Laser cutting circles in sheet metal
Laser cutting circles in sheet metal panels
Cutting circles greater than the diameter of a single hit tool have always been problematic in sheet metal. Smaller holes can easily be stamped with a simple round punch and die in a CNC punch press, fly press or power press. We use this type of tooling all the time in the sheet metal work that we produce. Holes above 76mm diameter can be produced with a CNC punch press by either nibbling with a smaller tool and then cleaning up or by using a “banana” tool ground to a given radius. Both of these methods are good and we often use them to produce internal and external curves. The best solution to producing a perfect continuous circle is to use a laser cutting machine. Our Trumpf 3030 fibre laser is perfect for this type of work whether it’s a circular cut-out such as this shown here or a curved outer profile it makes no difference to us. The laser is also able to cut out ellipse shapes, irregular complex curves and irregular polygons. Using Radan software the start and stop points are automatically programmed to show no witness on the finished part reducing or often eliminating the need for any edge de-burring.
So if you have a sheet metal working project that has a large circular hole give us a call and we will be happy to produce a quote for cutting the parts for you.