So I might need to cut some stainless for a fire pit. I have never cut stainless and may never cut it again. So I really don’t want to invest in going with Nitrogen. So if I cut with air I know there will be more clean up. What would that clean up entail?
Will it be rough edges? Discoloration?
With enough clean up can it look as good as if it was cut with Nitrogen?
The first time I cut stainless steel, it was 10 gauge and I did experience some hard backside dross.
Mind you, that was 10 gauge and I did nothing to dial in my speeds or anything as it was with my CUT60 on compressed air.
Lately I’ve cut quite a bit of 16 gauge stainless, and I cut it per book speed on my Hypertherm and the backside dross was non-existent. The cut edge also wasn’t as brown as the pictures above.
So, if you’re cutting this with your Hypertherm I’d say you could follow book settings and get pretty damn close to where you need to be. I’d expect maybe some hard dross on thicker material but not much.
That looks fine for a fire pit in my book. Thanks.
Be prepared to get a lot of black oxide dust that will dirty up your water tray if you use air.
