Making detailed cuts with.
Cutting thick sheet metal.
Wax your saw blade before cutting sheet metal.
Straight cutting compound snips work best for cutting thick or doubled up sheet metal.
The lower the number the thicker the metal is.
Extend blade life by keeping the saw s speed slow.
Choose a blade with 20 to 24 tpi teeth per inch for thin metal 10 to 18 tpi for medium thickness metal and about 8.
Choose between red blue or yellow snips based on the cut direction.
Set your saw to straight rather than oscillating if there s a choice.
They look like scissors and work fine with sheet metals like brass aluminum tin steel etc.
They don t cut curves well.
How to cut sheet metal method 1 of 4.
Such as straight cut snips left cut the right cut etc.
Jigsaws and metal cutting band saws are more work but can make most cuts in light to medium sheet metal.
For a cleaner cut put a strip of masking tape on the top and bottom of the sheet to keep chips from scratching the material.
A hacksaw can cut sheet metal but its shape limits its turning radius and depth of cut.
Using tin snips for thin sheets.
A handheld cutting tool fitted with a metal cut off wheel will easily cut through sheet.
Simply line up your chisel along the line you are going to cut and strike the back of it with a hammer.
Most sheet metal cutting tools are limited to 16 gauge and thinner 14 gauge is still sheet metal but in common forms 11 gauge while technically sheet metal is 1 8 thick and not really sheet metal for the purposes of this article so we will focus on 16 gauge and thinner.
There are some cuts that you can do with decent tin snips.
Here are a few tips for cutting metal with a recip saw.
To prolong blade life rub wax along the length of the blade.
Cutting straight lines with an electric saw.
There are two ways to cut round ducts.
If you ve hit it hard enough the chisel will cut the sheet metal if it s thin enough.
