Plasma cutters can be a fabricator’s best friend and make cutting all metals quick and easy. Most times cutting can be done freehand but you’re left up to human error when making accurate straight and curved cuts. We often find that our customers start out with a Versa-Cut Plasma cutter and just do rough cuts in metal freehand without and assistance or help from a guide. This can be very frustrating if you’re trying to make an accurate cut or need to make the cut in one single pass without excessive grinding or sanding. This is where have a plasma cutter guide or circle cutter comes in handy!
The Eastwood Plasma Cutter Guide fits around the nozzle on any plasma cutter with a diameter of 0.95″. Once the guide is mounted you can use it alone with the wheels to easily trace any shape or pattern but it still would be difficult to make a perfect circle. In order to make a perfect circle you simply thread the circle cutter centering rod into the side of the guide and slide the centering pin onto the rod. You can now adjust the centering pin to help you make perfect circles from 3.75″ to 17″ in diameter!
Cutting a perfect circle with your plasma cutter is pretty easy once the parts are all attached to the nozzle of the plasma cutter. Simply find the center of your circle and center punch or drill a small hold to allow the centering pin to sit into or attach through the sheet metal with.
We offer two ways to fixture the circle cutter in place. First is the pointed end of the centering pin. With a small indent with a center punch you can let the point rid in that depression to keep the tool centered. This works well for quick cuts but still does leave a small room for human error if you push too hard/fast and pop it out of the depression. We suggest this method for panels where you don’t want to drill holes in the panel. For ultra-secure plasma cut circles you can flip the centering pin around and remove the thumb screw. By drilling a small hole in the center of the circle you can now attach the the metal to the centering pin with the thumb screw and be sure that you won’t have a chance of pushing or slipping the centering pin out of the center of the circle. This will give you quick AND accurate cuts in metal. This method also works if you want to make repeatable radius cuts in metal by leaving the tool all set up and only changing the centering pin location.
If you want to learn about all of our plasma cutting tools and supplies visit our site HERE.