Minimum compressor requirements for plasma

[BrokenBiker]

As above really, I have a 2hp 50ltr compressor, would this be up to the task?

I know when it's fully charged I have 10 bar to play with, and I'm sure when it's on the pump and I've got a tool running it sits around 50psi(ish)

Realistically cuts wouldn't be very lengthy, I want it mostly for artistic stuff, cutting scallops in flat bar, maybe cutting some universal beams or thick C channel for projects and chopping bits off cars that are hard to reach with a saw or cut off wheel

 

[Pete.]

Yeah that'll do fine.

 

[gaz1]

yes it will as i have a 40 litre for my plasma cutter

but note stop cutting while it recharges the air cylinder and then continue when it stops

 

[BrokenBiker]

Cheers both, best get looking for a plasma then

 

[gaz1]

i use a cut 50 with the 40 litre and use skotyls settings

that works fine for me and ive tried cutting many stuff with it

 

[BrokenBiker]

I'm curious about skotyls settings now

 

[Turbo]

Me too.

 

[gaz1]

i bought the cut 50 and didnt know its air setting that was needed so asked

Post in thread 'cut 50 stopped working'

Mar 26, 2020

you shouldnt be below 60

from skotl as there a good guide even for me to use them and have no problems

I set the air at about 65psi and never touch it after that.

12 mm would be at 50A
8mm at 30A
6mm at 20A
3mm at 15A

• gaz1

• 

 

[vachekir]

I have a very close config and for artistic short cuts, it passes if you take breaks to let the compressor resume. But for thick or chained profiles, it quickly becomes limiting.

 

[George Erasmus]

Hypertherm Powermax 30 XP Plasma Cutter 60PSI to operate, + Metabo Mega 350W
3mm steel cuts like dream, 5mm Stainless the cuts are short and I have to go slow and best I could get is 5-8 cm at a time before I have to wait for the compressor to refill try to cut 2 meters of 5mm Stainless, if I was doing it daily I would go for a 100 litre capacity compressor. I guess a higher rated plasma cutter like hypertherm powermax45 sync you could get longer cuts although it uses 85psi

50 litre 145psi 10bar
is ok for light long cuts
Thicker material requires a lot more air if you want a clean straight cuts 100litre + would be my go too

Cutting thicker steel with a small air supply makes it hard to get a clean straight cut

 

[Barking Mat]

As said, as soon as your compressor kicks off, have a pause, until it's full, then continue, or you'll kill your nozzles / consumables.

 

[tom2207]

and drain your compressor daily . well not drain it , but drain the water from the receiver

 

[GRW]

I've not had much success at all with my Parkside Plasma - almost certainly operator error & perhaps settings mess as well.
If you run too much (whatever that might be - the above suggests north of 65psi?) .... can I ask what effect that has on the cutting please?
Ditto for "too low" come to that!
I might give me some idea what to look for.
(I have a Clarke 100L belt drive portable that is a good little compressor, & my 1972 IR30 that is 150L (was 3ph prob 3hp originally, but converted to a 2hp I think it is 1ph motor many years before I aquired it - so it is probably a bit slower to pressurise than it ought to be I'm thinking, but it's a nice, pretty quiet old thing that donks away)

 

[BrokenBiker]

I've not had much success at all with my Parkside Plasma - almost certainly operator error & perhaps settings mess as well.
If you run too much (whatever that might be - the above suggests north of 65psi?) .... can I ask what effect that has on the cutting please?
Ditto for "too low" come to that!
I might give me some idea what to look for.
(I have a Clarke 100L belt drive portable that is a good little compressor, & my 1972 IR30 that is 150L (was 3ph prob 3hp originally, but converted to a 2hp I think it is 1ph motor many years before I aquired it - so it is probably a bit slower to pressurise than it ought to be I'm thinking, but it's a nice, pretty quiet old thing that donks away)

If you run the pressure too low it's not going to blow the molten metal away, as thats all its really doing is melting it with the arc and blowing it away with the air...I'm not sure on the issues from being set too high apart from the obvious of wasting the air reserves.

 

[gaz1]

if your settings are too low you get a molten mess on top of the sheet your cutting that destroys your tips

too low air - molten mess
power settings - molten mess
faulty unit - molten mess

but not always true you can get a molten mess on top by the wrong speed across the metal

for the cuts

you can have the right air and sever jagged edges as thats caused by low power settings, faulty unit, wrong speed across the metal

you should have little steps when you look at the edge of the cut and you might have some metal at the underside of the metal being cut

 

[George Erasmus]

Information I provided above is incorrect regarding Hypertherm Powermax 30 XP Plasma Cutter been a while since I have had a look at the set-up just incase a new 30XP user reads this

Minimum required gas inlet flow and pressure 99.1 L/min at 4.7 bar (3.5 scfm at 68 psi)
Recommended gas inlet flow and pressure 113.3 L/min at 5.5 bar (4.0 scfm at 80 psi)
Maximum gas inlet pressure 9.3 bar (135 psi)

 

[gaz1]

these are with a motor and guide

Post in thread 'Cutting track'

Jan 19, 2021

I've wanted a mountable plasma cutting track for quite some time now. Something that attaches via magnets/clamps, and gives a nice smooth, straight and parallel cut.

You can buy something like a Messer Stablecut:
http://www.messercutting.sk/products/oxyfuel-equipment/accessories/stablecut/
Angled more towards flame cutting. I priced them at work... horrendously expensive! But very clever, with a built in friction speed limiter etc.

Anyway, I was looking on ebay, and found some cheap linear rails. SBR12 with 4 ball race carriages.

Last night, I made some bolting plates out of...

• skotl

this is cnc plasma

Post in thread 'A quick play with the Cut40 on 8mm plate'

Sep 24, 2016

i ended up getting 2 sets of consumables 1 failed to send the 10 pots i then bought from river and that was delivered very quickly

im going to have to have a right play one day

can any of you guys advice on the cost of using the plasma cutter on the electric side of it ?

Do you mean the cost of electricity to power the unit? Negligible, I'd have thought.
Taking Adrian's figures, a 35A cut is drawing 15A at the 230V input, so that's around 3.5KW.

Picking a random provider (SSE) shows that they charge 12.04p per KW/hour so if you ran the cutter non-stop for an hour then we...

• skotl

• 

 

[Dutch Welder]

The big thing is not the size of the reciever, but the rated output of the pump on the compressor.
If the pump is up to the task, then the size of the reciever is not really important, the reciever only comes into play if your pump is undersized, as you can build up a buffer for when cutting.

Running 2 Hypertherm units, a 30xp and a 65.
Also have 2 compressors, both Keasers, both of them the 460 pump, one of them single phase (to use with the 3 phase Powermax65) and one of them 3 phase (to run with the single phase 30xp)

This is because I only have one dedicated 3 phase supply, and one dedicated 1 phase supply to my workshop, and running the single phase plasma/compressor or 3 phase plasma/compressor at the same time trips the breaker.

The 3 phase compressor has a 90 litre tank, the single phase one only has a 30 litre tank, as the tank originally on it was very rusty, and I reposposed a tank that was good, but hasd a baf pump, and even with the 65 on my CNC machine the 30 litre tank is more then enough to keep up, as the pump supplies 250 litres a minute of air at 6 bar, and the Powermax 65 uses less then that at only 5 bar.

The trouble starts with pumps that advertise the air intake as actual capacity, but usually the delivered air capacity at pressure is half or so of the air intake capacity.
If you look at the Metabo above, they call is a 350,but it only takes in 290l/min, and supplies just 195 l/min (and at what pressure that is??)
If the 195 l/min delivered air is measured at a lower value then the air pressure going into the plasma cutter then the 195 litres will be less, maybe even far less, and then you start getting into consumble wear and cut quality issues.