home shops and saws

[fourperf]

Morning all. I have been cutting alum plate with a table saw and had a few kickbacks that really scared the sh*&t out of me. What kind of saws do you guys use to cut alum plate and steel plate

mark

[underthetire]

a band saw, or get it pre-cut.

[ger21]

Make a sliding cutoff sled for your table saw, and it'll be much safer.

[NightshiftHD]

If you're cutting metal frequently, you really need to invest in a good bandsaw. My favorite saw is my vertical Roll-in ... a multi-purpose saw which has a nice big table for flat stuff and it does a great job doing cut-offs on long stuff too. I have a horizontal Wellsaw and a vertical 14" Powermatic but rarely use either as 99% of time my Roll-in does the job.

[Jonsmach]

I had a high quality Freud narrow kerf wood blade with lots of teeth (84?) on my table saw for years and had no problems with kickback until I replaced it with a Milwaukee blade specially designed for aluminum when I had 200' of 1/2" aluminum to cut. The new blade was really scary! Chucked parts across the shop a couple of times before I scrapped the new $65 blade and went back to the old one. The cuts on the table saw have a much better surface than using my bandsaw. Just cut 500 parts from 3" x 1/4" angle with my poor sadly abused Makita chopsaw with a really nice wood blade on it. Much faster than a bandsaw and really nice cuts, accurate to length too, since I built a saw bench for it. Just have been spraying the blade with a shot of WD40 every few cuts.
Jon

[fourperf]

Thanks for the answers guys. I think I am going to buy a bandsaw. Does anyone have any experience with Grizzly industrial. I was looking at this saw

http://www.grizzly.com/products/Vert...Bandsaw/G0621X

mark

[behindpropeller]

Originally Posted by fourperf Thanks for the answers guys. I think I am going to buy a bandsaw. Does anyone have any experience with Grizzly industrial. I was looking at this saw http://www.grizzly.com/products/Vert...Bandsaw/G0621X mark

Not sure where you are from but there is plenty of American made iron available. That would be my first choice over a Chinese bandsaw!

Tim

[Delw]

Originally Posted by behindpropeller Not sure where you are from but there is plenty of American made iron available. That would be my first choice over a Chinese bandsaw! Tim

+1

[NEATman]

+2 and I also second the Roll-in bandsaw. Sure the table doesn't tilt on the model I have, but it is so handy to have a vertical bandsaw that also functions in the same manner as a horizontal cut-off bandsaw. I need space efficiency as I have to play "tetris" in my shop (many things are on wheels) as I have more machines than space...
http://www.rollinsaw.com/band_saws/E...l_band_saw.htm
Found mine at a local used machinery dealer for a steal - it hadn't sold because it was missing the table - but I made a custom t-slotted table for it that is more versatile than the original. I bought the whole saw for less than half the cost of the replacement table from Rollin...
There are great deals out there on american made machines - you just need to find them.

Keith

[Tristar500]

I've been using a chop saw to cut most all my aluminum strut/bar stock.

Secret, Clamp the stock to the saw's fence with two clamps and take your time with a good carbide blade. Works sweet!

[l u k e]

The only one I currently use (I also have a band saw) Dewalt DW872 >>> http://www.factoryauthorizedoutlet.c...FQ5cbQodI0iDag
Worth every penny I paid!