Plasma table

[eSCHEn]

Does my head in that. If you’re going to advertise fast delivery then at the very least get it parcelled and shipped out as quick as possible. Once courier has it fair enough it’s out of your hons but sitting on it for a while is just dumb.

 

[Germanmachinist]

Really a amazing project!

 

[Hood]

The table is more or less complete now, still waiting on the 32mm hose that was fast and free delivery

Cut some Alu on the table today.

Then welded it up but thought it looked too high.

I was right, 200mm too high so ended up chopping it apart again and just used the side back and base as it is only for this.

Will get a ratchet strap tomorrow to make it totally secure on the bracket and maybe if I can be bothered I will redo in the future but that is unlikely as it is serving its purpose.

Vid of the plasma doing its thing, no smoke at all so quite happy with the water table

 

[Brad93]

The table is more or less complete now, still waiting on the 32mm hose that was fast and free delivery

Cut some Alu on the table today.

View attachment 267999

Then welded it up but thought it looked too high.

View attachment 268000

I was right, 200mm too high so ended up chopping it apart again and just used the side back and base as it is only for this.

View attachment 268001

Will get a ratchet strap tomorrow to make it totally secure on the bracket and maybe if I can be bothered I will redo in the future but that is unlikely as it is serving its purpose.

Vid of the plasma doing its thing, no smoke at all so quite happy with the water table

Water table looks good mate. Get virtually no smoke off ours. You do get a taste in the air though which I think is probably ozone. Not great for you (free radical) but no where near as bad as the fumes and dust, and with your doors open it’ll be gone pretty quick.

 

[Hood]

Certainly no smell or taste today but that was only a small bit of cutting. If I get bothered with it I will rig up the extractor fan I used on the downdraught but looking like I won't need so far.

 

[Hood]

Yesterday I made a strainer for the tables drain.

Got the hose eventually and all connected up now, so drain valve and fill valve.

Also decided to make up a heavier duty vent and I am thinking of making another smaller tank so I can add a bit more water to the system if required, the main tank holds just enough to fill to normal level but I may wish to try some under water cutting at some point.

So did similar to the drain valve by milling holes at 90 degrees to each other in a block of aluminium and then tapping for a hosetail and welding to the lid, I will clean off the silicone overspill once set (maybe )

To say I am happy with the table would be an understatement, I loaded 3 sheets of 5mm aluminium on it today for cutting up and it was so easy especially when I think back to how hard it was on the last table. I still have the trolley to make for heavier sheets and I am going to make a slider for running the front edge of the sheets on as I load.

One of the sheets I chopped today, just two large sections that will be for lids for some side guides I will be fitting to a boat on Monday.

 

[Germanmachinist]

This project is so impressive, thank you for sharing it

 

[Hood]

The gantry was running about 10mm out of square so I, well, squared it up

I placed a remnant of a 2500mm x 1250mm sheet on the table and aligned the Y axis (2500mm edge) , pic of the torch at the far end then the near end.

I removed the belt from the left hand motor and then ran along the X to line up with the right side of the sheet.

I then moved the X back to the left side and was able to manually turn the pinion until the torch was aligned then tighten the bolts. It is now pretty good by sight so probably less than 0.25mm over the 1250 width.

I also decided to try some stainless on the water table and was quite happy with the results. Normally the full cut would be black with the oxidisation but as can be seen it is only the top and the rest was a golden colour, also less dross on the top than normal.

Pic makes the golden colour look a rusty brown but it is not

I think if I raised the water level to the underside of the stainless it would have minimal oxidisation but I will have to weld in a bit at the rear of the table as the water is almost up to the top of it, the sides and the front have 25mm extra in height.

 

[Hood]

Here is a slightly better pic of the stainless, it is propped up against a steel block, the black bit is the top edge.

 

[Hood]

Bored and tapped the end of the rails today and parted off a couple of heavy washers to act as hard stops. Also put a small blob of weld on some M10 cap screws so that I could screw into the trucks until the weld stopped them, I then chopped off the heads top leave studs.

I did this to allow me to quickly remove/replace the angle and I was going to secure with wing nuts, it seems to be fine with it just sitting over the studs so that is even better as it means it just takes a second or so to remove/replace.

I then chopped up some 8mm 5083 aluminium for the hinges for the loading table I will eventually get made.

Close up of the cut.

 

[Hood]

Just been messing about with the manufacturing model feature in Fusion, think it is going to be a big time saver especially as it allows you to go backwards and forwards to the design and manufacturing. It also allows you to input the dimensions of the material and any spacing between parts and edges and it will then arrange them for you.
Full process shown in the video for a model I had previously done.

 

[Revs1972]

Went down to the workshop this afternoon with a plan. I found an old control panel I had made for one of my CNC machines and thought it would make a perfect test bed for the plan. I chopped it up so it was basically a tray and then welded up all the holes. I then placed it on the plasma and filled it up with a mix of cutting oil and water and cut a load of aluminium above it to see if there was any visible reaction.
All seemed good, no visible fumes, nothing went on fire and the aluminium dross seemed to ball up so I decided to go for it and fill up the table, worst comes to the worst I will have to drain it into drums and use on the mill/lathes and then purchase either GreenCut or PlasmaCut Blue although further research is required on both and any other I plasma fluid can find.

Here is a pic of what it looks like, nice mucky duck pond green

View attachment 266085

how much does the cutting oil cost per litre , and how much did you put in.. I have been looking at the Greencut and plasmacut Blue too and it looks to be around £10 a litre. When I refilled my 3 X 1.5 swiftcut table, I stuck 5 litres of swiftcut anti rust in. (thats how much we used first time we filled it , and when I cleaned it out the steel parts that were still in there were rust free so it does work. That works out around £10 a litre too. Then I put the anti fungal tablets in once a week.
Also , is there an advantage to having the toothed slats over the standard straight lengths ? What thiickness are yours ? Cheers

 

[Hood]

how much does the cutting oil cost per litre , and how much did you put in.. I have been looking at the Greencut and plasmacut Blue too and it looks to be around £10 a litre. When I refilled my 3 X 1.5 swiftcut table, I stuck 5 litres of swiftcut anti rust in. (thats how much we used first time we filled it , and when I cleaned it out the steel parts that were still in there were rust free so it does work. That works out around £10 a litre too. Then I put the anti fungal tablets in once a week.
Also , is there an advantage to having the toothed slats over the standard straight lengths ? What thickness are yours ? Cheers

The soluble oil I put in is rocol V-Cut SS which is just under £100 including the VAT for 20l.
Greencut and Plasma Blue are in the £300 plus region for the 20l and they are supposed to be 20:1 mix , currently I am using the Rocol approx 50:1 in my CNC machines and I just used the same in the plasma. I think however it may be a bit too much for this application as I can't see through the green colour so I am considering draining 50l and topping up with water and will see how that works out. There is absolutely no rust at all on the slats at the moment so it is doing the job at the 50:1 mix, we will see if it does the same at a weaker mix



Regarding the slats previously I had straight slats and they were ok but decided to try the toothed slats this time. Few reasons, one is I reckoned it would be easier to slide sheets on if the contact was much reduced but the main reason is the arc shouldn't contact and cut the slats nearly as much as the the target is tiny in comparison. Also dross should not build up on the slats in the way it did on the straight slats and so far that seems to be the case.

 

[Hood]

Oh forgot, the slats are cut from 3mm sheet.

 

[Revs1972]

The soluble oil I put in is rocol V-Cut SS which is just under £100 including the VAT for 20l.
Greencut and Plasma Blue are in the £300 plus region for the 20l and they are supposed to be 20:1 mix , currently I am using the Rocol approx 50:1 in my CNC machines and I just used the same in the plasma. I think however it may be a bit too much for this application as I can't see through the green colour so I am considering draining 50l and topping up with water and will see how that works out. There is absolutely no rust at all on the slats at the moment so it is doing the job at the 50:1 mix, we will see if it does the same at a weaker mix



Regarding the slats previously I had straight slats and they were ok but decided to try the toothed slats this time. Few reasons, one is I reckoned it would be easier to slide sheets on if the contact was much reduced but the main reason is the arc shouldn't contact and cut the slats nearly as much as the the target is tiny in comparison. Also dross should not build up on the slats in the way it did on the straight slats and so far that seems to be the case.

Thanks,

Thats good to know re the soluble oil. I think its around 450 litres of water in the table ,so my swiftcut fluid is at roughly 90:1 . It keeps the slats clean, as well as long lost small parts ( worst thing about the water table is having to fish out parts that drop through ).
I like the idea of your variable water level, make it so much easier to clean out and find parts
Might give the toothed slats a whirl next time we change them out. Be good to hear how yours are fairing after a few months of cutting.

 

[Hood]

The Rocol V-Cut SS seems to be doing a good job. Doesn't seem to be any fumes coming from it and after 3 months the steel table slats are rust free.

Might try a lower concentration and see how it holds up as I would like it to be a bit less opaque.

Drained and cleaned it today, quite a bit of sludge but easy enough to clean up by using a spray from a garden style hose to was it down to the drain.

.

 

[Hood]

Been cutting more stainless today and I must say I am well happy with the water table, what a difference.
Previously the whole edge would be black and a good amount of dross, now it is like this.

No dross underneath and just a sprinkling on the top.

 

[henry Kadzielski]

Good afternoon @Hood, are you having the water right up under the S/S plate as that edge colour seems to indicate little oxygen at the cut surface. When I cut S/S on mine the edge is basically black (sugary). Just got notification that the nitrogen generator I want will be leaving western Australia (perth) on monday for, hopefully delivery by Friday next week. If that's the case then the next alli project and S/S will be cut with nitrogen through the PM125 . I have tried nitrogen through the PM125 before, from a bottle and the cut finish with both alli and S/S is much better, especially with S/S. Anyway so here's hoping all goes well, everything that I have arranged recently is over 1.5 months late

 

[Hood]

The water is about 10mm below the plate. I would like to get it right up to the plate or even submerge slightly on stainless but I will need to weld in an extra bit on the plate at the back.
Never used anything other than air but I am extremely happy with the cut quality on aluminium with the Jasic and with the water table the stainless is now good.

Tell me about it, still waiting on the next Cat to arrive, it was supposed to be here Feb, then March then April, it is late again and they are not too happy. The Cat they have just sold went away today and the lorry was to be dropping it off in Wales, going to the Isle of Wight to collect the new one then back up the road. Because of the delay that means 2 lorry trips are needed so double the cost and it is not cheap

Pic of the Cat getting loaded today and it will now be well on its way to the land of the dragons.

 

[Hood]

Cut some 8mm stainless today, this water table is excellent, pic of the flange straight off the plasma.