Anything Manufacturing - Small to Medium Scale Metal Work (CAD/CAM included!)

Was curious about it myself.

On one hand, I see your point about fumes from it and all, but I expect the slats to be fully cured before being drowned in the rust-inhibitor solution.

That and plasma cutting lends itself to producing a lot of fumes and dust already so you'll normally have good ventilation (supposed to anyway).

Then there's the MSDS to look for with different fluids. Some are pretty harmless whereas others can cause irritation if inhaled or worse depending on your health.

Now you got me wondering, generally speaking.

 

Yeah, so I know about welding Hot Dipped Galvanized Metal and grind it off before welding any of it. However, I am still doing some research on this Cold process spray. I actually saw it in a YouTube video from a guy with a Langmuir table. He swore by it, but I’m not completely sold yet. Simply being able to drain my table without wasting chemicals will go a long way to reducing the rust on slats in general. My cursory looks haven’t shown up much at all thus far. I guess that leads me to all are now DEAD and can’t post about it or it is perfectly fine. It could go either way really.

 

Still a bit undecided but plenty of work to do until that time comes. Here is a pretty solid explanation, but I really should setup my fan to extract fumes as well.

Below is what I found and not verified by anyone. Unfortunately the CDC link is broken as well.


Summary of toxicology Inhalation of zinc oxide fume causes an influenza-like illness termed metal fume fever. Heavy human exposure to zinc oxide fume may cause an immediate dryness and irritation of the throat, a sweet or metallic taste fol lowed by substernal tightness and constriction in the chest, and a dry cough. The key word is heavy exposure. Very little zinc oxide is vaporized on the slats. And what little is there, it is quickly burnt off leaving just mild steel. Besides, you should be running a smoke and fume elimination system. The chromium and nickel fumes are extremely toxic and carcinogenic, which are the real threats to your health, not a miniscule amount of zinc oxide. If you are welding galvanized pipe all day without a respirator, you may develop some fume fever symptoms. It won't kill you. Here is a link to the CDC guidance: https://www.cdc.gov/niosh/docs/81-123/pdfs/0675.pdf?id=10.26616/NIOSHPUB81123#:~:text=Summary%20of%20toxicology%20Inhalation%20of,chest%2C%20and%20a%20dry%20cough.

 

For us poors that have to scribe their shit for bending.

 

The underside of my ram is not super flat. They didn't even machine the entire rough-cut part! (that lowest surface is the datum surface for the ram height - what is supposed to contact the punches) If I had a big enough mill I would contemplate taking this thing off and cleaning it up. Sheesh.



But a funny (not funny?) thing - it's also short compared to the clamping bars - so the clamps were actually supporting the punches, not the ram. So I lopped .006 off them and now they're all flat with in a few 10th's. Certainly flatter than anything on the machine. Lol.




And with that, I am ready to resume some "kwikvetting." Lots of small squares of metal with sharpie notes to follow!

 

Man, sucks it came like that but at least you were able to take care of it.

 

Tried my hand at finecut consumables for the first time, I am impressed!



With Hypertherm having different charts for their Finecut on mild steel, I went against what I normally do and just used my friend's amp setting of 32 amps.

The kerf is so freaking small, and those outside edges remained pretty damn sharp because of it.





Had to cut these small hangers too, and I have to say I'm impressed by the amount of dross (or lack thereof) right off the table.

Topside -



Underside -



As far as running finecut, I opted to run a new retaining cap as well in order to keep my regular consumables together like a "cartridge".



Over 700 pierces too!







I'm not really hoping for, but rather, expecting to get +1,000 pierces per set on my regular consumables.

And lastly, soon as I got done cutting, UPS dropped off my package!



10 electrodes and 10 nozzles all as part of "warranty" after the 2 month ordeal with all the time and metal wasted trying to troubleshoot my table.

I'm set for at least another 6+ months.

 

And, incorporated a little bit of bending too.





@ERod27 needed something to hold up his "stuff" whatever that means; maybe code for sex toys

 

Fired up the air compressor once more; wife's car needed air in her tires so I figured why not cut a customer's order today



Top one is 18" tall, bottom one is 30" wide.

 

Shockingly, I’m getting no request for any Yankees paraphernalia!!!

BTW, I got some fine cut consumables on the way. Pretty excited to see your results.

 

Ha, I did!

My mom came by to visit on Saturday so she hung out with the wife most of the day. Well, she saw me cutting some stuff up and said "ooooh can you make me a Yankees sign"

So I'll have to make her one cause she's a diehard fan, even if they're getting killed in the World Series.

The Dodgers signs are for a repeat customer that I normally make low rider bike parts for.

As for those finecut, oh man you're gonna love them.

If you look closely at the edges, you'll see my steel isn't discolored! With non-finecut, or even the UPM-105 when I ran the PrimeWeld, you'd see a lot more of that along the cut path due to the heat and speed.

Here, the only real heat applied is at the corners.

 

@Zebinator

 

Links not working for me! Gah!

 

@Zebinator

 

Oh, those things are a HAZARD! I'm going to just lop 'em off and keep the two buttons on the plate. I don't know what Langmuir was thinking. Yes, they may prevent someone who has no business using the tool from hurting themselves, but they will almost certainly put any user's eye out, make a cranial contusion, knock out a tooth, etc!

I occasionally host kids from our robotics team and like some safety apparatus. LOL.

 

The big punch press i ran in my younger days had two palm buttons that had to.be held down for the foot pedal.to work.. another place had the cables that yank your hands back if they where two close to the danger zone.. one night they did not get adjusted right an the system thought my hands where in the way an it pull my hands back so fast and hard it dam near dislocated my shoulders. Or so it felt at the time

 

I can't imagine using anything other than your feet to operate a press brake.

Me earlier today.

https://youtu.be/am0rKl6rOMY?si=FiW6rknoGGTsucLw

 

Just set a petal up on mine too

 

So convenient right?

Only issue is, I haven't secured it ever since I switched out my welding tables.

 

Havent used it yet, just did it last night. Even having 2 hands on a normal press I could see coming in handy.

Mines secured to the HF press just by welding a tab onto the base. Works great and it doesnt roll well enough to roll away when your on the petal.