Best Way To Cut Sheet Metal Straight With Hand Tools

This machine is very fast and cuts clean.

Best way to cut sheet metal straight with hand tools.

Hot metal chips will fly everywhere. Open the cutters as wide as you can at the start of each stroke and make long smooth strokes. They are also called tin snips and available in different versions. The method you choose to cut sheet metal depends on the thickness of the metal and the type of cut you plan to make.

Can cut straight lines fast than using tin snips by hand. Long straight cuts are easier to make with large tin snips. Thick using a ferrous metal cutting blade. You can find scissor like hand shears designed with thinner blades and shaped well to help you achieve certain cuts.

Today i ll go over three different tools you can use to cut sheet metal and plate. Lift the cutoff strip and roll it to the side to prevent it from binding on the tin snips handle. Tin snips or aviation snips are one of the most widely used tools to cut sheet metals. Perfect for quickly cutting metal roofing that is hidden under a ridge or flashing.

Shears are a cheap tool that can quickly cut sheets of corrugated metal in straight lines with little effort. You can cut mild steel up to about 3 8 in. Prior to using this tool i cut by hand with tin snips. Such as straight cut snips left cut the right cut etc.

Start by taping both sides of the sheet metal directly over the line you want to cut and clamp the metal to a work station so it doesn t move. Make long strokes for long straight cuts. If you don t have the ability to that then it s difficult to do so with tool. On the corrogated tin you have to follow the contours of the metal and then it cuts fine.

For smaller jobs when you want to cut metal with more flexibility than by hand a nibbler drill attachment has a place for professional results for intricate metalworking cuts on sheet metal. It may not be an obvious choice but fitted with the right blade a circular saw is a great metal cutting tool. Cut metal with your circular saw. Cheap compared to a nibbler.

If you want to cut circles as well as doing straight cuts a cheaper alternative to a dedicated nibbler tool is a nibbler drill attachment it is a great alternative for diy ers. Use hand shears to cut metal hand shears are popular tools that are used to cut metal and it is the simplest way of cutting metal sheets. In our test it cut through rebar like a hot knife through butter. For most applications it is necessary to file and clean up the edges left by a snip.

Aviation snip is a term applied to the higher end form of this sheet metal cutting tool which comes in 3 basic varieties allowing for straight left hand curved and right hand curved cuts. To cut straight lines use an electric saw. This tool is a must have if you do any metal work at home.