Re: Cutting 3mm aluminium channel
Posted: Sat Jan 19, 2019 9:19 am
Fortunately aluminium doesn't oxide (burn) anywhere near as easily as magnesium, and fires can be quenched with water (try that with magnesium and it'll make things worse). Mix aluminium dust with iron oxide dust, though and you have the beginnings of thermite, a highly combustible material used in some explosives and for welding railway lines in-situ. Aluminium dust, like any other metal dust, is harmful - which is why industrial set-ups for cutting and grinding metals all have to have extraction on them these days (I think I mentioned extraction earlier on). If you are sawing, though, as opposed to sanding, grinding or polishing the particle size won't often be small enough to become airborne - still best to wear eye protection and consider a mask, though, if processing in volume.Alloy ally wrote:It reminds me of magnesium.