Hello I got my dremel clone and it's suprisingly well made for under £30 after following the instructions I loaded in a cutting disc and set to work on an old side panel off a case, I managed to make a 2inch cut before the disc wore away totaly, the panel was steel and not especialy thick. Do I need to buy some stronger discs? is this normal? is my technique to fault? linky to my tool> http://www.lawson-his.co.uk/scripts/details.php?cat=Multitools&product=691 My technique was basicly hold it and press down firmly but not overly hard untill the disc was through the matirial.
the discs wear out MUCH faster when you cut the edge of a sheet than on top of it. try cutting entire lines, but don't cut trough the sheet, just "scratch it deeply" for each pass... do this over and over again.
these cutting discs included with it normally are not very good at cutting steel (or any other metal ), try to get a dremel fiberglass reinforced disc (i believe the ones i'm talking are the 426, a bit expensive compared to normal discs...) but are worth the money...especially if you'll be cutting metal, for me1 disc lasted for 5 or 6 80mm fan holes, plus some other little jobs. also like Smilodon said, don't put too much pressure on it, my cousin was able to break 10 or more of those normal discs because of that...then he discovered he should't put much pressure on it...
Take it very slow, I didn't and wasted probably 40 cutting discs cutting a window in my computer case haha, it was steel like yours (old AT one) and the window is like the size of an entire computer. That gives you an idea of how big it is, but took me forever because i would cut all the way through and slowly drag it along cutting it. Sometimes you get lucky and I went like a whole foot, then it shattered all to pieces
lol ok Im off to order lots of discs If your wondering about my mod (my first) it's basicly a star trek TNG borg themed case making exstensve use of convection instead of case fans (I.E lots of mesh) and a re style of the front of the case I have (crappy zorro X or somthing) with jet fighter toggle switches. Also relocation of the psu to where the hard drive rack is, and Im also planning parelel controlled LEds which will light the case from bottom to top depending on how much ram is used (I will have to make the program first ). Lastly I will be adding two temp displays one for Video card and one for HArd disk and two more on a 20x4 char caracter display showing the NB and cpu) this mod is going to take a long time! *thanks for the tips guys *should I post a project log?
gotta say, if u are cutting out a large window use a jig saw with a metal blade for the strait bits. its so so so much easyer, faster and cheaper.
Yeah Reinforced Cutoff wheels are the way to go, and best way to descibe it is to not consider the blade as a saw but more like a grinder and that you are grinding notches out of the metal until you eventually get through.
what u need are reinfoced cut off discs like that guy said^^^ i had the same prob as u but as soon as i bought these the work was very easy, also still use the small ones for more detail work.
For what its worth i used to get surgical saw blades... basically a hacksaw blade style cutting wheel. fits great in a dremel and lasts for a long time... just be careful you dont slip lol (hey, at least it would be a straight clean cut )
i cut a 8" diameter circular window in the side panel of my case (~1mm thick steel) with a single reinforced cutting wheel on my dremel. just take it really slow and don't push down at all. just guide the direction of the dremel, it will go through the metal by itself edit: yes!!! of course post a project log
Your wish is my command, project log is up (3rd time lucky I managed to quit my browser and then have it crash) http://forums.bit-tech.net/showthread.php?t=94894
I love my dremel, but for cutting a case window or blohole its just clumsy.. Buy a holesaw or jigsaw... so much easyer.
Get some reinforced ones, or preferably a jigsaw. Or even an angle grinder! A £10 angle grinder is great for PC modding, as long as you have a big file.
yeah, you need the reinforced disks. i cut a whole window with only one disk, and soem more stuff before it got worn to nothing.
