What do you do when your roll bar tubing needs to be shortened? What about when you need a specific length of steel bar? Ever need to cut out rust and patch in sheetmetal? Well, it's obvious that all of these items require some cutting of steel. If you do not have a lot of experience with it, you might be surprised how many different ways there are to form steel to the length you need. The intent of this article is to survey some of them, helping you understand what is available, and which ones might work best for specific tasks.

I have quite a few different tools in my shop for cutting steel. I have hand tools, air tools, tools powered by electric motors, and there are other types I do not have. The most basic of these are the hand tools.

I get heavy use out of two different hand tools in my shop. The first is the hacksaw. It seems that everyone has one, and for good reason. They're cheap, useful, and get the job done (eventually). Hacksaw blades are available for many different applications, making it so you can cut just about anything. Unfortunately, it takes forever to cut anything bigger than about 1/2 round. Also, it can be difficult to get a straight cut, and may sometimes require additional finishing if that's what you're looking for.

The other hand tool I use a lot are my metal shears. These are more than tin snips; they can cut sheetmetal with ease, and I've even cut some of the thicker gauge steels. It's excellent for making small cuts, or even cutting out larger panels, but it can distort the metal some. The action of the shears is to displace the steel along a plane, which necessarily bends it some. Because steel has a memory, it can be massaged back, but it may no longer be perfectly flat. Also, the shears can make it difficult to precisely cut complex shapes because they naturally want to travel straight. However, for cutting small patch panels out of sheetmetal, the shears are quick, easy, and precise.

I do not have one, but one big manual tool for cutting steel is the jump shear. It's a shear that cuts large sections at a time. The shearing action is actuated by a foot control. Position the steel, jump on the lever, and it will make a single clean cut. There are also hydraulic versions of this, which are great for cutting parts of 4x8 sheets, or thicker gauges.

I have a number of air tools which I use for cutting. Probably the most intuitive is the cutoff tool, which uses an abrasive disk on a rotating spindle to cut items. Fast (for thinner steel), messy, and cheap, but it can be hard to control. Better for cutting the center out of things (think cutting rust out of a car) because they are portable and can start cutting in the middle of steel.

I don't have one, but air body saws can be useful as well. They use a blade on a reciprocating saw, using air to drive the blade at high speed. Blades are cheap, and it can be quick and create clean cuts.

The sheet metal nibbler might be considered the poor man's plasma cutter. The nibbler cuts tiny crescent shaped bits out of steel sheet, allowing it to quickly cut steel, and make sharp turns. As a bonus, it doesn't use any consumables. While it cannot handle thicker steel, this is my tool of choice for clean, thinner steel sheet.

Those are the major types of air tools I use for cutting. Moving on to the electric-powered tools…

Believe it or not, you can cut steel with a Skilsaw. This is how I cut everything for my first roll cage. Slap a metal cutting abrasive disk on it, put on your goggles & hearing protection, and let it rip. It's messy, and can be slow if the steel is thicker, but given that most people have some sort of circular saw in their shop, it can a cheap way to cut. I can remember standing on roll cage tubing which was propped on 2x4s, while letting the sparks fly. It took forever, but I did get decent cuts out of the saw. However, it was a lot of work, and I'll likely never do it again.

There are a bunch of reciprocating saws out there; I have a cheap one that takes forever to cut. Consumables are cheap, and the tools can be cheap. However, I might suggest buying a quality tool here. Mine is so slow that it takes forever to cut through anything. Also, buy the decent blades because they last longer.

Stepping up in size, there is the chop saw. Commonly using 14" or larger disks, these tools can cut through all types of steel, including hardened if necessary. Most come with built-in vices to hold parts steady, allowing you to concentrate on keeping the right pressure on the cut. Keep in mind that chop saws are messy, noisy, and require you to attend to the whole cut. They do have the advantage of being faster than other methods, and being able to cut hardened steel. My advice here is to buy a decent one; I had a cheap one from eBay that gave up the ship in about 4 cuts. The brushes wore out quickly, and it overheated internally, melting some wires.

I do have a power hacksaw, which is perfect for cutting roll cage tubing. It can cut at an angle up to about 45 degrees, consumables are cheap, it's easy to set up, it's quiet, it's clean, and the cuts are straight. It takes a long time to cut, but it can be set to turn off automatically when the cut is done. Just set it up and walk away -- come back when you hear the "clank" of the steel falling. I do recommend buying purpose-built power hacksaw blades. I used hand hacksaw blades in mine, and they wore out and broke quickly. This may have been partially a result of setup (transition from backstroke to cutting stroke), but I do not believe the thicker power hacksaw blades would have exhibited this failure.

The next step up may be the bandsaw. I do not have one, but from what I understand, the horizontal bandsaw can be even better than the power hacksaw once set up. Compared to the power hacksaw, the cuts are almost as straight, faster, and the units usually have an auto shutoff. However, consumables are more expensive (each), and improper setup can cause bad cuts or broken blades. From what I understand, the best thing to do is set up using a cheap blade (because it may break), then switch to long-lasting quality blades.

This covers the major mechanical cutters, leaving a couple of very handy torch type cutters.

The oxy-acetylene cutting torch has a lot going for it. It's portable, fast, and cuts all types of steel. From what I understand, it can cut thicker steel better than a plasma cutter. However, it can leave slag, and may not make perfectly straight cuts. And it can be dangerous if you don't know what you're doing. Even so, this is one of the most common and most useful cutting tools available.

While I do not have a plasma cutter, I understand that they can be more accurate at cutting thinner steel, such as sheet metal. They are precision cutting tools, making clean cuts that do not heat the surrounding metal as much as the oxy-acetylene torch.

While I'm sure there are other cutting tools out there, these are some of the most common. They each have their own strengths and drawbacks, making each suited to certain tasks. I find that I prefer ones that are automatic, allowing me to continue with other work while the tool cuts to my specs and turns itself off. To that end, I do plan on getting a horizontal bandsaw in addition to my power hacksaw. I also plan to add a plasma cutter to my tool set.

I hope that this short article may help you if you're shopping for a new cutting tool, or maybe even opened your eyes to one you hadn't known you needed.