You gotta have the right toys

January 2007

Up until now I had an arc welder, and gas welding/cutting sets. Any cutting was done using either gas, or angle grinders. I purchased a machine that combined an inverter welder, TIG welder, and plasma cutter.

I've done a huge amount of work with the pasma cutter, removing a lot of the old decayed or unwanted steel. It saves a huge amount of time and money, on consumables. When using gas for cutting the major cost is in the oxygen and acetylene you use. With a plasma cutter, there is just the occasional electrode or ceramic cup. It is also very neat and clean, removing just 1mm of material from the cut. The heat is also so concentrated, at the cut, that you can use a wooden straight edge as a guide to make perfectly straight cuts.