1. Home
  2. ⚡ Welding Forums
  3. Plasma Cutter

Plasma Cutter

I have a recently purchased 40 amp plasma cutter and have some questions.

Most of my day to day cutting is 1/8" - 1/4" mild steel and as this stuff will all be welded I'm trying to get the cleanest cut with the least slag possible.

I have experimented with varying the amperage and air pressure and it seems as though lowering the air pressure results in a cleaner cut.

The recommended air pressure is 4.5 Kg/Cm2 and it appears that using 3

- 3-1/2 Kg/Cm2 is giving me cleaner cuts.

My question is what should I be doing to get the cleanest cuts possible and whether lowering the air pressure will result in damage or premature wear on the machine or consumables?

Bruce in Bangkok (brucepaigeatgmaildotcom)

Reply to
Bruce
Loading thread data ...

Have you tried experimenting with travel speed as well? That's just as important. Moving too slow will allow the arc to melt extra metal and leave more slag.

You can also play with the distance of the torch away from the work piece.

If lowering the pressure gets a cleaner cut, I doubt it will cause the consumables to wear out faster.

Reply to
Curt Welch

After reading your response I suspect that a combination of air pressure and cutting speed is the answer since a great deal of what I am cutting is freehand shapes and I do tend to go rather slowly in order to stay on line. I know that a template wold make things go faster but as these things are usually one offs making a pattern for each piece would double the time for the job.

I'll keep experimenting. Bruce in Bangkok (brucepaigeatgmaildotcom)

Reply to
Bruce

PolyTech Forum website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.