Just curious how some of you guys are grounding your plasma cutters? I have noticed that with me grounding the plasma cutter to the drain on the water table and I’m cutting out a fairly good size piece, that the arc will shut off halfway thru cutting. I’m thinking it’s a ground issue, but sometime the piece isn’t big enough to hook the ground clamp directly up to it, without getting in the way of the torch.
I am going to bring this thread back to life…
I too am looking for grounding ideas for grounding the plasma ground to the piece of work.
what do you prefer or works best for you?
Ground to the water table
Ground to the metal slats
Ground to the actual work piece
Magnetic ground to work [piece
Clamp ground to work piece
or do you have any other ideas?
The caveats are to make sure you are clamping to a point that won’t be freed from the rest of the material mid-cut or you may lose the arc (might not depending on the current path through the slats, but not guaranteed).
The other is to try to keep it close to where you’re cutting but that’s not as critical on small tables like this.
First lets get this out of the way, their is no ground on a plasma cutter other then the one that comes from the electric power cord to the case of the plasma cutter…
The work clamp is not a ground, it is a positive and the torch is a negative. You must have both to complete the circuit or the plasma cutter will not work.
The work clamp should always be on the work piece to insure a good positive connection so you will get a good complete circuit.
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