If you don't have vise, or some clamps to hold your metal firmly, you will have a tough time with a hack saw. If you do it with a hacksaw you want as many Teeth per in (TPI) as you can find. You want to nick the edge with your blade, just as a slight guide to hold the blade on your line, but then you want to engage as many teeth in the metal as you can. Meaning a shallow angle. Again, I would just use a box knife, a ruler and square if it was available, if not just a knife and ruler. Mikek
A chop saw is used for cutting material quickly. The saw is mounted on an arm that pivots down when pressure is applied by the operator's hand. The ones for wood usually also allow the arm to be set at an angle to the fence on the saw so that repeated angle cuts can be made, like when a bunch of molding needs miter cuts. Some even allow for compound cuts, with the arm twisting as well as being set at an angle to the fence. Eric
and wear eye protection...
I'm sorry the strip is 2" wide 0.05 thick, how long is it? Hacksaw will do ~4-6" in length? I'm guessing you don't have a band saw.
George H.
(oh, I guess you can turn a hacksaw sideways... I haven't done that in a while.) GH
He said he wants to cut it in half in the 2 inch direction.
For aluminum that thin it may pay to clamp the aluminum between 2 thin pieces of wood. Then use a hacksaw, jig saw, or any saw with a fine tooth (maybe 24 to 32 teeth per inch) blade.
My sentiments exactly. One thing I'd like to add is to nick the edge first with the edge of a triangular file to guide the first stroke.
I hope we get this done soon, I'm getting exhausted and haven't seen the first cut.
I have a small miter box which is perfect for such cuts. ...Jim Thompson
amdx prodded the keyboard with:
50 thou thick ! Realistically, a Stanley Knife and a straight edge, several swipes, place over a piece of round bar and press down on each side. Clean up the edges with sanding block. Job done...
As in...
...Jim Thompson
A vise may eventually weaken on its own by that time though.
I confess that I do it a lot, and my vise looks OK.
It's a good way to cut thin sheet metal or copperclad FR4 at home; I use a shear at work. They won't let me cut FR4 on the nice foot shear [1] (it dulls the blade, theoretically) so I have to use an old rusty cheap Chinese hand-shear/roll/brake thing.
[1] and I own the company!
I used to wait until everyone left for lunch, then use the paper cutter.
FR4 will dull the shear. And a dull shear pisses off the person who has to use it. Years ago I worked in a shop where we machined lots of bare FR4. Most of it was for use in some sort of superconducting machine. Anyway, there was a guy who there who decided shearing the stuff would be OK. Then the sheet metal guy had a s*it because the sheetmetal would no longer shear cleanly, it started to have a bent edge. We had to have the blades sent out for grinding. Eric
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