Basic metal work tools

If you want to toast some bread, you need a toaster. If you want to stick two metals together, you guessed it, you need a welder! Turn it on, and move the positive lead to what you want to weld and BOOM, sparks should fly! Metal is strong, and these babies are great for tweezing and fixing certain parts that are proving a little too strong for you. During any kind of construction work safety is key. Safety glasses and protective gear are necessities whilst creating metal art.

Imagine using your plasma gun and not having your eyes protected from the sparks? The power tools used in metal work are extremely loud. Not only this, they act as a shield by preventing the teeny hot sparks flying into your lobes. Is it just us, or has all this talk of metal made you want to jazz up your living room with some funky abstract metal wall decor?

Remember Me. Lost your password? Construction Construction See all. December 9, Farming See all. Tractors: The Ultimate Guide April 24, June 14, All Innovation Know-How News. Metal See all. While filing metal may seem like a simple activity, it can take a lifetime to truly master.

When you saw and drill metal, you leave behind sharp raised uneven edges called burrs. The deburring tool is designed to remove them. By dragging along the edge of the cut surface, the burr is simply scraped away. This leaves behind a nice smooth beveled edge in its place.

We will go over this more in a bit. When metalworking, you will want a hammer. If you have a standard claw hammer at home already, that will be fine for now. However, for metalworking you will eventually want to invest in a ball peen hammer and a dead blow both pictured above.

A ball peen hammer has a striking surface on one side, and a ball on the other for shaping metal. This is much more useful than a generic claw hammer, since you will unlikely have any nails that will need removing. In addition, a dead blow has a counterweight inside of the striking head that minimizes rebound and translates most of the force downwards onto the surface being struck.

This is useful for shaping metal amongst other things. Center punches are used to mark the center of the hole you are trying to drill. When used correctly, they leave behind a small dimple that will keep your drill bit in place and prevent it from wandering.

You shouldn't consider drilling metal without first center punching it. A scribe is used to leave a really light scratch on the surface of a metal part. This is used for marking cut and drill lines. This is preferably to pencil or marker because a scratch line is thinner, more accurate, and does not wear off easily.

If you are going to making scribe lines on your metal, you are likely going to need to do some measuring. It is recommended you get digital calipers and a metal ruler. You have likely used a ruler before, but may have not use calipers. So, to explain, digital calipers have two jaws which slide back and forth upon a track. On the readout, it tells you the distance between the two jaws to a fraction of an inch. This is useful for making really precise measurements, which you often need to do for metal.

Unlike softer materials such as wood or plastic, metal has no give. You need to be spot-on with your measurements. This is a little different than normal dry sandpaper used for woodworking. The most important part, is that the paper is stronger and doesn't rip as easily. We will be discussing sanding much more in the finishing section.

The buffing wheels we will be using in this class are shank-mounted and designed to go into a drill bit. They are basically a bunch of thin layers of fabric sandwiched together. It is the edge of the sandwiched fabric disc that is used to buff metal.

This is yet another thing we will discuss more later. If you are using a buffing wheel, you will want to get some metal-appropriate buffing compound. There are many different types of buffing compounds. Essentially, they act upon the surface of the metal much in the same way a fine sandpaper does.

This is a finishing touch used to create a smooth, shiny, surface upon metal. Throughout this course we will be using a handful of different chemicals. We are not using anything particularly caustic, but it is important to always be mindful when dealing with chemicals and handle them carefully i. Dykem steel blue layout fluid is a blue ink used to coat the surface of metal for marking cut lines.

Tap Magic is a cutting fluid for cutting threads into drilled holes using a tap. It serves as a lubricant to decrease friction and a cooling agent to absorb the heat of machining threads. It is important to get the appropriate safety and cleaning materials for working with metal.

The following is the minimum requirements. When doing metalworking, it is unlikely you will be wearing all of the safety equipment at once like I am, but let's take a moment to discuss what you need:. Aside from personal protective equipment, you will also want to get a basic first aid kit. This does not have to be anything too fancy. It should have materials to clean and dress scratches, cuts and bumps.

Since we are not really using power tools, potential injuries will likely be on the more manageable side of the scale. To clean up, at the very least, you should have a broom. The broom is used to sweep everything up into a nice neat pile.

You should also invest in a brush and dust pan is for getting that neat pile of metal scraps up off of the floor. It can also be used for cleaning off work surfaces as well. If you think you may have damaged your square, make a mark on a piece of stock. Then move the square to the other side of the stock. If the blade doesn't match up perfectly with the scribed line, the square needs to be replaced. If it's difficult to tell if the line is parallel to the blade when the square is moved to the other side of the stock , scribe a second line a few thousandths from the first line.

It's relatively easy to see that the lines are not parallel when they're so close together. Center Punch: Whatever type of punch you use, you need to use one that has the point precisely ground. Don't try to sharpen an old screwdriver on a grinder. The point will not be perfectly round. The following photos show a real center punch and a punch made from a piece of drill rod. In the second photo, notice how much sharper the point of the ground center point is.

An Optical Center Punch: An optical punch can be useful in finding the precise intersection of two scribed lines. It has a magnifier that fits tightly in a metallic base. You use the crosshairs or center spot used on other optical center punches in the magnifier to align the base. When you have it aligned, you remove the eye piece and replace it with the center punch. Then you hit the center punch to mark the spot. If desired, you can go back the optical piece to check for proper placement and depth of punch.

The next 4 photos show the Veritas optical center punch in it's case, set up for sighting the mark, setup for punching and the fourth photo shows the view through the eyepiece. As you can see, the eyepiece will show you the intersection very clearly.

It's actually much better than in the photo perfectly clear and in focus for entire sight area but it was somewhat difficult to capture with a camera. I generally set the punch with the crosshairs as shown then turn it until the black lines completely obscure the scribed lines. It's sometimes difficult to see the precise center of very fine scribed lines when the crosshairs are oriented in on top of the lines. The crosshairs are not perfectly centered on the scribed lines in the photo. Note: To prevent movement when making a mark on a narrow piece of stock or near the edge of a piece of stock, you should place another piece of stock of the same thickness against the side of the one being marked.

The rubber o-ring in this punch's base is very soft and it's easy to get off a bit if you don't have a solid surface for it to sit on. One problem with using a hand held drill is that it's difficult to get the center-line of the hole perfectly perpendicular to the surface of the workpiece. If precision is important when drilling a hole, you need to use a drill press or a mill or a lathe When properly set up, a good quality drill press can allow you to drill holes that are very nearly perfect.

The drill press below is an old Harbor Freight piece that's seen better days. It still works but you have to be careful with precise operations because there is so much runout in the bearings and spindle.