[TowerTalk] Cutting tubing

Charlie Gallo Charlie at TheGallos.com
Mon Aug 9 07:03:51 PDT 2010


On 8/8/2010 N2TK, Tony wrote:

> I needed to cut off a piece of 2” x ½” walled 4130 tubing. Tried a Sawzall
> with a diamond encrusted blade with cutting fluid. That was pretty much
> useless. Made only a small cut after several minutes

Diamond is the WRONG material for cutting ferrous metals - if the blade gets at all hot (and it will), the diamond can actually dissolve into the steel, raising it's carbon content, making both the steel harder, AND dulling the blade.  It's the reason you can't/shouldn't use PCD tooling on steel in a machine shop.  They use CBN for steel, plain carbide, or just good old High Speed Steel

-- 
73 de KG2V - Charles Gallo
Quality Custom Machine-shop work for the radio amateur (sm)



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