TFS: Best Way to Remove Dross?
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 2 ต.ค. 2024
- Is there a "best" or "perfect" way to remove dross from a part? Which one is fastest? Which one leaves a near perfect finish? What tools are ideal? Let's explore a few of them....
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The easiest way I have found to remove the dross/slag is to have someone else do it.
Tumbler
@@Amirnake tumbler for small parts but what about big parts that are 1/2 -more? A chisel gun?
I can't remember but I think you have an air dryer on the supply for the plasma torch but wanted to take the opportunity to remind folks that the dryer the air the better chance you can get a clean cut. I put a desiccant system on my supply for my plasma torch and the difference was almost night and day. Thank you for posting.
Hey. When I was fabricating exhaust ducts out of mild steel for commercial cooking applications, we''d use plasma cutter by hand for most of this type of stuff. Anyway, I'm sure the difficulty increases proportionally with the thickness of the steel, and thus the thickness of the dross that rolls over the edge. The thing about dross, though, is that it shears off easiest if you chisel it back over the edge it came from. You can''t chisel along the edge, because the rolled junk along the edge resists the force.
If you're working on parts that need to be welded together and can't have impurities bubbling out your welds, it's best to chisel the dross away, then dress the edge with a grinder or a file. If you just chisel or knock the edge, there's still a little bit left and it shits up the weld, especially for thin gauges of steel.
Hope this feedback helps!
Get a used Cement Mixer off Craigslist.....and a bag of pea gravel from Lowes. Throw the parts and gravel in the mixer, turn on, walk away and keep on working. Come back in 15-20 minutes.......DONE.
BINGO! We have a winner!
Oh, and if there are paddles inside the drum, remove them. Also, sometimes it may take 60 minutes or in the case of the very nasty slag you purposely created, maybe a couple hours for that stuff. But there is Zero labor with this method other than loading and unloading. You can run dry or with water.
I have done that for years, works great, and if you have a lot of parts, you don`t need extra gravel, but it all depends on what finish you want.
Way cool idea guys, brilliant!!
Wet or dry?
Get two Needle Scalers--one with chisel tip needles, and one with a chisel. And a flap disc grinder for final touches.
yup!
I was going to suggest the same thing.
Throw them in a cement mixer or make your own tumbler. Works great ! Especially that many parts
I was thinking a rock tumbler too!
I'm late to this party, but a vibratory finishing mill is a wonderful thing if you have access to one. If not, a tumbler like you suggest is great, ceramic media does a beautiful job and leaves a matte finish ready for paint or powder.
Yep vibratory abrader is needed
Get a magnetic chuck to hold the pieces in place and keep your hands out of the way, and you'll find the wire wheel on the angle grinder works a whole lot better
That was scary watching
With the Grinders, the direction the your wheel is moving against the part makes a huge difference. You seem to be grinding away from the part. If you position your wheel so that it is moving into the part where it makes contact, it 'shears' off the corner of the dross/slag quicker/easier. The only problem is it tends to send your sparks up and more towards your eyes, but not so much as to make it intolerable. I've run plasma and oxy fuel CNC machines for years, tried all the methods here except the multitool; grinder with the wheel in the right spot is almost always the best method. Someone else mentioned a needle scaler, and it would certainly be helpful to keep one handy on your cleaning bench.
After spending hours upon hours for months, I read a post from another fabricator that he just tossed his parts on the cement floor of his shop and half the dross fell off. I had not been aware how brittle the dross actually is. The dross is VERY hard from the plasma arc, in fact the dross and the shiny surface of the cut edge will dull your liquid cooled band saw with a new blade in about 3 seconds. Hold it in a vise or clamp to your welding table and chip it off with a hammer and cold chisel. If you need to grind it you best use 3M Cubitron ceramic sanding discs cuz dross is HARD.
Get yourself a (electro)magnet table for grinding small parts
How could one utilize vibration to do large numbers of parts at once. Say a textured surface that would have a variable vibration function ringed with a raised perimeter to keep the parts from leaving the table as they vibrate around. Not sure what type of surface would work best but it would be something rough that would knock the dross loose. Would probably need a top piece heavy enough to lightly press the part to the textured surface. Like a one side waffle iron that vibrated. LOL
I'm considering adding either a rotary or vibratory tumbler to my shop. I'm looking all over for examples and recommendations. We use the flap disc today. It makes a mess and takes a lot of time.
Awsome vid as always, thank you, I've used all those methods, seems like there is time and place for each tool, except the oscillating tool. Never used one of those yet. I also take a planer blade weld some round stock to a piece and use as a scraper.
What I found is the Farrier file is the fastest way I found to remove dross, Hope's it helps.
What are you doing man? Get 3M Cubitron disk and you're done!
As many pointed out, a needle scaler works amazingly well on not only dross but slag from stick welding. For large batches of small things, just toss them into a small concrete mixer with some gravel and sand. After couple of hours parts come out nice and clean. It's not any faster than doing it by hand, but it frees _you_ up to do more interesting things.
Awesome vid as always!! I love the flap disc! If it's a part that needs to be painted then I have a bin of used flap discs that will take off the dross but won't chew up the part. I use old flap discs all the time for pre cleaning up a part that is about to be powder coated or painted...works great!
I use an 8” or 10” long by 1.5” wide masonry chisel without a hammer. Just slide it across the surface on a 25 -or so- degree angle. Just let the inertia do all the work for me. I have found it faster then a grinder.
What if you sprayed the under side of the piece you intend to cut with welding anti splatter before you begin your cut?
The cross is liquid metal that drips out of the cut and ends up on the hot edge. It can essentially be a weld laid on the edge of hot metal. Anti splatter is often olive oil or similar. It would probably cook off.
On bigger pieces I use a old hatchet, works like the chisel and hammer, but you only need one hand to do it.
I work in a sheetmetal fab that consist of mainly trumpf machines. I cannot beleive how poorly my company is utilizing thier million dollar laser cutter.
The best thing for small parts is a magnetic surface grinding Chuck. Then install a stone cup wheel on the angle grinder. A diamond cup wheel for resurfacing concrete also works well. Run the grinding wheel flat on the part. It does leave scratches but does not gouge the material and leaves it dimensionally the same. I've used a muriatic acid soak tub also but it's kind of a pain to set up, but works well if you have a lot of parts to do. Soak for 10 minutes and rinse with clean water, then oil to prevent flash rust. I've never tried the cement mixer tumbler, I will have to keep my eyes open for a cheap cement mixer and give it a shot.
I get dross off using a flap disc at 30° on the cut side one swipe, then hit again flat with the cut. Ball-peen works well with holes, but the flap disc does the job with inside corners and holes for me
I usually use an air chisel or a needle scaler in my shop. It sure beats a hammer and hand chisel.
I was impressed with your build video, now I am even more impressed with how well it works. Best Regards Sarah
That stuff breaks off pretty well with some pliers.
is there a chemical or acid that would attack the oxidized dross and not the base metal? so a chemical removal instead of a mechanical removal...
Muriatic acid solution. Nasty stuff and will rust whatever the fume comes in contact with.
Used to run Bystronic lasers at the factory I work at,and depending what thickness and gas used wouldn't have dross,but things happen,our sort tables had hand files and chipping hammers,,we do have a grinding station ,but if the parts were class A surface,usually would be rejected for paint. My fab shop,we just send files to a local sheet metal shop and they waterjet or laser depending as they only charge 75 an hour to cut and a day turn around,and never have dross. BTW I had 3 4x10 sheets of 3mm mild steel cut in 1.5 hours 2500 parts.
I had a plasma operator who had no idea how to make clean cluts. I knock off the big chunks of dross with a hammer followed by a flap disk or sanding pad
Air hammer with a chisel bit, works great on bigger pieces 😜
Flap disc cleaning up the cut does a good job too.
This was painful to watch, removing dross looks like a nightmare.
In the uk we use a flangle doink to clean this up. Aka the apprentice
In a machine shop, a surface grinder would work, but would take too long to be profitable. Taking from the wood-working folks, you could make a thickness planer/grinder. The parts move on a conveyer belt with a cutting/grinding head above set to the thickness of the material you’re using. Anything beyond that thickness would be removed, (dross).
I saw guys in quite bit production use some rectangle of tool steel beveled at 30° on a stick - rectangle was like 25x80mm and 20mm thick. That thing worked great for both slow and fast dross as well as for oxyfuel dross - as you probably know slow one is much easier to remove and you still showed in video it is not so easy always :) Cool video once again
Best method I found was to get someone else to do it!
In my mind, i think you need to make a air hammer attachment.
A needle scaler works amazing and fast.
Chasing the piece all around with the chisel is a joke because any firmly held position--even just a stop block would make the chisel method work 10x better than pecking it all around the rubber mat. Yes I know the rubber mat works for your power tools but some of us like doing things unplugged when we can. It can be fast enough and it's convenient/simple (and DUST free). It seems you really made it more difficult than necessary, but perhaps that's because you simply don't use that method. I use a hammer daily, so it looks entirely different when I do it.
I normally tap with a hammer to get the easy stuff off then a decent flap disk to clean it up. Although, I did learn a new word today! I've been just calling it slag for years, nice to know the proper terms.
With a chisel, get in BEHIND the slag. When using a grinder, you must grind the cut face. The oscillators are alright but they're better for weld slag. What you didn't use was a foot-long auto hacksaw blade- EVERYONE should have one of those. Grind a chisel edge on one end and you have the best general purpose tool there is. Spatter, slag, weld-toe cleaning; everything. They are brilliant.
Without all the cutting details it appears your torch speed is too slow, that is to much dross to begin with.. Layout out some cut lines that vary 10 ipm per line and see how each line cuts. Then adjust future cuts accordingly. Example if your chart says 50 ipm I would do a 30-40-50-60-70 ipm coupon to cut.
Cool to see the grind table being used as designed rather than just a dude blowing vape at it. Has you noticed a reduction in black dust from your grinding operations since building it? I'm planning a shed attached to the shop so I can do most of my grinding out-of-doors, but do like the table. Did you ever show us how much crap it collects?
Air powered needle descaler
An air hammer with a chisel bit for the heavies then fallow-up with an electric hand grinder to break the edges 🛠
I know this is over a year old now, but in case anybody every see's this, my method is to use a flap disk, but not on the surface where the dross sits, but on the cut edge beside it. Rather than grinding perfectly flat along that edge, tilt it up, just a few degrees so you're mostly hitting the corner where the dross is. Light dross like your control part will come off with a very quick light run down the length of the part. Heavier dross might require another pass or two. I find this is very efficient, doesn't mar the top surface at all, since you never grind it, and leaves maybe just slight grinding marks along the cut edge, but to me, that just improves the finish.
A $20 air hammer. Weaker the better and tools are not super hard. Somewhat dull chisel bit at an angle so you don't ding up part. Then flap disk. Use it on 14 gauge to 1/2" Thats my process.
I can't help thinking that your soft bench is absorbing the shock when using the chisel and maybe the oscillating tool too. You didn't try a carbide burr in a die grinder. I have a little electric chisel/scraper, like the oscillating tool but reciprocating action, that I will try next time I need to clean up edges.
What I do is, 1. I drop the piece as flat as possible and as hard as possible on may flat concrete floor. 2. drop it in a large flat pan of pool acid, set and forget. 3. clean up with wire wheel if necessary, which rarely does. Pierce dross (tough buggers) is the worst.
Hammer and chisel is better used on parts that are either heavy enough to stay put or ones that are clamped down. If the part can slide around you lose a lot of power, like hammering on wood instead of on an anvil.
I've found the best way is to knock off the larger pieces with hammer / chisel and go back for the little stubborn nubs with a flap-wheel.
We are trying to figure the best way. I'm thinking a chisel gun. Especially for parts that are around 1/2 to more thick. Pain in the ass.
Tongue and groove pliers... aka Channel lock pliers. Works pretty well for me... just grab the dross and pull off while holding the plate with another pair.
80 grit flap disc against the dross(same direction of cut) almost perpendicular with the cut edge, works every time. And I do it every day.
Take a pair of old wire cutters or a cheap pair and if you can grab the dross with the wire cutters you can snap it right off
If the dross is on the outer perimeter of small parts, ive "back stroke" the edges using a grinding wheel or flap disc and they tend to pop off. I have also used steel putty scrapers too and theyre quite effective.
We would get an old file, cut an inch or two off it and weld it to the end of a heavy steel rod about 12 to 15 inches long. Then grind a bevel on the file at about an 85 degree angle. This makes for a nice and heavy deburing chisel which you can use without a hammer.
I see this is an older video….but an air chisel with air pressure set to lowest amount that cycles the tool….bam….knocks it right off.
I think you nedd to let it cool down about 1 or 2 hours and it will be hard to remove so you'll know what was the best way to remove that dross, i dont use wire wheels often, it sucks you can accidentally throw the angle grinder to your hands that holding the piece, thick stone wheels doesnt remove it, it just making a curve to the piece, best to remove it for me was using cut disk and finishing it with flap disk or sanding disk or belt sander
I worked in a shop where they would take punched or stamped parts and put them in a concrete mixers with water and a shovel full of carborundum and tumble. It would take all the whiskers and burrs off and leave nice smooth parts. I suppose it would work for dross as well.
When we do it at work I usually use a chisel and or chipping hammer followed by flap disc on a grinder usually mostly on stainless steel but we’re only using a hand plasma cutter
Toss the loose parts in a Harbor Freight cement mixer along with some steel scrap pieces and let it tumble. Knocks the slag off, peens and polishes it all at once. Only downside is time and noise. Best to make a bunch of pieces and tumble them for a while and go do something else for awhile.
Not so much on small parts like that, but on larger parts I like to use an air hammer with a chisel bit.
I use a pair of electrician's 9 inch side cutter pliers. You can grab big sections of dross and pull it off. You can also use the side cutters as a hammer for tougher dross. I'll finish up with wire wheel on my bench grinder.
Dross (and the cut edge) is hard because it has been nitrided (heated very hot in the presence of nitrogen, leaving nitrogen diffused into the crystal structure. This hardens steel the same as any of the usual alloying elements diffused into the crystal structure, and for much the same reasons.
Don't you think a needle scaler or air hammer would be worth testing? If hammer and chisel does the big stuff well, you would think they might be worth it
I've heard of the oscillating tool, but you have to use it sideways so you're not cutting into the dross, the blade hits it... Muriatic acid bath sounds good for that amount of parts
Air chisel with a nice sharp chisel instantly removes it, and leaves no marks. You want ear and eye protection though, as with any of the power tool options shown.
Just get some ar500 cut up into rectangles and use it to hit the dross from all angles. It works and they last for a long time before getting dull. Trust me I run a kinetic
I hand cut small pieces like leaves and letters. I've heard I can soak small parts in vinegar and that will eat the dross off. Anyone try that?
Best way I found is to speed up while cutting :-P
Dipping it in peanut butter removes it instantly.
save your grinding disks!!
I think a small pneumatic beveller with a radius or chamfering insert would do the job really fast and well.
Wire wheels are too risky imo, if im doing it by hand chipping hammer and file to finish but if doing production flap disk all the way
Spray anti-spatter on the bottom of the metal before you cut. Or if you can afford it,step up to a plasma cutter than can use oxygen as the plasma gas.
I use a flap disk at about 90 degrees to the part for the outside edge and then for cuts on the inside of a part I use a heavy duty scraper and anything that doesn’t get hit with a flap disk.
SLAG IS THE CORRECT TERM FOR THIS,WHATEVER IT'S CALLED IT IS A PAIN TO CLEAN UP. THE CLOSER ALL VARIABLES ARE TO BRING IN LINE,THE BETTER FINAL PART WILL TURN OUT. DUH.
Wet tumbler?
Put parts in cement mixer they hit each other and come out mint I do it with all parts I cut out as long as you have other stuff to do whilst there churning
all ive ever done was hit the cut face with a hammer to knock off dross. if i need to stack parts, ill first adress with a hammer, then use a flapper disc to make them flat. i dont have a CNC, so i gotta plasma cut out all my parts, then stack them, then flapper disc them all to the same shape haha! plasma table is definitely on my wish list once i get a shop to put it all in though!
In my opinion, hammer for the boogers, and then finish with the wire wheel. Seemed to be the fastest by a long shot.
I use a sand paper on my grinder on the side of the piece my surface stay in perfect condition and i remove the taper of the plasma cut its a 2 for 1
Try a 4" X 36" bench belt sander with a suitable abrasive belt for the job.
i use an air hammer with a chisel bit in, just be careful as the dross flys off with good amount of speed
Great video Justin! Thanks for getting everyone to input their great ideas!
Belt sander with a flat platten and a good strong magnet you can hold buddy
Get a Waterjet machine!
A few times I used another piece of metal, just slid it across the part.
I used to use a small hammer and just tap the edge and it woukd usually just break right off
Air hammer with a chisel bit
Rub the tow pieces against each other works well
Pferd diamond wire cup 👍 also great for removing mill scale
Every cut I ever made with a plasma looks like them!!!!!!!
Needle scaler. Air powered and the needles are replaceable. Cheap and effective.
Sharp chisel and wire wheel combo is my preferred. A very sharp chisel is important.
Is this machine almost entirely made of 80/20?
Thank you! I'm really enjoying your videos!
Use a air powered gasket scraper it operate like a air chisel.
Ya grinder with flapper disc, and or wire wheel is what we use too. Oh I like you grinder holder pretty cool man .
I use a cheap (HF) 3" putty knife. I hold it in an over hand stabbing position at an angle to the edge of the part then simply jamb it in. If I go in one direction only while rotating the part, it is most effective. Unfortunately, I cut a lot of heavier gauge material (3/8 - 3/4) which requires that I move more slowly while maintaining cut-through. If I try to speed-up, I immediately get a rooster tail out the back and no cut-through. The part is literally welded back together, and, depending on the price of the stock (3/4" is muy espensive!), I will be forced to take a cutoff wheel to it to cut it free.
BTW, my cutter is a Hypertherm PM85, so not exactly a dog.
My go to tool is the old fashioned chipping hammer. I run the flat face at an angle down my part so I don't put dings in the surface. It's quick and gets rid of most of the dross very quickly, but make sure that you do it on a rigid surface. It's easy to criticize from a distance but by using the hammer and chisel on your grinding bench most of the energy of your hit was absorbed into rubber matting. Mind you, maybe your best option is a large grinder with a wire wheel that you can lean on. Means that you only have too carry the weight of the part, not the angle grinder, and you have two hands to hold onto the part with, and you can apply much more pressure. I always wear a leather welding apron and wear leather riggers gloves when on the wire wheel. You will invariably touch the wheel which will remove skin and the leather gloves protect you from wire bristles, flying dross and other debris, and looks after your skin. With no grinding rest in position your gloves cannot get caught. I've been using grinders for over 40 years now and my current range of hand grinders go from 1" to 9", and my bench and pedestal grinders go from 3" to 24".
I agree with all those saying a pneumatic needle scaler