

Based on that I'd suggest that if that's the size your looking at you may need to stick with laser.

I too am in Oz and am happy to cut one out for you and post it to you so you can see the item first hand if you PM me your address.

Murray

[jimcolt]

I would tend to agree with Muzza....the lettering is a bit small to cut with an air plasma, if good quality was to be expected. I would suggest that a sign of this size should be done with a laser.

If you were cutting from carbon steel you could probably do this well....assuming the cnc machine and height control could maintain plasma cut speeds and heights accurately. Comparing a $10k PlasmaCam with a low cost air plasma to a laser cutter that likely costs on the $300k range, especially on thinner stainless steel....will always favor the laser from a cut quality point of view. There are high definition plasma systems on precision cutting machines (about $100k) that would use a mix of 5% hydrogen/95% nitrogen as the plasma gas and will provide excellent cut quality on thin stainless.

A good rule of thumb for an air plasma (like the Powermax45 from Hypertherm) is that holes on steel can be cut with excellent quality on a 1:1 thickness/diameter ratio. On stainless and aluminum the ratio is more like 1:1.5.


Jim Colt Hypertherm

Hi all, first time poster. Thanks to the community for such an informative forum.

We outsource a lot of stainless cutting to a couple of our local laser cutting companies (I am in Australia) sizes cut are generally (sorry for the metric) .5mm, 1mm, 1.5mm and 2mm. I am hoping to buy a plasmacam with a HT45 that will suit my needs hopefully, I'm just about ready to bite the bullet and have been researching for almost a year. I have attached a file that I figure would probably rate up there as the most challenging for a cnc plasma and i'd just like as many opinions on whether it is achievable at a decent quality or am i kidding myself and i should just stick to outsourcing laser cutting.

My background involves about 6 years programming and operating industrial laser cutters and from there i have spent the last 10 years operating my own signwriting business that has evolved into producing printed and engraved labels for the manufacturing, mining and agricultural industries. So my need for stainless tags has grown quite significantly, costing me thousands and thousands per year in laser cutting.

I also understand that the general rule of thumb for cutting holes is about 1.5 times the material thickness but does that also apply on thin stainless steel or only thicker mild steel?

I look forward to everyone's opinions and hopefully Jim Colt chimes in with some advice (yes Jim I have been stalking your posts on many forums for months)

Thanks
Scott

[skuta]

Thank you both. I'll still go ahead and buy one, I'll just try to convince the customer to drop the fine lettering out of the job. If they won't do that they can continue to pay for laser cutting.

[itsnotlevel]

Sorry, I was looking at your post and I see nowhere in your post that you specified the size of what you drew up in the dxf file you posted. I can assume, because it opened in that size, that its a sign you are making and its supposed to be 160.533 inches long and 60.653 inches tall. If that is the case then that sign would cut out just fine, given a few limitations of the size of the table, but could still be accomplished. I have done signs that big and not with indexing. Am I looking at this correctly or am I just stupid?

[skuta]

Hi Paul you probably missed it because I had it in the attachment notes. It's 160mm