Frequently Asked Questions

Click the "Sign in" button in the top navigation, then select "Register". Fill in your details and verify your email address.

It depends on the saw and the section. On bar and profile up to about 200 mm a band saw typically holds ±2 mm, plate sawing about ±0.3 mm on plate from 3 mm thickness, and shearing about ±0.5 mm on thin sheet — figures published against DIN ISO 2768-1 class c. Precision sawing reaches ±0.13 mm, but that comes from the precision and aerospace segment and is not what a general sawing shop will quote. Confirm the achievable tolerance for your grade, section and quantity with the provider.

A band saw suits large-diameter solid bar: the continuous blade spreads heat along its length, so each tooth cools between entering and leaving the cut. A circular cold saw, typically used from roughly 25 to 125 mm diameter, gives a cleaner, squarer cut face on small and medium sections. For abrasive cutting we have no sourced guidance to offer, so we would rather say nothing than guess — ask the provider what they run and why.

Send the grade or material number, the form and dimensions, the cut lengths and quantity, and the tolerance you actually need. Add a drawing if the cut is angled or complex, say whether you require an inspection certificate, and give the delivery address and the date you need it. Those seven things are what turn an enquiry into a firm price rather than a range.

Cutting customer-supplied material is common practice, but whether a given shop accepts it — and on what terms regarding liability, remnants and traceability — varies by provider. Ask before shipping. If the material carries an inspection certificate, ask in the same message how they will mark the cut pieces so that traceability survives.

This is the question worth asking carefully. EN 10204 defines inspection document types 2.1, 2.2, 3.1 and 3.2, and 3.1 is the usual buyer default in steel procurement. But sawing does not create a certificate — the certificate belongs to the material. What matters is whether traceability survives the cutting operation, and how each cut piece is marked so it stays linked to its heat. Ask the provider that directly.

Allow roughly 1 to 3 mm per cut for the kerf. Over many cuts from one length that adds up, so include it when you calculate how much stock a job consumes — the material lost to the blade is real material you are paying for.

There is no industry-wide minimum order quantity for contract sawing; it varies by provider. Some will cut a single piece, others price small quantities in a way that makes them impractical. Ask as part of your enquiry rather than assuming.

No general lead time can be stated honestly — it varies by provider, and with the section, quantity and their current load. One supplier advertises same-day cutting depending on quantity, but that is one supplier's offer and not a norm you should plan around. Ask for a committed date with your quote.

There is no industry-wide norm here — whether the cut is deburred, and whether that is included or charged separately, varies by provider. Because it is not a given, put it in the enquiry explicitly if you need the edges deburred or chamfered — it is one of the factors that moves the price.

Angled cuts are a normal request, but they are harder to hold to tolerance than a square cut and they take longer, which is why cut complexity is one of the things that drives the price. Send a drawing with the angle and the tolerance you need rather than describing it in text.

Sawing removes material mechanically with a blade, so it leaves a kerf of roughly 1 to 3 mm and no heat-affected zone worth speaking of. Thermal processes such as laser and plasma cut by melting or burning, which changes the edge condition and the material immediately next to it. For cutting stock to length, sawing is the usual choice; thermal cutting comes into its own for profiles and contours a blade cannot follow.

Contract sawing is not priced from a single rate, so any figure quoted here would mislead. What drives it is material thickness, steel grade, whether the cut is straight or angled, total volume, the tolerance you require, and any finishing such as deburring or chamfering. Send the seven items in the quote checklist and you will get a firm price instead of a range.

It depends on the thickness and on the size of the feature being cut. Suppliers publish tolerance tables against DIN EN ISO 9013 tolerance class 1: roughly ±0.1 mm on thin sheet and small dimensions, widening to about ±0.6 mm at 10 mm thickness. One supplier's class 1 table starts tighter, at ±0.075 mm — the two published tables disagree for overlapping ranges while citing the same standard, so treat the class as the reference and the exact figure as something to confirm. Separately, suppliers advertise machine repeatability of ±0.05 mm and positioning accuracy of ±0.1 mm; those describe the machine, not the tolerance you will be quoted on a finished part.

For fibre lasers, suppliers advertise up to 30 mm in carbon steel, stainless steel and aluminium alike. At the thin end, one sheet-metal supplier quotes a working range of 0.025 in to 0.250 in, that is 0.635 mm to 6.35 mm, which reflects a sheet-metal shop rather than a heavy-plate one. The honest summary is that the limit is set by the machine in front of you, not by the process, so ask the provider what they run.

Narrow. Suppliers describe the cutting line as under 0.5 mm for most materials, with beam diameters around 0.15 to 0.25 mm depending on the material. That is the practical advantage of the process for nesting: you lose very little material between parts, so more parts fit on a sheet.

There is no industry figure for this, and that is worth saying plainly. Neither the standard nor any supplier we could find publishes a numeric heat-affected zone width for laser cutting steel. What can be said honestly is comparative: because the beam melts a very narrow line, the heat-affected zone is narrower than plasma or oxyfuel cutting. If a specific millimetre value matters for your application — because the part will be machined, welded or fatigue-loaded at the cut edge — that is a question for the provider about their machine and your material, not something the industry has standardised.

Every supplier we reviewed publishes figures for fibre lasers, and none published a comparable CO2 figure per material, so we will not manufacture the comparison. In practice the question that matters to you is simpler than the technology: ask what maximum thickness the shop holds in your material, and what edge quality they commit to. Those two answers decide your job regardless of which source produces the beam.

For flat parts, a 2D DXF is what shops ask for. If the part is bent or formed, suppliers prefer a 3D file — STEP, SLDPRT or IPT — because the flat pattern has to be derived from it. Wider format lists exist (STEP, STP, SLDPRT, DXF, IPT, PRT, SAT), but DXF for flat and STEP for formed covers almost every enquiry.

The file in the right format, the material and grade, the sheet thickness, the quantity, the tolerance you actually need, any finishing such as deburring or forming, and the delivery address with the date. Those seven turn an enquiry into a firm price rather than a range. Note that any minimum and maximum part size a shop quotes is their machine envelope, not an industry limit — a larger shop cuts larger.

They solve different problems. Sawing removes material mechanically with a blade and is how stock is cut to length; laser cutting melts a narrow line and is how a contour is produced from sheet. The kerf difference is the visible consequence — the laser removes well under a millimetre while a saw removes considerably more, though the sawing figure belongs to the sawing page and its own source rather than being restated here. If you need bar cut to length, saw it. If you need a shape out of plate, laser it.

All three cut contours a blade cannot follow, and they differ in the edge they leave. Laser melts a very narrow line and leaves the narrowest heat-affected zone of the thermal processes. Plasma cuts thicker material faster but with a wider kerf and more heat input. Waterjet cuts cold, so there is no heat-affected zone at all, which is why it is chosen for materials that must not see heat — at the cost of speed. We have sourced figures for laser only, so treat the plasma and waterjet comparison here as directional and confirm specifics with a provider.

The same answer as for any cut-to-order steel: cutting does not create a certificate. EN 10204 defines the inspection document types 2.1, 2.2, 3.1 and 3.2, and 3.1 is the usual default in steel procurement, but the certificate belongs to the material, not to the cutting operation. What matters is whether traceability survives the cut and how each part is marked so it stays linked to its heat. Ask the provider that directly.

There is no industry-wide minimum order quantity for laser cutting; it varies by provider. Some shops cut single parts and quote them online, others price small quantities in a way that makes them impractical. Ask as part of your enquiry rather than assuming.

Laser cutting is not priced from a single rate, so any figure quoted here would mislead. What drives it is the material and its thickness, the quantity, the complexity of the part, and the scope of the work — cutting alone, or cutting plus finishing and assembly. Send the seven items in the quote checklist and you will get a firm price instead of a range.

Shot blasting is specified against ISO 8501-1, which defines cleanliness grades by how completely mill scale, rust and old coatings are removed. Sa 1 (light blast cleaning) removes loose scale and rust while firmly adhering residue may remain — equivalent to SSPC-SP7 / NACE No. 4. Sa 2 (thorough blast cleaning) removes most contamination with slight staining permitted — SSPC-SP6 / NACE No. 3. Sa 2½ (near-white, very thorough) leaves only slight shadows or stains — SSPC-SP10 / NACE No. 2, and the grade most steel stockholders offer as their standard service. Sa 3 (white metal) leaves a uniform metallic appearance with no visible contamination at all — SSPC-SP5 / NACE No. 1.

Sa 2½ is the practical standard for most coating systems: near-white, with only slight shadows or stains permitted, and it is what steel stockholders typically stock as their default blasting service. Sa 3 (white metal) removes every visible trace of contamination and is reserved for the most demanding coating or corrosion-protection specifications, where the cost of the extra blasting time is justified by the service the steel will see. Unless your coating specification or project standard explicitly calls for Sa 3, Sa 2½ is usually the right and more economical choice — confirm the requirement against your coating manufacturer's data sheet or your project specification.

ISO 8503 grades the surface profile separately from the cleanliness grade, using a comparator with Fine, Medium and Coarse segments. For shot blasting (dimpled profile, Type S), published figures are Fine 23–28 µm, Medium 35–45 µm and Coarse 60–80 µm, measured as Ra. Which band you land in depends on the abrasive size and blasting parameters used, not on the Sa cleanliness grade — a Sa 2½ surface can be blasted to a fine or a coarse profile depending on what the coating that follows needs. State the roughness band your coating system requires alongside the cleanliness grade when you order.

ISO 8503 distinguishes surfaces by the profile shape the abrasive leaves rather than by a specific product: shot abrasive (Type S) leaves a dimpled profile, grit abrasive (Type G) leaves an angular one, and the roughness figures on this page are for the shot (Type S) profile specifically. None of the suppliers we reviewed publish the specific media — steel shot size, grit type or brand — that they run, so we will not invent one. Ask the provider directly which abrasive they use and whether it matches the profile shape your coating specification calls for.

It depends on the shop's equipment. One supplier's continuous-line system runs a pass-through opening of 1500 x 500 mm at a throughput of 0.8–1.5 m/min, descaling all sides; another runs a batch system that accommodates plate up to 124 in wide with a maximum height of 14 in. Both figures describe one supplier's machine, not an industry limit — a shop with a larger chamber or a wider continuous line handles larger parts. Confirm your part's dimensions against the specific shop's equipment before ordering.

The same answer as for any processed steel: blasting does not create a certificate. EN 10204 defines the inspection-document types 2.1, 2.2, 3.1 and 3.2; one supplier in this lane explicitly offers 'Werkszeugnis 2.2 or an Abnahmeprüfzeugnis 3.1' as part of its processing programme, and 3.1 is the usual default in steel procurement. What matters is whether traceability survives the blast and how each part is re-marked so the heat or batch stays linked to it. Ask the provider directly how they handle re-marking.

Shot blasting is not priced from a single rate, so any figure quoted here would mislead. What drives it is the abrasive and the target cleanliness grade, the starting surface condition — how much mill scale, rust or old coating has to come off — the part size and total surface area, the batch size, and whether the shop needs to reach both sides or the inside of an enclosed shape. Send the six items in the quote checklist and you will get a firm price instead of a range.

The material and its current surface condition, the target cleanliness grade you need, part dimensions and quantity, the total surface area to be blasted, any areas that must be masked off, and the delivery address with the date. Those six turn an enquiry into a firm price rather than a range.

There is no industry-wide minimum order quantity for shot blasting; it varies by provider. Some shops blast single parts as part of a larger processing order, others set a practical minimum batch. Ask as part of your enquiry rather than assuming.

No supplier in the sources we reviewed publishes a standard lead time for shot blasting, and we will not invent one. It depends on the shop's queue, the batch size and whether the part needs other processing first. Ask the provider directly when you enquire.

A blasted surface removes mill scale, rust and old coatings that would otherwise interfere with downstream work: robotic welding sees a clean, consistent surface to arc against, and laser cutting starts from bare metal instead of a scaled one, both of which improve process reliability. It is also the standard first step before priming or coating, since paint keys into the roughened profile a blast leaves rather than a smooth mill surface. Shipbuilding, railcar manufacturing and structural fabrication all use it as a preparation step ahead of welding, cutting or coating.

Yes — one supplier in this lane specifically advertises mechanical descaling and blasting for both internal and external surfaces, which matters for tube, pipe and hollow profile work where the bore needs the same cleanliness grade as the outside. Confirm with the provider that their equipment reaches the specific internal diameter and length of your part, since internal access is a function of their equipment, not a given for every shop.

It depends on the feature size and the tolerance class you specify. Under ISO 2768-1, most shops meet class m (medium) as standard: on a 6 to 30 mm feature that's ±0.2 mm, tightening to ±0.1 mm at class f (fine) if you ask for it. For a toleranced bore or shaft fit rather than a general dimension, ISO 286 defines fit classes such as H7 — on an 18 to 30 mm hole, H7 runs from 0 to +0.021 mm. These tables give the range; confirm the exact figure for your size and class with the shop.

H7 is the hole side of the most common general-engineering fit, H7/h6 — a locational clearance fit for a shaft that needs to locate precisely in a bore without an interference press. Under ISO 286-2, an H7 hole's lower deviation is always 0 and the upper deviation grows with diameter: +0.015 mm at 6 to 10 mm, +0.018 mm at 10 to 18 mm, +0.021 mm at 18 to 30 mm. Yes, we cut to H7 and other ISO 286 fit classes — specify the class and the mating part on the drawing.

Ra 3.2 µm is the default as-machined finish most shops deliver without extra steps, commonly specified under BS EN ISO 1302. Tighter finishes are available in steps — 1.6, 0.8 and 0.4 µm — but each step usually means an extra finishing pass, which adds cost. State the Ra you need per surface on the drawing rather than 'smooth': different surfaces on the same part often need different finishes.

Turning holds the bar or blank in a rotating chuck and takes material off with a fixed tool — the natural choice for round, cylindrical or threaded features. Milling holds the part still and moves a rotating cutter across it, which is how flats, pockets, slots and off-axis holes get made. Many parts need both, done in one setup on a multi-axis machining centre, which avoids the alignment error of moving the part between separate turning and milling operations. Tell us which features the part needs and we plan the operations.

Send a drawing or a STEP file, the material grade, the tolerance class or the specific tolerances that matter, the surface finish you need per surface, the quantity, and whether you are supplying the material or we are sourcing it. Those six things are what turn an enquiry into a firm price instead of a range.

Machining customer-supplied material is common, but whether a given shop accepts it — and on what terms for liability and any remnant — varies by provider. If your material carries an EN 10204 certificate, say so up front and ask how they will preserve traceability through the machining operation.

EN 10204 certifies the material — types 2.1, 2.2, 3.1 and 3.2 exist, and 3.1 is the usual buyer default in steel procurement. It does not certify the finished machined part. If your tolerance is tight enough that you need proof the finished dimensions were actually held, that's a separate document — typically a dimensional inspection report from a CMM or similar measurement — and it is not standardized the same way EN 10204 is. Ask for both separately if you need both.

There is no industry-wide minimum order quantity for CNC machining; it varies by provider and by how much setup the part needs relative to the run length. Ask as part of your enquiry rather than assuming a single piece is either impossible or free of a setup charge.

No general lead time can be stated honestly — it depends on the provider, the part's complexity, how many operations and setups it needs, and their current load. Ask for a committed date with your quote rather than planning around an average.

Steel grade does affect machinability — harder and more alloyed grades generally cut at lower speeds, wear tooling faster, and sometimes need different tooling — but how much varies by grade, condition and the specific operation, and we have not found a sourced, general figure worth quoting here. Ask the shop about your specific grade rather than assuming a free-machining steel and a hardened tool steel cut the same way.

CNC machining, as we use the term here, is the broader service: turning, milling and multi-axis work to bring a part to its finished drawing dimensions, in whatever combination of operations that takes. Milling and drilling on their own are narrower, single-operation services — useful when that is genuinely all a job needs. If your part needs more than one operation to reach its finished geometry, that's a CNC machining job even if milling or drilling is most of the work.

CNC machining is not priced from a single rate — it depends on material removed, the steel grade's machinability, the tolerance class, the surface finish required, how complex the setup and fixturing is, the quantity, and any secondary operations. Send the six items in the quote checklist and you get a firm price rather than a range.

It depends on the line and the material. A published sheet-length/width tolerance from one coil-line provider is about ±0.25 mm. Two other providers report a length tolerance of about ±0.4 mm on dry, uncoated steel and about ±0.8 mm once the steel is oiled — oil on the sheet affects how it feeds and shears. A narrow-strip line (a different segment, cutting strip roughly 9.5 to 140 mm wide rather than full sheet width) publishes a looser, one-sided tolerance of about +6.4 mm on the cut length. Confirm the achievable figure for your grade, thickness and width with the provider.

One coil-line provider publishes a squareness tolerance of about ±1.6 mm on a sheared sheet. That is separate from the length tolerance — a sheet can be the right length and still be slightly out of square if the shear or the feed isn't holding true. Confirm the achievable squareness for your sheet size with the provider; we have not found a second independent figure to corroborate this one.

We have not found a supplier-published numeric flatness figure (an 'I-unit' or similar leveling index) for a general cut-to-length line that we could confirm from the source itself, so we are not going to hand you a number we can't stand behind. Flatness on a CTL line comes from the leveler ahead of the shear — ask the provider what leveling equipment they run and what flatness they will commit to for your grade and thickness.

Cut-to-length feeds from a COIL: the material is uncoiled, leveled and sheared into flat sheets. Contract sawing cuts BAR or SECTION stock — round, square, flat bar, structural profile — with a saw blade. The input form is the whole difference: if your material starts life as a coil, you want cut-to-length; if it starts as bar or profile, you want contract sawing.

Both start from coil, but they change different dimensions. Slitting narrows the coil's WIDTH — a wide coil goes in, several narrower coils come out, length unchanged, and one provider publishes a slit-width tolerance of about ±0.13 mm. Cut-to-length changes the coil's LENGTH — it cuts across the coil to produce flat sheets of a set length, width unchanged. If you need narrower coil, ask for slitting; if you need flat sheets of a set length, ask for cut-to-length.

Send the grade or material number, the thickness, the width, the sheet length you need, the quantity, whether you're supplying the coil or sourcing it from the provider, and any packing requirement. Those seven things are what turn an enquiry into a firm price rather than a range.

Cutting a customer-supplied coil is common practice, but whether a given line accepts it — and on what terms regarding liability, remnant coil and traceability — varies by provider. Ask before shipping, and if the coil carries an inspection certificate, ask in the same message how the cut sheets will be marked or batched so traceability survives the cut.

EN 10204 defines inspection document types 2.1, 2.2, 3.1 and 3.2, and 3.1 is the usual buyer default in steel procurement. But a cut-to-length line does not create a certificate — the certificate belongs to the coil. What matters is whether traceability survives decoiling and shearing, and how each batch of sheets stays linked to its heat. Ask the provider that directly.

There is no industry-wide minimum order quantity for cut-to-length; it varies by provider and by how a partial coil is handled. Ask as part of your enquiry rather than assuming.

No general lead time can be stated honestly — it varies by provider, coil availability, and the line's current load. Ask for a committed date with your quote.

A sheared edge is not the same as a slit or ground edge — the trade recognizes named edge conditions (mill, slit, cut, dressed) for exactly this reason. We have not confirmed a numeric burr-height limit for cut-to-length shearing that we're comfortable citing, so ask the provider what edge condition their shear leaves and whether deburring is available if you need it.

Cut-to-length is not priced from a single rate, so any figure quoted here would mislead. What drives it is material thickness, steel grade, coil width, the target sheet length, total volume, the tolerance you require, whether you or the provider supplies the coil, and any packing requirement. Send the seven items in the quote checklist and you will get a firm price instead of a range.

Sawing, shearing, drilling and milling all leave a burr — a thin ridge or fin of displaced material along the cut edge that was never part of the part's intended shape. Deburring removes it. The goal is not to create a new, defined edge geometry, only to take off what the previous operation left behind, so the part is safe to handle and fits where it needs to.

ISO 13715 (Technical product documentation — Edges of undefined shape — Indication and dimensioning) is the standard for this. It defines a drawing symbol — plus, minus, or plus-or-minus — that a designer places on a specific edge, together with a permitted depth in millimetres for that edge: a minus sign calls for material removal (no burr allowed, an undercut instead), a plus sign permits some excess material. The standard does not publish one figure that applies everywhere — the depth is set per drawing, per edge, by whoever specifies the part. If your drawing doesn't carry an ISO 13715 callout, say in words what "deburred" needs to mean for that edge.

Manual deburring — hand tools, files, rotary burrs or wire brushes — has the lowest setup cost and suits small batches or awkward geometry, at the cost of speed and consistency. Vibratory tumbling runs parts and abrasive media together in a bowl, which suits large batches of small parts. Brushing uses rotating wire or fibre brushes to take the burr off without changing the part's dimensions. Thermal deburring burns burrs off in a short, controlled heat pulse and reaches internal passages a tool can't enter. Electrochemical deburring dissolves the burr with an electrical current through an electrolyte, with no mechanical contact, and is precise enough for holes, cross-holes and intersections. Which one a shop reaches for depends on your geometry, material, batch size and required edge condition.

Deburring removes an undefined burr left by a previous operation — there is no target shape, only "gone". Chamfering is a defined, dimensioned cut: a bevel with a specific angle and depth called out on the drawing. The two are often confused because both leave a smoother, safer edge, but they answer different questions — deburring corrects a defect, chamfering adds a deliberate feature. A part can need either, both, or neither.

There's no industry-wide default here, and it varies by provider — some bundle deburring into a cutting or sawing order as standard practice, others bill it as a separate line only when asked. This is the same honest answer contract sawing gives to "is the cut deburred?": don't assume either way, put it in the enquiry.

Send the parts or a drawing, tell us which edges need deburring, and state the edge condition you need — ideally as an ISO 13715 callout, or in plain words if the drawing doesn't carry one. Add material and thickness, quantity, and the delivery address and date you need it. Those six things turn a request into a firm price instead of a guess.

Only the edges you specify, unless you tell a provider otherwise. A part can have edges that matter for handling safety, edges that matter for a mating fit, and edges nobody will ever touch — treating all of them the same wastes money on the ones that don't need it and risks missing the ones that do. Say which edges need deburring and, where it matters, what condition each one needs to end up in.

Deburring works at a scale below the part's general dimensional tolerance and is not meant to change the size or shape the drawing calls for — it removes displaced material at the very edge, not stock from the face. Where an edge condition genuinely matters to the design, the honest fix is to specify it explicitly, ideally with an ISO 13715 callout, rather than leaving "deburred" to mean whatever the shop's default happens to be.

No industry-wide minimum order quantity exists for deburring on its own; it varies by provider, and more so than for a primary cutting process, since deburring is often folded into a larger order. Ask as part of your enquiry.

No general lead time can be stated honestly — none of the sources reviewed publish one, and it depends on the method needed, the batch size, and whether it's riding on the back of another operation or standing alone. Ask for a committed date with your quote.

Yes, but the certificate isn't about the deburring — it's about the material. EN 10204 defines inspection document types 2.1, 2.2, 3.1 and 3.2, and 3.1 is the usual buyer default in steel procurement; deburring itself doesn't create one. What matters is whether the traceability your material already carries survives the deburring pass, and how the piece stays marked so it's still linked to its heat afterward. Ask the provider directly how they handle that.

Deburring isn't priced from a single rate, so any figure quoted here would mislead. What drives it is batch size, how many edges need it and how accessible they are, which method the geometry requires, material and finish sensitivity, whether the edge condition is actually specified on the drawing, and whether it's riding along with a cutting order or standing alone. Send the six items in the quote checklist and you'll get a firm price instead of a range.

Drilling alone typically holds a tolerance grade of IT10 to IT13 — coarser than a machined fit, but enough for clearance holes, fixing holes and general fabrication. A precision fit such as H7 or H8, for example a bearing seat or a dowel hole, is not something a twist drill delivers on its own: the hole is drilled undersize first and then reamed or bored to size. We do not publish an exact micrometre tolerance table here — we could not trace one to a verified primary standard — so ask your provider for the achievable tolerance on your diameter and material.

For bolted structural connections, EN 1090-2 sets the standard clearance-hole diameter for each bolt size: an M12 bolt gets a 14 mm hole, M16 gets 18 mm, M20 gets 22 mm, and M24 gets 26 mm. The hole is deliberately larger than the bolt so the connection can be assembled and aligned on site.

Send a drawing with the hole pattern, every diameter and its required tolerance, the depth — through or blind — and whether the holes need to be threaded. Add the grade or material number, the quantity, whether you need an inspection certificate, and the delivery address and date. Those eight things turn an enquiry into a firm price rather than a range. Standard shops work from the DIN 338 diameter series for their drills; if you need a size outside that series, say so up front.

Drilling customer-supplied material is common practice, but whether a given shop accepts it, and on what terms for liability and traceability, varies by provider. Ask before shipping, and if the material carries an inspection certificate, ask in the same message how the drilled parts will be marked so traceability survives the operation.

EN 10204 defines inspection document types 2.1, 2.2, 3.1 and 3.2, and 3.1 is the usual buyer default in steel procurement. But drilling does not create a certificate — the certificate belongs to the material. What matters is whether traceability survives the drilling operation, and how each part is marked or batched so it stays linked to its heat. Ask the provider that directly.

Drilling with a twist drill produces a hole to roughly IT10 to IT13. Reaming and boring are follow-up operations that take a pre-drilled hole down to a tighter grade such as H7 or H8, which drilling alone cannot hold. If your fit needs that precision, say so in the enquiry — the shop will drill undersize first and finish to size afterwards.

There is no industry-wide minimum order quantity for drilling; it varies by provider. Some will drill a single part, others price small quantities in a way that makes them impractical. Ask as part of your enquiry rather than assuming.

No general lead time can be stated honestly — it depends on the provider, the hole pattern, the quantity and their current load. Ask for a committed date with your quote instead of planning around a norm that does not exist.

Threaded holes are a normal request, and the thread size and depth belong on your drawing alongside the through-hole diameter. Thread requirements vary too much by application for us to state a general figure here, so put the exact thread callout in the enquiry rather than relying on a default.

There is a widely repeated rule of thumb that standard twist drilling is practical up to roughly three to five times the hole diameter before deeper holes need pecking cycles or specialised gun drilling. We could not trace this to a citable standard or a named supplier commitment, so we are not stating it as fact. For a deep hole, give the provider the depth and diameter and ask directly whether standard drilling reaches it.

Drilling removes material mechanically with a rotating cutting edge and produces a round hole with no heat-affected zone. Thermal processes such as laser or plasma can also pierce a hole, but they leave a cut edge rather than a machined bore and are not held to the same tolerance grades. For a hole that needs a specific diameter tolerance or a bolted fit, drilling — with reaming or boring if the fit is tight — is the usual choice.

Drilling is not priced from a single rate, so any figure quoted here would mislead. What drives it is material thickness, hole diameter, hole depth, the number of holes, the tolerance you require, the steel grade, and whether the holes need threading. Send the items in the quote checklist and you will get a firm price instead of a range.

EN ISO 9013 covers oxyfuel flame cuts from 3 to 300 mm. In practice the process is chosen where it stays economical — commonly plate over about 20 mm, and it's often the preferred method above 100 mm, where plasma and laser lose their speed advantage on thick material. As one concrete data point, Dünnewald's CNC flame-cutting machines cut contours up to 200 mm thickness — check the specific provider's machine limits for your job.

Flame cutting works by oxidising the metal, so it is limited to plain low-carbon and mild steel, and wrought iron. It cannot cut stainless steel, cast iron, aluminium or copper alloys — their chemistry or melting point defeats the oxidation reaction the process depends on — and high-carbon steel is also unsuitable because the slag it produces interferes with the cut. If your material isn't plain carbon steel, ask the provider which process they'd use instead.

EN ISO 9013 classifies oxyfuel flame cutting as quality/tolerance Class 2 — the same class as plasma cutting, and coarser than laser's Class 1. The standard sets the exact tolerance by thickness and cut length in a table we don't reproduce here; treat any figure a provider quotes as indicative, and confirm it in writing for your thickness and geometry before committing to a dimension-critical part.

Send the grade or material number, the plate thickness and dimensions, a contour or DXF/drawing file if the shape isn't a straight cut, the tolerance you need, whether you require an inspection certificate, and the delivery address and date. Those six things turn an enquiry into a firm price rather than a range.

Allow roughly 2 to 6 mm per cut for the kerf — flame cutting removes more material than sawing or laser cutting because the flame itself is wider than a saw blade or laser beam. Over a long contour or several parts nested from one plate, that adds up, so include it when you calculate how much plate a job consumes.

EN 10204 defines inspection document types 2.1, 2.2, 3.1 and 3.2, and 3.1 is the usual buyer default in steel procurement. But flame cutting does not create a certificate — the certificate belongs to the plate. What matters is whether traceability survives the thermal cut, and how each cut piece is marked so it stays linked to its heat. Ask the provider that directly.

Flame cutting earns its place on thick plate — roughly 20 mm and up, and especially above 100 mm — where its lower equipment cost and lack of a thickness ceiling on carbon steel outweigh being slower. Plasma and laser cut faster and hold a tighter tolerance class under EN ISO 9013 (Class 1 for laser versus Class 2 for oxyfuel and plasma), but plasma suits thinner material and laser thinner still. For thin, precision or non-ferrous work, ask the provider about plasma or laser instead.

Flame cutting leaves a heat-affected zone at the cut edge because the process works by melting and burning the steel, not shearing it. The sources we reviewed describe that zone only as larger than plasma's or laser's — none publish a sourced width in millimetres, so we won't invent one. If HAZ hardness or grain structure matters for your application, ask the provider for their measured figures or plan for a post-cut machining allowance.

Cutting customer-supplied plate is common practice, but whether a given shop accepts it, and on what terms for liability and remnants, varies by provider. Ask before shipping, and if the material carries an inspection certificate, ask in the same message how they mark the cut pieces so traceability survives.

There is no industry-wide minimum order quantity for flame cutting; it varies by provider. Some will cut a single part from your plate, others price small jobs in a way that makes them impractical. Ask as part of your enquiry rather than assuming.

No general lead time can be stated honestly — it varies by provider, plate thickness, contour complexity and their current workload. Ask for a committed date with your quote rather than assuming a standard turnaround.

Flame cutting is not priced from a single rate, so any figure quoted here would mislead. What drives it is plate thickness, steel grade, cut complexity — a straight line costs less than a contour — total volume, the tolerance you require, and any finishing such as deburring or secondary machining to bring the edge into a tighter tolerance. Send the six items in the quote checklist and you will get a firm price instead of a range.

Annealing softens the steel and relieves stress by heating above the transformation range and cooling slowly. Normalizing does something similar but cools in air, giving a finer, more uniform grain. Quenching (hardening) cools rapidly from above the transformation range to lock in a hard structure, and is almost always followed by tempering, which reheats to a lower temperature to trade some of that hardness for toughness — quenching and tempering together, not quenching alone, is what a usable hardened part needs. Stress relieving is milder still: it stays below the transformation range and removes residual stress from rolling, welding or cutting without changing hardness or microstructure. Carburizing and nitriding are case-hardening processes that diffuse carbon or nitrogen into the surface, giving a hard, wear-resistant skin over a tougher core. Which one applies to your part depends on the grade and what you need it to do.

It depends entirely on the grade, so no single figure can be given honestly on this page. As one published example, PGI Steel states stress relieving at 1100–1200°F for lower-carbon steels such as A36, A572 Gr50/A709 and 1020, sub-critical annealing at 1350–1450°F for higher-carbon grades such as 1045 or 4140, and full annealing at 1500–1650°F. Those are one supplier's own service ranges for the grade groups they name, not a universal figure — the temperature for your specific grade is a property of that grade. Check that material's own page in this catalogue, or ask your provider to confirm the figure for your exact specification.

There is no honest generic answer — oil, water, air or a specific quenchant is chosen for the grade and the properties you're targeting, and naming one here would be the wrong instruction for most readers' steel. Ask your provider what medium they use for your grade and why; it is one of the choices that determines whether the part reaches the properties you need without cracking or distorting.

This works differently here than on any other service on this site. EN 10204 defines inspection-document types 2.1, 2.2, 3.1 and 3.2, with 3.1 the usual buyer default — but heat treatment CHANGES the material it certifies. A 3.1 issued before treatment describes the steel before quenching, tempering or annealing altered its properties. Ask the provider directly whether the certificate you'll receive covers the material as-received or as-treated, and whether re-testing after treatment is included or needs to be requested separately.

Yes — that is the entire point of the service. Unlike cutting or cleaning, which change shape or surface, heat treatment changes what the steel IS: its hardness, strength, ductility and toughness move to a different point on purpose. That is exactly why the delivery condition and any post-treatment testing matter more here than on any other service this catalogue covers — the part leaving the furnace is not, mechanically, the same material that went in.

Send the grade or material number, its current condition, and the condition or hardness you need to reach. Add the dimensions and quantity, any standard or specification the treatment must meet, whether you need a post-treatment inspection certificate, and the delivery address and date. Those seven things are what turn an enquiry into a firm price and a firm process, rather than a guess.

Sending your own material for treatment is common practice, but whether a given provider accepts it, and on what terms, varies. Ask before shipping — and because heat treatment changes the material's properties, ask specifically how they'll document the treated condition and whether that documentation references the certificate the material arrived with.

Capacity depends entirely on the provider's own furnace. As one published example, Metals Engineering's stress-relieving furnace runs up to 1750°F, holds the load within ±25°F, and can log multiple thermocouples per run with a certificate of conformity and temperature chart for every job. That is one supplier's own equipment, not an industry figure — ask what your provider can fit and how they document the run.

There is no industry-wide minimum order quantity for heat treatment; it varies by provider and by how a job fits their furnace schedule. Ask as part of your enquiry rather than assuming.

No general lead time can be stated honestly — it depends on the provider, the process, the section size and their current furnace schedule. Ask for a committed date with your quote.

Heat treatment is not priced from a single rate, so any figure quoted here would mislead. What drives it is the process (or combination of processes), the grade and section size, the current and target condition, quantity, furnace scheduling, and any testing or documentation required. Send the seven items in the quote checklist and you will get a firm price instead of a range.

Use this page to understand which process does what, what a certificate means after treatment, and what a provider needs to quote. For the actual temperature, medium and hardness figures published for YOUR grade, go to that material's own page in this catalogue — the process names and definitions are the same on both, but the numbers that matter for your steel belong there, sourced to that grade specifically, not to steel in general.

EN ISO 1461 sets the minimum coating thickness by the thickness of the steel itself, as local and mean values. For steel over 6 mm it's 70 µm local / 85 µm mean; from 3 mm up to 6 mm, 55 µm / 70 µm; from 1.5 mm up to 3 mm, 45 µm / 55 µm; under 1.5 mm, 35 µm / 45 µm. Castings are slightly different — 70 µm / 80 µm at 6 mm and above, 60 µm / 70 µm below it. Centrifuged and threaded articles have their own, thinner table. These are minimums the coating must meet, not a target — how far above them it lands depends on the steel's own reactivity.

Yes, more than most buyers expect. The steel's silicon content governs how thick and how uniform the coating grows — this is known as the Sandelin effect. Below about 0.04% Si the coating tends to be bright and close to the EN ISO 1461 minimum. From roughly 0.04% up to about 0.14% Si, coating growth accelerates sharply and produces a thick, dull grey, sometimes brittle coating — the reactive range galvanizers try to avoid. ASTM A385 practice recommends specifying steel in the 0.15% to 0.22% range instead, where growth is more predictable. Above about 0.25% Si the coating is reliably thicker and greyer again, though less erratic than in the reactive range. Phosphorus in combination with silicon can push the reaction further the same way. If the part is large, decorative, or dimensionally critical, ask for the mill's silicon content before ordering the steel.

Two separate documents are in play, and it's worth keeping them apart. EN 10204 covers the STEEL — the usual buyer default is a 3.1 inspection certificate for the material itself. Galvanizing does not extend that certificate; it adds its own conformity confirmation under EN ISO 1461, covering coating thickness, adhesion and appearance against that standard's requirements. Ask for both separately: the mill's EN 10204 3.1 for the steel, and the galvanizer's EN ISO 1461 test report for the coating.

Almost certainly, if the part is a hollow section — pipe, box section, or anything that encloses a cavity. Molten zinc and the pre-treatment solutions before it need somewhere to get in, fill, and drain back out; without that, trapped air or liquid can make the article reject the coating, or in the worst case cause a violent steam explosion in the kettle. General guidance calls for vent and drain holes at least 13 mm (1/2 inch) in diameter, placed at the high and low points as the part will hang, and stiffeners or gussets cropped back at least 19 mm so they don't need their own holes. Confirm the exact provision with your galvanizer at the design stage — adding holes after fabrication is far more expensive than designing them in.

It can, particularly in thin, long, asymmetric, or heavily welded and cold-worked parts. The bath runs close to 450°C, and a part carrying locked-in stress from rolling, forming or welding can relieve that stress unevenly as it heats, which shows up as warping or twisting. There is no reliable numeric threshold — thickness, length and how symmetric the part is all interact, and it comes down to the part's design and the galvanizer's experience with similar work. If distortion risk is a concern, flag the part's fabrication history and ask the provider before you commit to the job.

There is no industry-wide maximum — every galvanizer's kettle is a different size, and that sets the ceiling for a single-dip part. Long or oversized parts can sometimes be double-end-dipped, but that adds cost and leaves a visible overlap line. Send your part's dimensions with the enquiry so the provider can confirm it fits their kettle before you commit to fabrication.

The zinc bath runs at roughly 438°C to 460°C for standard hot-dip galvanizing, commonly cited around 450°C. That's the temperature range every part is exposed to during immersion, which is why thermal stress and distortion risk are part of the design conversation.

High-temperature, or 'delta', galvanizing runs the bath much hotter — roughly 560°C to 630°C — producing a thinner, harder coating with more precise, controlled growth. It's used where fit-up between parts matters, or where a smoother surface is wanted for painting over the galvanizing or better abrasion resistance, at the cost of being a less common process not every galvanizer offers.

Send the grade or material number and its silicon content if you have it, the part's dimensions and weight, the quantity, the coating thickness class or standard you need to meet, whether the part needs venting and draining, whether it's a thin or distortion-prone shape, whether you need a certificate, and your delivery address and date. That turns an enquiry into a firm price rather than a range.

No general lead time can be stated honestly — it depends on the provider, their kettle schedule, and the size and quantity of your order. Ask for a committed date with your quote rather than assuming a standard turnaround.

There is no industry-wide minimum order quantity for hot-dip galvanizing; it varies by provider, and small or single-piece orders are common but may carry a minimum charge. Ask as part of your enquiry rather than assuming.

Hot-dip galvanizing bonds a zinc-iron alloy layer metallurgically to the steel surface, so it can't peel or flake the way a paint film can, and it protects the steel galvanically even where the coating is scratched. Paint and other applied coatings sit on top of the steel and only protect where the film stays intact. Galvanizing is usually the more durable, lower-maintenance choice for steel facing outdoor exposure or a harsh environment; painting still wins where colour, a specific finish, or a very thin coating is required — and painting over galvanizing (a duplex system) combines both.

ISO 2768-1 sets four general tolerance classes for linear dimensions: f (fine), m (medium), c (coarse) and v (very coarse). On a dimension from 30 to 120 mm, for example, published engineering-reference tables restating the standard give ±0.15 mm in class f, ±0.3 mm in class m, ±0.8 mm in class c or ±1.5 mm in class v. Tolerance widens with size rather than staying fixed — on a larger dimension, say 1000 to 2000 mm, the same table gives ±0.5 mm in class f, ±1.2 mm in class m, ±3 mm in class c or ±6 mm in class v. Check the full table for your dimension. Milling shops most commonly quote class m or class f. Confirm the achievable tolerance for your grade, section and quantity with the provider.

Flatness and straightness are covered by ISO 2768-2, in classes H, K and L, and the applicable row depends on the larger side length of the surface (or the diameter, for a round one). On a 100 to 300 mm face, published engineering-reference tables restating the standard give 0.2 mm in class H, 0.4 mm in class K or 0.8 mm in class L. A face-milling call-out for 'flat' is not a complete specification without a length and a class letter — put both on the drawing.

A rough milling pass typically leaves Ra 3.2 to 6.3 µm, with 3.2 µm the best case. A finish pass typically reaches Ra 1.6 µm and can get to Ra 0.8 µm on steel with a sharp tool and the right feed and stepover. Getting below Ra 0.4 µm needs a follow-on step — grinding, lapping, polishing or electropolishing — milling alone will not get you there on most materials.

It comes down to what the part actually needs and what it costs to hold. Class f (fine) and class m (medium) are the two milling shops quote most often; c (coarse) and v (very coarse) exist for parts where dimensional accuracy genuinely does not matter, such as some fabrication blanks. Tighter classes cost more to hold in machining time and inspection, so specify the loosest class the part's function allows rather than defaulting to the tightest one.

Send a drawing with dimensions, the grade or material number, the tolerance class (ISO 2768) or your individual tolerances, the surface finish you need, quantity, whether you require an inspection certificate, and the delivery address and date. Those seven things are what turn an enquiry into a firm price rather than a range.

EN 10204 defines inspection document types 2.1, 2.2, 3.1 and 3.2, and 3.1 is the usual buyer default in steel procurement — one supplier we checked offers exactly 'Werkszeugnis 2.2 or Abnahmeprüfzeugnis 3.1'. But milling does not create the certificate — the certificate belongs to the material. What matters is whether traceability survives the material being cut into smaller milled pieces, and how each piece is marked so it stays linked to its heat. Ask the provider that directly.

Milling works across the common structural and engineering steel grades, but machinability differs by grade — it is one of the things that drives the price and the achievable finish. We have no sourced list of which grades a given provider mills, so ask directly rather than assuming a grade is covered.

Milling customer-supplied material is common practice, but whether a given shop accepts it — and on what terms regarding liability, remnants and traceability — varies by provider. Ask before shipping. If the material carries an inspection certificate, ask in the same message how they will mark the milled pieces so that traceability survives.

There is no industry-wide minimum order quantity for milling; it varies by provider. Some will mill a single piece, others price small quantities in a way that makes them impractical. Ask as part of your enquiry rather than assuming.

No general lead time can be stated honestly for milling — it varies by provider, and with feature complexity, tolerance class, quantity and their current load. Ask for a committed date with your quote rather than assuming a standard turnaround.

Milling removes material with a rotating cutter against a stationary (or fixtured) workpiece, which is what generates flat faces, pockets and slots. Turning rotates the workpiece against a stationary cutting tool, which is what produces round, symmetric features — shafts, bores, threads. If your part is a flat plate, a bracket or anything with pockets, that's milling; if it's a cylindrical part, that's turning, which sits under our CNC machining service rather than this one.

Milling is not priced from a single rate, so any figure quoted here would mislead. What drives it is material thickness and how much stock has to come off, steel grade and machinability, the tolerance class you require, the surface finish, feature complexity — pockets cost more than a flat face — total volume, and any fixturing the job needs. Send the seven items in the quote checklist and you will get a firm price instead of a range.

EN 10204 defines four inspection document types. A 2.1 is a declaration of compliance issued by the manufacturer with no test results. A 2.2 is a test report — compliance plus test results, but from non-specific inspection, not necessarily the lot you received. A 3.1 is an inspection certificate with results of specific inspection on your delivered lot, validated by the manufacturer's own representative independent of production. A 3.2 adds a second, independent sign-off — either an outside inspector or your own representative — on top of the same specific-inspection results.

Both 3.1 and 3.2 carry specific inspection results — actual test data from the lot you were supplied, not generic production figures. The difference is who validates them. A 3.1 is validated once, by the manufacturer's own authorized representative, who must be independent of the manufacturing department — typically the quality department, not production. A 3.2 is validated twice: by that same manufacturer's representative, and additionally by an independent third-party inspector or by your own authorized representative. That second, independent signature is what 3.2 buys — most buyers who get this wrong assume 3.2 means better material; it means the same material with an extra independent witness.

A 2.1 is a plain statement that the delivery complies with the order — no test data attached. A 2.2 adds test results, but they come from non-specific inspection: figures the manufacturer holds from its production process, not necessarily generated on the specific lot in front of you. Neither is tied to your delivered material the way a 3.1 or 3.2 is, which is why steel procurement defaults to 3.1 whenever traceability matters.

A 3.1 or 3.2 certificate states the heat (cast) number, the chemical composition from the product or ladle analysis, the mechanical test results relevant to the product standard — for example tensile strength, yield, elongation or hardness — and the delivery condition, such as the heat-treatment state. A 2.1 or 2.2 does not carry this level of detail: a 2.1 has no test data at all, and a 2.2's data is not tied to your specific lot.

3.1 is the usual buyer default in steel procurement — it is the lowest type that ties actual test results to the material you actually received, validated independently of the people who made it. Ask for 3.2 only when your project or client specifically requires the additional independent sign-off; it is not a routine upgrade.

Certificates are normally supplied with the shipment, and that is the point at which to ask if one is missing. A mill can reissue a certificate it already produced but did not send with the material — that is routine. What is generally not possible is creating genuinely new specific-inspection results after the fact for material that was shipped without testing; the practical fallback there is an independent lab testing retained samples from the same heat, not a certificate conjured after the fact.

Yes, one certificate can cover several pieces cut from the same heat, provided the heat number is carried onto every piece before the original marking is removed. The certificate is tied to the heat, not to the piece — so what actually determines whether traceability survives the cut is the marking, not the paperwork.

Traceability rests on marking, not on the certificate alone. When heat-marked material is cut, the heat number has to be transferred onto every resulting piece before the original mark disappears with the offcut. Skip that step and a perfectly valid 3.1 certificate no longer proves anything about the piece in front of you, because nothing links the two anymore.

A stockholder can pass through the original mill's 3.1 certificate unaltered when reselling material it holds in stock. What it cannot do is issue its own 3.1 for material it did not melt and test itself — a 3.1's specific-inspection results belong to the manufacturer that actually produced and tested that heat. If a reseller offers you a 3.1 it generated itself for material from another mill, ask where the original test data came from.

Send the grade or material number, the heat or cast number if you have it, your delivery note reference, your order reference, and which certificate type you need — 2.1, 2.2, 3.1 or 3.2. Those five things let a provider locate or produce the right document instead of guessing which one you mean.

There is no industry-wide figure for what a mill test certificate costs — it depends on the certificate type, the inspection body involved, and whether third-party sign-off is required, and that varies by provider. Ask for the certificate cost as part of your quote rather than assuming it is included or a fixed add-on.

No general lead time can be stated honestly for obtaining or reissuing a certificate — it depends on whether specific inspection or third-party validation is still outstanding, and that varies by provider and by how the request is handled. Ask for a committed date when you request the certificate.

It depends on the equipment and the segment quoted. Benedict-Miller publishes ±0.015 in (0.381 mm) cut repeatability with square edges typically held within about half a degree. Hypertherm, a plasma equipment maker, publishes ±0.38-0.5 mm for standard-definition plasma on steel under 10 mm thick, with edge angularity of about 1° on 12-38 mm steel and less than 1° on 50 mm steel. Their high-definition X-Definition process is published as capable of holding EN ISO 9013 Class 1 and Class 2 tolerances, with about 0.5 mm generally acceptable — but that describes a specific high-end system, not standard-shop plasma. Confirm the achievable tolerance for your grade, thickness and quantity with the provider.

Published ranges vary widely by shop and equipment. Benedict-Miller's mild-steel range runs 0.032 in to 1 in (0.8 mm to 25.4 mm). Haynes International's plasma table covers 0.187 in to 1.50 in (4.75 mm to 38.1 mm) of plate, sending anything thicker to waterjet cutting instead. Fractory recommends roughly 15 to 50 mm for the best cut quality on carbon and stainless steel, up to about 40 mm on aluminium, and states plasma is capable of up to 150 mm overall — though quality drops well before that limit. There is no single "plasma cuts up to X mm" answer; ask the provider what their machine and their quality standard actually deliver.

Hypertherm publishes a plasma kerf ranging from about 1.5 mm on thin metal up to roughly 5 mm on thick material at higher amperage — narrower than flame cutting's kerf, wider than laser's. The material lost to the cut adds up across many cuts, so include it when you calculate how much stock a job consumes.

Hypertherm, a plasma equipment manufacturer, publishes a typical heat-affected zone under 0.25 mm for modern plasma systems — narrower than oxyfuel flame cutting, which trade sources describe only qualitatively as wider. That figure describes well-tuned, modern equipment; no independent standard sets a heat-affected zone width, and it is not a guarantee every shop's machine will match it. Ask the provider what their own equipment achieves if HAZ matters for your application.

Plasma cutting works on any electrically conductive metal — carbon steel, stainless steel, aluminium and other non-ferrous metals — because it melts the material with an ionised gas jet rather than by oxidising it. That is the key difference from oxyfuel flame cutting, which is limited to plain carbon steel and wrought iron. Cut quality and achievable tolerance still vary by material and thickness, so confirm both with the provider.

Both are thermal processes, but they suit different jobs. Laser holds tighter tolerances and a narrower kerf on thinner material, with a smaller heat-affected zone. Plasma reaches thicker sections at lower equipment cost and, according to Hypertherm, out-cuts a 15 kW fibre laser above about 16 mm mild steel and a 20 kW laser above about 20 mm — the exact crossover depends on the laser's power. For thin sheet with tight tolerances, laser is usually the better choice; for mid-to-heavy plate, plasma is often the more economical one.

Plasma and oxyfuel flame cutting overlap on mild and carbon steel, but not on much else — flame cutting cannot cut stainless steel or aluminium, plasma cuts both. On carbon steel, plasma generally gives a narrower kerf, a smaller heat-affected zone and a faster cut in the low-to-mid thickness range; flame cutting stays capable on much heavier plate, where its slower speed matters less. If your material is anything other than plain carbon steel, plasma is the only one of the two that applies.

Send the grade or material, the plate thickness and dimensions, the contour or a drawing file, and the tolerance you actually need. Say whether you require an inspection certificate, and give the delivery address and the date you need it. Those six things turn an enquiry into a firm price instead of a range.

EN 10204 defines inspection document types 2.1, 2.2, 3.1 and 3.2, and 3.1 is the usual buyer default in steel procurement. But plasma cutting does not create a certificate — the certificate belongs to the material. What matters is whether traceability survives the cut, and how each cut piece is marked so it stays linked to its heat. Ask the provider that directly.

There is no industry-wide minimum order quantity for plasma cutting; it varies by provider. Benedict-Miller advertises no minimum at all, but that is one supplier's offer, not a norm you should plan around. Ask as part of your enquiry.

No general lead time can be stated honestly — it varies by provider, and with the section, quantity and the shop's current load. Ask for a committed date with your quote.

Plasma cutting is not priced from a single rate, so any figure quoted here would mislead. What drives it is material thickness, steel grade, whether the cut is straight or a contour, total volume, the tolerance you require, and any finishing such as deburring or secondary machining. Send the six items in the quote checklist and you will get a firm price instead of a range.

It is really a question about the machine, not the plate. A plate wraps around the top roll as it is formed, so the top roll's own diameter is the real limit — trade guidance for 3- and 4-roll machines puts a single-pass, full-width minimum at roughly 1.5 times the top roll diameter, and down to about 1.1 times for a narrower or softer plate rolled in multiple passes. A minimum expressed purely as a multiple of plate thickness is sometimes asked for, but no reliable industry figure exists for that framing — ask the provider what top roll diameter their machine carries and work from there.

Thickness and width trade off against each other on any given machine — a narrower plate can be rolled thicker, a wider plate has to be thinner. Two published examples show the range: one supplier rolls 2 in (50.8 mm) thick at 12 ft (3657.6 mm) wide, or 12 in (304.8 mm) thick at 3 ft (914.4 mm) wide, on the same equipment. Another publishes a general-purpose range of 12 GA to 1/2 in (about 2.7–12.7 mm) thickness up to 8 ft (2438.4 mm) wide. These are two named suppliers' own machines, not a portfolio-wide maximum — confirm the actual capacity for your thickness and width with the provider.

Any plate rolled through a set of rolls leaves a short flat, un-rolled section at the leading and trailing edge, because the rolls cannot grip and curve the very end of the plate — typically about 1.5 to 3 times the plate thickness. Pre-bending curves those two edges before the main rolling pass, so the finished shell forms a continuous arc without flat spots at the seam. Ask for pre-bending whenever the shell is going to be welded along that seam — a flat zone there creates a stress concentration and makes alignment harder.

We have no sourced roundness or out-of-round figure to give you for a rolled shell, and we would rather say that plainly than borrow one from a different product. Pipe and tube bend ovality standards exist, but they describe pipe bending, not plate rolling into a shell, and applying that number here would not be honest. Ask the provider directly what roundness tolerance their process and your diameter, thickness and grade can actually hold.

Yes — the top-roll-diameter multiple that limits a single pass loosens with multiple passes. Trade guidance for 3- and 4-roll machines reports a single-pass minimum around 1.5 times the top roll diameter, versus roughly 1.1 times when the plate is narrower than the full roll width, the material is softer, and it is rolled in more than one pass. It costs more setup time, so weigh it against just specifying a slightly larger diameter.

Send the inside or outside diameter you need, the plate thickness, the shell length, and the grade or material number. Say whether the seam is to be welded and whether the ends need pre-bending, and say whether you need an inspection certificate. Those seven things are what turn an enquiry into a firm price rather than a range.

Rolling customer-supplied plate is common practice, but whether a given shop accepts it — and on what terms regarding liability, remnants and traceability — varies by provider. Ask before shipping. If the plate carries an inspection certificate, ask in the same message how they will mark the rolled shell so that traceability survives forming.

This is the question worth asking carefully. EN 10204 defines inspection document types 2.1, 2.2, 3.1 and 3.2, and 3.1 is the usual buyer default in steel procurement. But rolling does not create a certificate — the certificate belongs to the material. What matters is whether traceability survives the forming operation, and how the finished shell is marked so it stays linked to its heat. Ask the provider that directly.

That depends on the provider and what you ask for. Some rolling shops weld the seam as part of the job, others hand back an open shell for you or a separate welding shop to close. Say explicitly in your enquiry whether you need the seam welded — it is one of the things that changes the price and the delivery date.

Rolling passes the plate through powered rolls to form a continuous curve — a cylinder, part of a cylinder, or a cone — and is what you want for shells, tanks and pipe sections. Press-brake forming makes discrete straight bends at specific points along the plate, which suits angles, channels and boxed shapes rather than a smooth radius. If the finished part needs to be round, rolling is the process; if it needs sharp, located bends, a press brake is.

No general lead time can be stated honestly — it depends on the provider, their current load, the diameter and thickness, and whether pre-bending and welding are included. Ask for a committed date with your quote rather than assuming a standard turnaround.

Plate rolling is not priced from a single rate, so any figure quoted here would mislead. What drives it is plate thickness, steel grade, plate width, the target diameter or radius, quantity and repeat setups, whether the seam needs welding, and whether the ends need pre-bending. Send the seven items in the quote checklist and you will get a firm price instead of a range.

Standard epoxy and polyester powders on steel typically cure around 160 to 200°C, held for roughly 10 to 25 minutes once the part itself — not the oven — has reached that temperature. Those figures are trade consensus, not a spec: the actual cure schedule for a specific powder is set by that powder manufacturer's own technical data sheet, so confirm it with your provider for the product you're using.

General industrial powder coating typically builds a dry film of about 60 to 100 µm in a single coat, measured with an electronic gauge per ASTM D7091 or ASTM D1186. Heavier-duty and marine coatings are commonly reported thicker. Treat the range as indicative and confirm the specified thickness against the powder manufacturer's data sheet.

Colour is normally specified by its RAL Classic number — for example RAL 9005 for jet black or RAL 9010 for pure white — rather than by a verbal description, so the provider and the powder supplier agree on exactly the same shade. Matching outside the standard RAL palette is possible, but oven scheduling and any minimum quantity for a custom batch are provider-specific — ask before committing to a non-standard colour.

Yes, powder coating is regularly applied over hot-dip galvanized steel as a decorative or extra-protective final layer, but it needs one step a bare-steel job doesn't: thermal pretreatment before the powder goes on, following the preparation practices in ASTM D7803, to stop the zinc coating outgassing during the bake and blistering the finish. Done correctly, per the American Galvanizers Association, the combined system reportedly lasts roughly 1.5 to 2.3 times the lifetime of either galvanizing or powder coating used alone. Tell your provider up front that the part is already galvanized.

Threads and machined or mating faces are masked before coating and unmasked after cure. A coated thread risks cross-threading against its mating part, and a coated mating face or bore risks fouling a tolerance or a seal — both are avoidable by masking rather than fixing afterwards. Tell your provider which features must stay bare.

Maximum part size is set by the individual provider's oven and pretreatment-bath dimensions, so it varies. One supplier publishes a maximum of 10′ × 10′ × 28′ for their line as an example of the scale involved — check the actual oven size with your provider before you commit to a job.

This is the question worth asking carefully. EN 10204 defines inspection document types 2.1, 2.2, 3.1 and 3.2, and 3.1 is the usual buyer default in steel procurement. But powder coating does not create a certificate — the certificate belongs to the material. What matters is whether traceability survives blasting, pretreatment and the bake, and how each coated piece is marked so it stays linked to its heat. Ask the provider that directly.

Send the grade or material number, the form and dimensions, the RAL colour or a sample to match, and the required film thickness if you have one. Say whether features like threads or machined faces need masking, whether the substrate is bare steel or already galvanized, whether you need an inspection certificate, and give the delivery address and the date you need it. That turns an enquiry into a firm price rather than a range.

There is no industry-wide minimum order quantity for powder coating; it varies by provider, and some price small or single-piece jobs in a way that makes them impractical. Ask as part of your enquiry rather than assuming.

No general lead time can be stated honestly — it varies by provider, and with part size, colour availability and their current oven schedule. Ask for a committed date with your quote rather than planning around a general figure.

Priming is a preparatory layer that protects the steel temporarily and gives a following coating something to bond to — it is not meant to be the finished surface. Powder coating is the finished, decorative and protective final layer, baked on and expected to stay on the part in service. A part can be primed and later powder coated; the two are different stages of the same protective build-up, not alternatives to each other.

Powder coating is not priced from a single rate, so any figure quoted here would mislead. What drives it is the colour or custom colour match, the required film thickness, part size relative to the provider's oven, surface prep and masking complexity, total volume, and whether the part is already galvanized and needs the extra pretreatment step. Send the items in the quote checklist and you will get a firm price instead of a range.

Preservation — Konservieren in the German steel trade — is temporary corrosion protection for a steel part: an oil, wax, lacquer or thin primer coat applied after blast cleaning, meant to protect the part through transport, storage and intermediate processing steps. It is not a permanent, multi-layer protective-coating system — providers who offer both treat them as separate services, and this page is about the temporary one.

Preservation is applied after blast cleaning, and the suppliers we reviewed blast to Sa 2½ — ISO 8501-1's "very thorough blast-cleaning" grade, where the surface must be free of visible oil, grease, dirt, mill scale, rust and old coatings before the protective layer goes on. Two independent suppliers confirmed this grade for their own preservation lines.

Two approaches are used in practice. For short-term protection through transport or storage, providers use oils, greases, hard waxes or clear lacquers. Where the part will go straight into a customer's own coating process, a thin water-based primer is applied instead — compatible with standard coating systems, so it doesn't need stripping before the real finish goes on.

One published example: a zinc phosphate alkyd resin welding primer at 15–20 µm, in a standard reddish-brown shade, with grey-white (RAL 9002) or white (RAL 9010) available for larger quantities. That is one supplier's own product, not an industry-wide specification — confirm chemistry, thickness and colour options with your provider.

No supplier we reviewed states how long the protection is expected to last, and we won't invent one — it depends on the method chosen, the storage conditions, and how corrosive the environment is. Tell the provider how long the part needs to stay protected and where it will sit, rather than assuming a default.

ISO 12944-2 classifies environments by how corrosive they are, from C1 (very low, dry heated buildings) up to C5 (very high) and CX (extreme, offshore). It isn't a spec any of the suppliers we reviewed quote for their preservation service directly — it's the vocabulary that lets you describe your requirement precisely: naming a category, or just how long and where the part will be stored, is what turns a vague request for "protection" into something a provider can actually plan for.

Sending your own material for blasting and preservation is common practice in this trade, but whether a given provider accepts it, and on what terms for liability and traceability, varies. Ask before shipping, and if the material carries an inspection certificate, ask in the same message how the piece will stay marked through blasting and preservation.

EN 10204 defines inspection document types 2.1, 2.2, 3.1 and 3.2, with 3.1 the usual buyer default in steel procurement. But preservation doesn't create a certificate any more than sawing does — the certificate belongs to the material. What matters is whether traceability survives blasting and the protective coat, and how the piece is marked so it stays linked to its heat. Ask the provider directly.

Send the grade or material number, the form and dimensions, and the current surface condition. State the corrosivity category if you know it, or simply how long and where the part will be stored — that's what lets the provider choose between oil, wax, lacquer or a primer coat. Say whether you have a protection-method preference, whether you need a certificate, and give the delivery address and date. That turns an enquiry into a firm price.

No industry-wide minimum order quantity exists for preservation; it varies by provider, and none of the suppliers we reviewed publish one. Ask as part of your enquiry rather than assuming a single piece is either fine or impractical.

No general lead time can be stated honestly — none of the reviewed suppliers publish one, and it depends on part size, coverage area and the provider's current load. Ask for a committed date with your quote.

Preservation is a temporary measure — oil, wax, lacquer or a thin primer — meant to carry a part through transport, storage or a gap before its next processing step, and providers who also offer full coating systems keep the two separate. A protective-coating system is the permanent, multi-layer finish a part keeps for its service life. If what you need is the finished part's final surface protection, ask for a coating quote, not a preservation quote.

It depends heavily on the grade, and one producer publishes the only clean grade-by-grade table we could source: SSAB's own figures for its Docol, Domex, Hardox and Weldox brands. At the soft end, DOMEX 700 up to 3 mm thick takes a minimum radius of 0.8 times the material thickness. Mid-range, WELDOX 700 under 8 mm needs 1.5 times thickness transverse to the rolling direction, rising to 2.0 times along the rolling direction. At the demanding end, HARDOX 500 over 20 mm thick needs up to 6.0 times thickness along the rolling direction. These are that producer's own figures for its own branded grades — for ordinary structural steel such as S235 or S355 we found no comparably solid published number, so ask your provider what radius they can hold for your specific grade and thickness rather than assume a generic rule.

Yes. The same sheet bends tighter when the bend line runs across (transverse to) the rolling direction than when it runs along (parallel to) the rolling direction — the published figures above show the along-rolling minimum radius always equal to or larger than the transverse one for the same grade and thickness. If your part allows some freedom in how it is nested on the plate, orienting the bend line across the rolling direction gives the tightest achievable radius.

A standard tolerance of ±1° on bend angles is widely published and achievable on ordinary press brake work. With matched bottom-bending tooling set up for the specific angle, ±0.5° is achievable, at the cost of dedicated tooling and lower throughput. Material thickness variation and the material's own strength affect how repeatable the angle is in practice, so state the tolerance you actually need rather than default to the tightest one.

A flange should generally be at least 4 times the material thickness. Shorter than that, the flat edge cannot reliably span the die opening for the full stroke and risks slipping into the die, which ruins the part and can damage the tooling. If your design needs a shorter flange, say so early — it usually means a different tooling approach, not a simple no.

A hole or cut feature that sits closer than roughly 4 times the material thickness to a bend line is inside the zone that stretches as the metal forms around the bend, so it distorts along with it — a round hole can come out egg-shaped. Keep functional features that distance back from any bend line, or expect the provider to flag it and possibly punch or cut them after forming instead of before.

All springback is elastic: the material relaxes slightly back toward flat after the punch releases, so the finished angle opens up a little from the angle it was bent to. It increases with the material's yield strength, with a larger punch radius, and with a wider die opening; it decreases with more friction between the plate and the tooling. One producer publishes a rough estimate for its own tested grades: for plate under 10 mm thickness with a die opening of about 10 to 12 times the thickness, springback in degrees is approximately the tensile strength in MPa divided by 100. That is a starting estimate for that producer's grades and test setup, not a guarantee for any material — the provider compensates by overbending and confirms with a trial piece.

Send the grade or material number, the form and dimensions, a drawing showing every bend line, angle and radius, the tolerance you actually need, and the quantity. Say whether you require an inspection certificate, and give the delivery address and the date you need it. A drawing with dimensioned bends turns an enquiry into a firm price rather than a range.

Providing your own material for forming is common practice, but whether a given shop accepts it — and on what terms regarding liability, offcuts and traceability — varies by provider. Ask before shipping. If the material carries an inspection certificate, ask in the same message how the formed parts will be marked so that traceability survives the bend.

EN 10204 defines inspection document types 2.1, 2.2, 3.1 and 3.2, and 3.1 is the usual buyer default in steel procurement. But forming does not create a certificate — it belongs to the material. What matters is whether traceability survives the forming operation, and how each formed part stays linked to its heat. Ask the provider that directly.

There is no industry-wide minimum order quantity for press brake forming; it varies by provider. Some will form a single piece, others price small quantities in a way that makes them impractical. Ask as part of your enquiry rather than assuming.

No general lead time can be stated honestly — it varies by provider, the section, the tooling required, the quantity, and their current load. Ask for a committed date with your quote rather than plan around a generic figure.

Press brake forming is not priced from a single rate, so any figure quoted here would mislead. What drives it is material thickness, steel grade, part length and the number of bends, the tolerance you require, the tooling setup and die selection the part needs, and total volume. Send the items in the quote checklist and you will get a firm price instead of a range.

A shop primer is temporary protection, not a finished coating. SSPC Paint Specification No. 15 defines this class of primer as protection for the steel "during delivery, storage on site, and erection" in a normally dry environment, with a minimum dry film thickness of 20 µm — a holding coat meant to survive fabrication and transport, not decades of weathering.

It needs the same near-white grade a shot-blasting shop targets. One named shop primer, Jotun Muki EPS, specifies Sa 2½ (ISO 8501-1) or NACE No. 2 / SSPC SP-10 as BOTH the minimum and the recommended preparation for carbon steel. Priming over a lower grade undercuts the adhesion of everything applied afterwards, including any topcoat.

With the right product, yes — this is the question worth asking before the part reaches a welder rather than after. Jotun Muki EPS is welding-approved to ISO 17652-2 and states compatibility with MIG, MAG and G-FCAW "when applied in low film thickness." It is also type-approved as a shop primer by classification bodies RMSR and DNV GL. Not every primer carries this approval — ask your provider for it by name, don't assume a primer is weldable because it is thin.

One named product, Jotun Muki EPS, states a typical recommended range of 15 to 50 µm (0.6 to 2 mils), applied in an automated shop-priming line. That is one product's own figure, not an industry average — confirm the range with your provider for the primer they actually use.

There is no generic number — overcoating time depends on the specific product and the substrate temperature. Jotun Muki EPS states its own dry-to-overcoat minimum: 15 hours at 5°C, 10 hours at 10°C, 7 hours at 23°C, and 3 hours at 40°C substrate temperature. Ask your provider for their product's figures rather than assuming a rule of thumb.

ISO 12944 defines six corrosivity categories for atmospheric exposure — C1 (very low, heated indoor spaces) through C5 (very high, heavily polluted or coastal industrial zones) and CX (extreme, offshore). But this classifies the environment a finished coating SYSTEM has to survive, not a rating a single shop-primer coat earns on its own. A shop primer's job is to hold the surface during fabrication; matching a C3, C4 or C5 environment is a separate decision about the full system applied over it — which chemistry and how many coats is a system-design question no general source answers for you.

No, and treating it as one is a real risk. A shop primer is a thin holding coat for the fabrication and transport phase — SSPC Paint Specification No. 15 describes exactly this as temporary protection. A full coating system that has to meet an ISO 12944 corrosivity category is a separate, later specification: typically a primer, one or more build coats and a topcoat, each chosen for the actual service environment. Ask explicitly whether what's being quoted is a holding primer or part of a finished system.

The certificate belongs to the material, not the primer coat. EN 10204 defines inspection document types 2.1, 2.2, 3.1 and 3.2, and 3.1 is the usual buyer default in steel procurement — but priming does not create one. The real question is whether heat and batch marking stays legible, or is re-marked, before the primer covers it. Ask the provider directly.

Send the material and its current surface condition, the environment the finished part will face if you know it (an ISO 12944 category is useful shorthand), the film thickness you need, part dimensions and quantity, and whether the parts will be welded, cut or formed after priming — that last one decides whether weldability actually matters for your job. Add the delivery address and the date you need it.

There is no industry-wide minimum order quantity for priming; it varies by provider. Ask as part of your enquiry rather than assuming.

No general lead time can be stated honestly — it varies by provider, product availability and current load. Ask for a committed date with your quote.

Priming is not priced from a single rate, so any figure quoted here would mislead. What drives it is the surface preparation grade reached, the primer chemistry and film thickness, part size and total surface area, batch size, whether weldability is required, and any certification requirement. Send the items in the quote checklist and you will get a firm price instead of a range.

It depends on the material form. Shearing thin sheet typically holds about ±0.5 mm — the same figure published against DIN ISO 2768-1 class c that contract-sawing also cites for shearing. On round, hexagon, square and flat bar and profile stock from 10 to 50 mm, one supplier publishes a tolerance of max. ±0.30 mm. Confirm the achievable tolerance for your grade, form and quantity with the provider.

A mechanically sheared edge has four zones. Rollover is the plastically deformed area where the blade first bends the material as it contacts the edge. Burnish is where the blade penetrates before anything fractures — flat, smooth and shiny, because the surface compresses against the tool. Fracture is where the material actually separates, rougher than the burnish zone and set at an angle rather than square to the cut. Burr is metal pushed out and elongated on the trailing edge, where the blade exits. None of that is a defect — it is simply what a sheared edge is, as opposed to a melted or eroded one.

How far the shear disturbs the material below the visible edge depends heavily on grade and thickness. In one published comparison of advanced high-strength automotive grades, the shear-affected zone reached about 41 percent of initial thickness on a 1.56 mm DP780 sheet, and about 20 percent on a thicker 2.90 mm CP800 sheet. Those two grades are not general mild or structural steel, so treat the range as illustrative of how much depth can vary by grade and thickness rather than a number to apply to your own order.

There is no single industry-wide maximum — it is a property of the specific machine, not of shearing as a process. Shear-machine manufacturer specifications commonly span roughly 0.1 to 40 mm mild steel capacity, most standard machines cap out around 20 mm, and heavy-duty hydraulic shears go past 30 mm. Ask the provider for their shear's actual rated thickness rather than assuming a nominal spec-sheet number applies to your grade.

Shearing leaves the metallurgy untouched — no melted edge, no heat-affected zone — and for straight cuts within a shear's rated thickness it is usually the cheaper, faster choice. Above that thickness, or for shaped and contoured cuts a straight blade cannot follow, the work moves to a thermal process such as plasma or laser cutting, which trades the clean mechanical edge and the untouched metallurgy for reach into much thicker material and arbitrary shapes.

Two forms, sourced from different suppliers' published capabilities: thin sheet, and round, hexagon, square and flat bar or profile stock in the 10 to 50 mm range. If your requirement sits outside either of those — very thick plate, or an unusual profile — ask the provider directly whether their shear reaches it before assuming it does.

Send the grade or material number, the form and dimensions, the cut lengths and quantity, and the edge quality you actually need. Add a drawing if the cut is shaped or complex, say whether you require an inspection certificate, and give the delivery address and the date you need it.

EN 10204 defines inspection document types 2.1, 2.2, 3.1 and 3.2, and 3.1 is the usual buyer default in steel procurement. But shearing does not create a certificate — the certificate belongs to the material. What matters is whether traceability survives the cutting operation, and how each sheared piece is marked so it stays linked to its heat. Ask the provider that directly.

There is no industry-wide minimum order quantity for shearing; it varies by provider. Some will cut a single piece, others price small quantities in a way that makes them impractical. Ask as part of your enquiry rather than assuming.

No general lead time can be stated honestly — it varies by provider, and with the section, quantity and their current load. Ask for a committed date with your quote.

There is no industry-wide norm here — whether the sheared edge is deburred, and whether that is included or charged separately, varies by provider, exactly as it does for contract-sawing. Because it is not a given, put it in the enquiry explicitly if you need the burr removed.

Shearing is not priced from a single rate, so any figure quoted here would mislead. What drives it is material thickness, steel grade and hardness, the edge quality you require, cut length and batch size, whether the cut is straight or shaped, and total volume. Send the items in the quote checklist and you will get a firm price instead of a range.

Slit-width tolerance depends on strip width, thickness and the equipment used, so there is no single industry figure — published numbers vary by supplier. Scott Stainless Steel states a standard tolerance of ±0.005 in on narrow slit coil and -0 in/+0.062 in on wide coil. Walmay publishes ±0.2 mm as its standard tolerance and ±0.1 mm on its precision line. A widely circulated typical-tolerance table from EOXS scales from about ±0.005–0.010 in on material 0.010–0.025 in thick up to about ±0.020–0.030 in on material 0.126–0.250 in thick, but that source labels it 'typical', not a standard. Confirm the achievable tolerance for your grade, thickness and width with the provider.

Capability varies by processor. Chesterfield Steel accepts incoming master coils up to about 50000 lb, with inner diameters of 20–24 in and an outer diameter up to about 72 in, in strip widths from 1.125 to 72 in and thicknesses from 0.015 to 0.250 in. Walmay publishes thickness ranges of 0.1–6 mm on cold-rolled and 0.1–12 mm on hot-rolled coil. Both suppliers note that capability varies by grade and thickness — confirm the exact envelope with the provider.

This also varies by line. Scott Stainless Steel can slit stainless coil to any width from 0.188 in up to 72 in. Walmay's published range is 0.5–300 mm, with a minimum slit width of 1.0 mm on its precision line versus 0.5 mm standard. Ask the provider for their line's actual range for your grade and thickness.

Burr is the raised edge the slitting blades leave along the cut. One coil-processing case study reports an acceptable standard, with a properly tuned slitter head, of under about 0.05 mm on cold-rolled commercial-quality and drawing-quality grades — but that is a reported case figure, not a codified cross-industry standard. Excess burr can impair welding, coating adhesion and feeding through automated equipment. State your edge-quality requirement in the enquiry rather than assuming a default.

Camber is the sideways bow along the length of a slit strip. One documented case treats more than about 2 mm of camber over a 2 m length as unacceptable — but that figure comes from a tube-forming end use, not from a slitting line's own published specification. If your process is camber-sensitive, state the maximum you can tolerate rather than assuming a default.

Send the grade or material number, the incoming coil's weight, inner diameter and thickness, the strip width you are slitting from, and the slit widths and quantities you need. Add the tolerance you require, whether you need an inspection certificate, and your delivery address and date. Those are what a coil processor needs to quote a slitting job.

Toll slitting of customer-supplied coil is a normal service, but whether a given processor accepts it depends on the coil's condition, weight and dimensions fitting their line, and terms vary by provider for liability, remnants and traceability. Ask before shipping. If the coil carries an inspection certificate, ask in the same message how the slit coils will be tagged so traceability survives.

EN 10204 defines inspection document types 2.1, 2.2, 3.1 and 3.2, and 3.1 is the usual buyer default in steel procurement. But slitting does not create a certificate — the certificate belongs to the material. What matters is whether the material's traceability survives the slitting operation, and how each resulting coil is tagged so it stays linked to its heat. Ask the provider that directly.

There is no industry-wide minimum order quantity for slitting; it varies by provider. Some will slit a single coil, others price small runs in a way that makes them impractical. Ask as part of your enquiry rather than assuming.

No general lead time can be stated honestly — it varies by provider, and with coil size, quantity and their current line load. Ask for a committed date with your quote.

Slitting is a continuous rotary-blade process that converts a wide coil into narrower coils or strips at line speed — Walmay's published line speeds range from about 10–50 m/min standard down to 5–30 m/min on precision runs. Sawing and shearing instead cut a length to size from bar, plate or sheet, piece by piece. If your requirement is narrower coil for further processing, slitting is the fit; if it is finished-length pieces, sawing or shearing is.

Slitting is not priced from a single rate, so any figure quoted here would mislead. What drives it is material thickness and grade, the total weight processed, how many slit widths you need from one coil, your tolerance requirement, and the edge-finish standard you require. Send the details in the quote checklist and you will get a firm price instead of a range.

It depends on the form, the size and which standard you're working to. As-supplied hot-rolled bar already carries a straightness tolerance under EN 10060 (round), EN 10059 (square) and EN 10058 (flat) — all three converge on the same limits: up to 0.4% of length between 25 and 80 mm section, tightening to 0.25% above 80 mm, with no fixed value below 25 mm. A dedicated precision straightening machine can hold considerably tighter than that mill tolerance — see the precision-capability answer below. There is no single number for 'straightening tolerance': state the form, grade and the tolerance you actually need when you ask for a quote.

Three things, most of them ordinary. Hot rolling cools unevenly along the length and across the section, which leaves differential shrinkage and residual stress that shows up as camber. Cutting — sawing, flame-cutting, plasma-cutting — releases that residual stress unevenly across the cut face, so straightening is often bought precisely because a prior cutting operation introduced the bow. And coiled, bundled or unsupported stock deforms in transit and handling before it ever reaches you. None of this means the material is out of spec; it means straightness is a property that degrades between mill and job site.

Meaningfully tighter. EN 10060/10059/10058 express hot-rolled bar straightness as a percentage of length — 0.4% or 0.25% depending on section, as above. EN 10278, which governs cold-drawn (bright) bar, instead sets a fixed maximum deviation in millimetres: 1.0 mm for round bar under 0.25% carbon, 1.5 mm for higher-carbon or alloy round bar, and correspondingly 1.0–2.5 mm for square and hexagon bar depending on size and steel group. The one steel group EN 10278 leaves without a fixed figure is quenched-and-tempered round bar — the published tables show no value there, so treat that combination as provider-specific rather than standard-guaranteed.

One published benchmark, from a precision straightening machine builder rather than a general standard: a guaranteed 0.2 mm/m as the headline figure, tightening to 0.15 mm/m on a multi-roll (6–16 roll) straightener and as low as 0.08 mm/m on a two-roll straightener for round bar. Treat these as what dedicated precision equipment CAN achieve, not what an ordinary job-shop order will be quoted at — confirm the actual achievable figure with your provider for your material and section.

No — they measure different things. Straightness is bow along the length axis, checked end to end. Flatness is deviation across a plane, checked by laying a straight edge on the surface in any direction, and for hot-rolled plate from 3 to 400 mm thick and 600 mm or wider it's governed by EN 10029, with separate Normal (Class N) and Special (Class S) tolerance classes. If your material is plate and the problem is waviness across its face rather than bow along its length, you're asking about flatness, not straightness — say so in your enquiry, since the two aren't interchangeable requirements.

Send the grade or material number, the form and dimensions, and a photo or measurement of how far out of straight the material currently is — that's what lets a provider judge whether it's a routine correction or a heavier job. Add the tolerance you need, the quantity, whether you require an inspection certificate, and the delivery address and date. Those seven things turn an enquiry into a firm price.

Yes, sending customer-supplied material for straightening is common practice. What varies by provider is how they handle liability if the material is more severely bowed than expected, and how they preserve traceability if the piece carries an inspection certificate — ask both questions before you ship.

EN 10204 defines inspection document types 2.1, 2.2, 3.1 and 3.2, with 3.1 the usual buyer default in steel procurement. But straightening does not create a certificate — the certificate belongs to the material, and it was issued against the original delivery, not the straightening pass. What actually matters is whether traceability (heat number, original certificate reference) survives the operation and how the piece stays marked afterward so it does. Ask the provider that directly.

We found no sourced, general rule for where the line sits between cold and hot straightening — it depends on the grade, the section and how severe the bow is, and that judgement is the provider's to make, not something a standard fixes. Ask which method your provider intends to use and why, particularly if the material has a heat treatment history that hot straightening could disturb.

There is no industry-wide minimum order quantity for straightening; it varies by provider. Some will correct a single piece, others price small jobs in a way that makes them impractical. Ask as part of your enquiry rather than assuming.

No general lead time can be stated honestly — it depends on the provider, the section, the degree of correction needed and their current load. Ask for a committed date with your quote rather than planning around an assumed turnaround.

Straightening isn't priced from a single rate, so any figure quoted here would mislead. What drives it is the material form — bar, section or plate — its dimensions and cross-section, how far out of straight it currently is, the steel grade, whether cold or hot straightening applies, the tolerance you require, total volume, and any certificate requirement. Send the items in the quote checklist and you'll get a firm price instead of a range.

Waterjet cutting tolerance depends on whether the figure is a machine specification or a tolerance a shop actually commits to on a finished part, and no source ties either to a formal dimensional standard the way sawing (DIN ISO 2768-1) or laser cutting (DIN EN ISO 9013) does. Charles Day Steels publishes ±0.25 mm on length and width, the same figure repeated across every thickness band up to 50 mm, for 2D parts. Xometry publishes ±0.010 in (0.254 mm), nominal on the top face of the plate. Machine-capability figures published by TechniWaterjet and RapidDirect run tighter — roughly ±0.001 to ±0.004 in — but that is what the equipment can do, not what a shop quotes on your part. Confirm the achievable tolerance for your grade, thickness and quantity with the provider.

Abrasive waterjet — the only waterjet process used on steel — reaches deep into plate. TechniWaterjet publishes 229 mm (9 in) for stainless steel and 305 mm (12 in) for hard materials generally, both figures from the same publisher's own service pages. Xometry independently states parts as thick as 250–300 mm in its own laser-vs-waterjet comparison, the same range from an unrelated source. Practical, cost-effective cutting sits well below the maximum reach in most jobs — ask the provider what is economical for your thickness rather than assuming the ceiling is the sweet spot.

Waterjet kerf runs wider than a laser's. Xometry states a 0.5 mm minimum cutting slit for waterjet cutting; Fractory's own cutting-method comparison table states 0.9 mm. Both are shown because they are two different suppliers' figures, not one averaged number — expect the real width on your job to fall in that 0.5–0.9 mm range, and include it when you work out how much material a job consumes.

A waterjet cut is not perfectly square through the thickness. Charles Day Steels publishes a draft-angle tolerance of ±1° on its own tolerance table, for 2D parts. Separately, the shape of the taper depends on thickness: thin material tends to form a V-shaped taper, narrower at the bottom than the top, while thicker material tends to form a barrel shape, wider in the middle of the cut than at either face. Ask the provider how they control taper for your thickness if the application is taper-sensitive.

Waterjet cutting removes material by mechanical erosion, not heat, so unlike laser or plasma cutting it leaves no heat-affected zone. OMAX describes it directly: since waterjet is a cold cutting method, there are no heat-affected zones. Xometry makes the same point from the buyer's side, stating that waterjet does not generate heat input to the part. The grain structure, hardness and strength of the steel next to the cut stay exactly as they were before cutting, which is why property-sensitive work often specifies waterjet over thermal cutting for this reason alone.

Both are non-contact cutting processes, but the trade-offs run in opposite directions. Waterjet leaves no heat-affected zone at all, where laser leaves a narrow one; waterjet reaches thicker plate — into the 250–300 mm class against laser's practical reach of around 30 mm; and waterjet leaves a wider kerf, roughly 0.5–0.9 mm against laser's roughly 0.15–0.5 mm, a figure that belongs to and is sourced on the laser cutting page. What waterjet gives up is speed: Xometry states laser cutting running at 20–70 inches per minute against roughly 1–20 inches per minute for waterjet, so a job that needs neither waterjet's thickness reach nor its heat-free edge will usually cut faster and cheaper on a laser.

Yes — every steel figure on this page is an abrasive-waterjet figure. TechniWaterjet is explicit that steel is one of the most common materials cut with abrasive waterjet, and that abrasive waterjet cutting cuts through steel blocks up to 12 inches thick, while pure waterjet — water alone, with no garnet abrasive added — is limited to soft materials such as food, paper, foam, rubber, felt and soft plastics, plus thin metal foils. If you are quoting steel plate or bar, you are quoting abrasive waterjet by definition.

Send a 2D file of the contour, the material and grade, the thickness, the quantity, and the tolerance you actually need. Add whether you need any finishing such as deburring, and give the delivery address and the date you need the parts. Those seven things are what turn an enquiry into a firm price rather than a range.

EN 10204 defines inspection document types 2.1, 2.2, 3.1 and 3.2, and 3.1 is the usual buyer default in steel procurement. As with sawing and laser cutting, waterjet cutting does not itself create a certificate — the certificate belongs to the material. What matters is whether traceability survives the cut, and how each cut piece is marked so it stays linked to its heat. Ask the provider that directly.

There is no industry-wide minimum order quantity for waterjet cutting; it varies by provider, the same honest answer contract sawing and laser cutting already give for this question. Some shops will cut a single part, others price small quantities in a way that makes them impractical. Ask as part of your enquiry rather than assuming.

No general lead time can be stated honestly for waterjet cutting — it varies by provider, by section, by quantity and by their current load, exactly as it does for sawing and laser cutting. Ask for a committed date with your quote rather than assuming a standard turnaround.

Waterjet cutting is not priced from a single rate, so any figure quoted here would mislead. It runs slower than laser cutting, which is one reason it typically costs more per part on material both processes can cut; what actually drives the price is material and thickness, steel grade, part complexity, total volume and the tolerance you require. Send the items in the quote checklist and you will get a firm price instead of a range.

There is no general figure for how much a weld will distort a part or what tolerance the finished assembly can hold — it depends on joint design, restraint, welding sequence and heat input, all of which are job-specific. If you have a tolerance requirement, say so on the enquiry; the shop should design the sequence (and any pre-set or clamping) around it rather than quoting a number that doesn't apply to your geometry.

Send the grade or material number, a drawing showing the joint details, the material thickness and form, the weld length or seam count, the welding position and access, and whether you need inspection or NDT. If the job is structural, add the required execution class or certificate requirement. Those eight things turn an enquiry into a firm price rather than a range.

Supplying your own material for welding is common practice, but acceptance — and the terms around liability, weld-procedure suitability for that exact grade, and traceability — varies by provider. Ask before shipping, and if the material carries an EN 10204 certificate, ask how the shop will preserve that traceability through the weld.

EN 10204 defines the material's inspection-document types — 2.1, 2.2, 3.1 and 3.2 — and welding the material doesn't change that certificate; it belongs to the base metal, same as it would for a cut piece. 3.1 is the usual buyer default in steel procurement. This is separate from whether the shop or the welder is certified — see the next two questions.

This is the layer most sawing- or cutting-service pages never mention. EN 1090 requires CE marking of structural steel components placed on the EU market, issued against an execution class (EXC1 to EXC4, defined in EN 1090-2) that reflects how demanding the structure is. Separately, EN ISO 3834 certifies the shop's welding quality management system, in tiers from elementary to comprehensive. Ask which execution class the shop is certified to, not just whether they 'do EN 1090' — a shop certified for EXC2 is not automatically qualified for EXC3 or EXC4 work.

A shop's EN 1090 / EN ISO 3834 certification is not the same as an individual welder being qualified for your joint. EN ISO 9606-1 qualifies a welder for a tested range of process, material group, thickness and position — a certified shop can still assign a joint outside a particular welder's tested range. Ask which qualification range covers your specific joint. Qualifications also require periodic revalidation under EN ISO 9606-1; we haven't verified the exact interval against the current standard text, so ask the shop for their current renewal record rather than assuming a figure.

Manual metal arc (MMA/stick, EN ISO 4063 reference 111) needs no shielding gas, which is why it holds up on site work and outdoor repairs. MAG with solid wire (135) feeds continuously, giving a higher deposition rate that suits shop production runs. TIG (141) gives the most precise heat and filler control, which is why it's chosen for thin sections and root passes where quality matters most. Submerged arc welding (SAW, 121) runs under a flux blanket at high deposition, suited to long straight seams in thick plate. The right choice depends on your material, joint and volume — ask the shop which process their qualified WPS covers for your grade.

Carbon equivalent is the standard starting point. The IIW formula — CEV = C + Mn/6 + (Cr+Mo+V)/5 + (Ni+Cu)/15, from EN 1011-2 Annex C method A, best suited to C-Mn and low-alloy steels above roughly 0.18% carbon — tells you how the chemistry is likely to behave under welding heat. It is one indicator among several, not a pass/fail number by itself, and other formulas (CET, Pcm) apply to different composition windows. What actually governs the job is a qualified WPS for your grade and thickness — ask the shop whether one exists or needs qualifying under EN ISO 15614-1.

A Welding Procedure Specification (WPS) documents how a joint is to be welded — process, consumables, parameters, sequence — to the content set out in EN ISO 15609-1. Before it can be used, the procedure is tested and the result recorded as a Welding Procedure Qualification Record (WPQR) under EN ISO 15614-1. For anything beyond a simple repair, ask to see the WPS for your grade and joint type — it's the document that actually governs the weld, more specific than any general weldability guidance.

There is no industry-wide minimum order quantity for contract welding; it varies by provider and by whether a new WPS needs qualifying for your grade and joint. Ask as part of your enquiry rather than assuming.

No general lead time can be stated honestly — it depends on whether a qualified WPS already exists for your grade and joint, the inspection or NDT scope, and the shop's current load. If a new procedure needs qualifying under EN ISO 15614-1, that adds time before production welding can start. Ask for a committed date with your quote.

Contract welding is not priced from a single rate, so any figure quoted here would mislead. What drives it is material thickness, steel grade and its weldability, joint type and welding position, total weld length or volume, any inspection or NDT requirement, and whether certification (execution class, welder qualification) applies. Send the eight items in the quote checklist and you will get a firm price instead of a range.