Cutting Thin Sheet Metal With Jigsaw

To reduce the heat buildup you need to use the proper jigsaw blade with minimal pressure and set your jigsaw to a slow cutting speed.

Cutting thin sheet metal with jigsaw. How to cut metal with a jigsaw is mainly down to the correct choice of machine and your choice of blade. A word of advice if you are attempting to cut thick pieces of metal. I also clamp the metal down whenever possible to stop it rattling up and down and use a medium speed at first but speed up as much as possible provided the tool is cutting well and the blade isn t trying to. Stainless steel builds up heat quickly when you are cutting.

To avoid shredding sheet metal or raising a lot of edge burrs tightly sandwich the metal between two layers of thin plywood. For cutting sheet metal choose a finer blade with 21 to 24 teeth per inch. For pattern cutting drill blade starter holes instead of making plunge cuts. With a quality jigsaw and a few metal cutting blades you can easily expand the versatility of this great power tool allowing it to replace the use of circular.

When cutting sheet metal or pipes with a jigsaw i have found bosch hss jigsaw blades to be the best combination of value and performance. Horusdy 40 piece metal woodworking jig saw blade set with storage case t shank blades hss hcs blades assorted for wood thin sheet metal steel aluminum cutting 4 6 out of 5 stars 161 12 99 12. Cut metal plate and pipe on low speed. First things first if you re going to cut any sort of metal using a jigsaw you need to make sure you re using the correct blade.

This isn t hard to do and we ve produced a guide to choosing the correct type of jigsaw blade. 36 tpi sheet metal cutting jig saw blade bi metal t shank 5 pack model dw3778 5 17 97 17 97. Some of the most common cutting tools are metal shears circular metal saws or even a cutting torch depending on the thickness of the sheet metal but the most recommended cutting tool for sheet metal is a jigsaw. Set your store to see local availability add to cart.

The cut can produce enough heat to melt the teeth from the edge of a jigsaw blade.