The Cold Hard Facts of Cold Saws

Cold saws are some of the most misunderstood machines in shops today. Easily dismissed as “Chop saws” these machines have progressed over the years to become precise, productive part producing machines integral to the success of machine and fabrication shops worldwide.  While more a machining process then a sawing one, the Cold Saw can be the right choice for a lot of applications where precise clean and straight cuts are required.

What is a Cold Saw?

A cold saw is a machine designed to cut metals and other materials by using a circular toothed blade to remove material. The processes action transfers the heat generated by friction into the chip thereby allowing both the blade and material being cut to remain cool, thus the term “Cold Saw”. These saws use either a solid high speed steel (HSS), tool steel (M2, M35 etc.) or carbide-tipped, resharpenable circular blades. They are equipped with an electric motor and quality industrial grade saws offer a gear reduction unit to reduce the saw blade's rotational speed for steady and precise cuts. This allows the saw blade to feed at a constant rate with a very high chip load per tooth.

Cold saws are capable of machining most ferrous and non-ferrous alloys and can be manually controlled or controlled via a CNC Programmable controller.  While the blade and material are usually cooled with coolant it is also not uncommon to use cutting oil on the cold saw depending on the application.

What makes a Cold Saw Better and for What Applications?

Limited in capacity by the circular blade (typically 6” diameter parts and under) the cold saw can be powerful additions to any machine or fabrication shop. When cutting small diameters, short lengths, thin walled material, aluminum extrusions and production parts into the thousands, a cold saw is the preferred method. Because of the rigidity of the blade and the process the cut quality is more like a “milled” finish and the straightness is extremely accurate. Often a cold sawed part edge is adequate for processing without further refinishing or machining. Further equipping these saws with full automation can provide for an unattended sawing or parting operation.  

These automated machines are often equipped with full mitering and part shuttling systems as accurate milled miter edges along with accurate part lengths are critical in manufacturing industries such as window and door frames. Further these fully automated systems can provide repeatable accurate parts for critical further processes such as robotic welding.

Applications

• Typical Cold Saw Applications include:
• Tubing/Pipe
• Window Frames/Extrusions
• Sign Manufacturing
• Parting Operations

Do you want to discuss how a Cold Saw cutting solution from Southern Fabricating Machinery Sales can work for your application? Contact the experts at Southern Fab today! Call us directly at 813-444-4555 or visit us on the web at WWW.SOUTHERNFABSALES.COM

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