[TheForge] brainstorming and other thoughts on cutting sheet metal

[Mike Spencer]

> thoughts, comments, suggestions would be appreciated.

My solution to this very problem:  I borrowed a little Craftsman
router table from a wood butcher friend.  Intended use was to mount a
hand held router upside down  but it came with a slotted disk
insert that filled all but a narrow slit of the hole through which the
router bit would protrude.  That made it posible to mount an electric
hand-held jigsaw upside down with the blade sticking up out of the
table.  I don't think it would be too hard to build a table like that
from scratch if you can't turn one up.

I made a bridge out of angle stock that attached to short verticals at
either side and, in the center of the bridge over the blade, attached
a thing like a sewing machine presser foot made from ca. 16 ga. and
slotted so that it could be adjusted up and down a bit.  Put a
fine-toothed metal cutting blade in and it worked great.  The presser
foot keeps the thin sheet from chattering and lifting, much as the
sewing machine version does with fabric.

Full eye protection.  It threw little bits of swarf further than I
would have thought.  And a variable speed saw might work better than
my early 70s vintage single speed one which, I thought ran a tad too
fast for thin metal.

If you're set on a non-electric option, it might save some work to use
the drive mechanism from a burned up jig saw to get your non-wobbling
linear motion.

- Mike

-- 
Michael Spencer                  Nova Scotia, Canada 
                                 
mspencer@tallships.ca            
http://home.tallships.ca/mspencer/