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CNC Machining for Aerospace
The extremely high level of precision needed within the aerospace industry makes CNC machining a suitable manufacturing process for the sector. This article provides you with a complete guide to aerospace machining and its importance.
Choose from 50+ metals and plastics for your project.
CNC Machining eBook
If you want to produce high-quality machined parts with a sleek appearance, it’s essential to consider some critical factors related to CNC machining. Here, we’ve gathered some basic information and important considerations to help you achieve the desired results.
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Lead time as fast as 3-5 days
What Is Plasma Cutting?
Plasma cutting is a production process involving the use of ionized gas at temperatures above 20,0000C to melt and remove material from a workpiece. The gasses used here include argon/hydrogen, argon, or nitrogen. Plasma cutting is ideal for making high-precision parts with both general and industry-specific applications. You could get numerous benefits from using RapidDirect’s custom plasma cutting service when making your product parts. Some of these advantages include:
High Precision and Repeatability: Precision and repeatability are one of the major strengths of our plasma-cutting service. This is especially true when cutting shapes and angles from a metal workpiece. At RapidDirect, we boast experienced operators with steady hands that guarantee a clean, highly precise cut.
Versatility to Various Materials: Versatility is one of the major advantages of fabricating metals using plasma cutting. This is due to its ability to cut through conductive metals like iron, copper, stainless steel, steel, brass, and other metals. Besides, plasma cutting has one of the fastest cutting speeds, making it one of the best methods for metalwork.
Suitable for Different Thickness: Unlike other metal cutting options, CNC plasma cutting can cut metals with various thicknesses. Our plasma cutting team at RapidDirect can cut metals with thicknesses up to one-and-half inch and thicker.
Complex Shapes: Plasma cutting facilitates the creation of various shapes, regardless of the complexity of their geometry. At RapidDirect, we use plasma cutting to create intricate shapes, straight lines, and curves that would be impossible to make using other metal-cutting techniques.
Energy Efficient: Energy efficiency is one of the reasons why more companies and businesses are leaning towards plasma cutting. At RapidDirect, our CNC plasma machines are energy efficient, saving the long run cost.
Quote Within One Day, Operate at Your Fingertips
RapidDirect provides a AI-powered, hassle-free online quotation platform that can help simplify your ordering and manufacturing process. Stop wasting time in emails, get interactive quotes with DFM analysis within seconds, optimize your orders immediately, compare your multiple quotes side by side, manage your orders in one place.
Bulk Pricing
Get in-bulk quotes, allowing you to make a pricing comparison between different specs, quantities, raw material, and surface finishes, and helping you choose the solution that best suits your needs and budget.
Real-Time Order Tracking
Our online platform enables real-time visibility of the manufacturing process that fosters more efficient operation monitoring and quicker response to negative changes.
All-in-One Order Management
Quickly check, search, and manage all your orders in one place. What's even better is that you get visibility into all stages of the production process and every aspect of the manufacturing operation.
Plasma Cutting From Prototyping to Production
RapidDirect’s custom plasma cutting services can be used for various applications such as mold tooling, rapid prototyping, and custom manufacturing, and more.
Functional Prototype
Create prototypes with intricate details and fine features that might be difficult to achieve using other cutting methods. Allowing for quick turnaround times and reducing the overall production time.
Rapid Prototyping
Create quick and precise cuts for a variety of materials. This can include creating test pieces, evaluating designs, and producing small quantities of a product for testing and validation.
On-Demand Production
Create precise cuts for mass production. Our plasma cutting machines are available in various sizes and configurations, allowing them to be used for cutting thin and thick metals.
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Plasma Cutting Capabilities
RapidDirect is committed to meeting and surpassing customer requirements and industry standards. Our high-precision plasma cutters cut with the highest accuracy and precision, regardless of the material type and design complexity.
Standards
Description
Thickness
Aluminum≤40 mm, Steel≤50 mm, Stainless Steel≤50 mm
Cutting Tolerance
The standard tolerance level for plasma cutting ranges between 0.1 to 0.2mm. This tolerance level depends majorly on the size of the part and general requirements. However, at RapidDirect, we adjust our tolerance levels to match our customer’s requirements.
Cutting Area
The cutting area for thin sheet aluminum of up to 4mm thickness is 1000 x 2000mm, 1250 x 2500 mm, and 1500 x 3000mm.
While cutting area for thick sheets of steel over 4mm thickness is 1500 x 3000mm, 2000 x 3000mm, 1500 x 6000mm
Lead time
5 days or more
Materials for Plasma Cutting
RapidDirect’s CNC plasma cutting service is ideal for use on many materials. The hot gas emitted in this process can cut through conductive materials irrespective of thickness. Below are some plasma-cutting materials you could use for your next project.
Aluminum’s ability to reflect heat is one of the reasons why machinists favor this metal as a plasma-cutting material. It is also lightweight, non-corrosive, and highly malleable. Furthermore, aluminum is cost-effective, with a shorter plasma cutting time compared to other materials. Aluminum also has a high rate of recyclability, which helps reduce waste in the long term.
Steel is one of the most popular metals in machine shops due to its high machinability. Asides from machinability, steel has high tensile strength, ductility, and malleability. It is also very durable, with an aesthetically pleasing appearance. One major reason steel is ideal for plasma cutting is its high weldability, which allows it to withstand the stress caused by heat from the plasma cutter.
Stainless steel is a metal alloy that contains at least 11% chromium. The chromium content of this metal gives it a glossy appearance. This metal is ideal for plasma cutting due to its strength at high temperatures, as it performs better than most metals. Stainless steel also has a high tensile strength and good plasticity. Besides, stainless steel is quite easy to machine.
Parts made using plasma cutting usually feature excellent finishes. At RapidDirect, we offer various custom finishing options that boost the produced part’s functionality, appearance, and durability.
Name
Description
Materials
Color
Texture
Link
Anodizing
Anodizing improves corrosion resistance, enhancing wear resistance and hardness, and protecting the metal surface. Widely used in mechanical parts, aircraft, and automobile parts, precision instruments, etc.
Bead blasting results in parts with a smooth surface with a matte texture. Used mainly for visual applications and can be followed by other surface treatments.
Powder coating is a type of coating that is applied as a free-flowing, dry powder. Unlike conventional liquid paint which is delivered via an evaporating solvent, powder coating is typically applied electrostatically and then cured under heat or with ultraviolet light.
Electroplating can be functional, decorative or corrosion-related. Many industries use the process, including the automotive sector, in which chrome-plating of steel automobile parts is common.
Polishing is the process of creating a smooth and shiny surface, either through physical rubbing of the part or by chemical interference. The process produces a surface with significant specular reflection, but in some materials is able to reduce diffuse reflection.
Plasma cutting affords both machinists and industries extensive benefits—little wonder why it has become the go-to process for metal fabrication. Plasma cutting facilitates the high-precision production of prototypes and parts regardless of volume. Here are the industrial applications of plasma cut parts according to industries.
Aircraft
Nearly every industry requires precise parts, and the aerospace industry is no exception. This industry also requires parts with excellent dimensional stability and tolerance standards. Plasma cutting facilitates the production of parts that are exactly needed for the proper functioning of aircraft parts like turbine engines.
The automotive industry uses plasma metal cutting services to fabricate several metal parts found in automobiles. This industry uses plasma cutting for making parts like gears, pins, and shafts that require high precision and accuracy.
The construction industry is one industry that uses plasma cutting quite often for fabricating steel and aluminum parts used in building construction. It also facilitates the creation of metal shapes that serve as decoration on buildings.
At RapidDirect, we let our work speak for us. We produce plasma cutting parts for various industries with excellent tolerance, high precision, and dimensional stability. Here are some plasma-cutting projects we have worked on.
Why Choose Us for Plasma Cutting
Utilizing our precision plasma cutting system alongside other advanced technologies, we deliver top-quality custom parts tailored to your exact specifications. Additionally, we offer efficient CNC plasma cutting services, leveraging our technical expertise to optimize production processes, minimize waste, and enhance cost-effectiveness.
Fast Online Quotation
Just upload your design files and configure material, finishing options and lead time.
Quick quotes for your waterjet cut components can be created in just a few clicks.
Assured High Quality
With an ISO 9001:2015 certificated manufacturing factory, we provide material and full dimensional inspection reports as your request. You can always rest assured the parts you get from RapidDirect will exceed your expectations.
Strong Manufacturing Capacity
Our domestic factories in China provide a complete project solution through flexible material, surface finish options and infinite manufacturing capacity for low volume and high volume production runs.
Engineering Support
We provide 24/7 online engineering customer support for your custom engineering and manufacturing problems. This includes case-by-case suggestions to help you reduce costs early on in the design phase.
See What Our Customers Say About Us
A customer’s words have a more substantial impact than a company’s claims – and see what our satisfied customers have said regarding how we fulfilled their requirements.
Hi, Andy. I want to express my gratitude to you and your team for all your efforts in completing the project. Working with RapidDirect on this metal fabrication project has been a great pleasure. I wish you a wonderful rest of your summer, and I am confident we will work together again in the future.
Stephen Phearsdorf– Lead Mechanical
I would like to thank you for working with us on this successful project. Our project team has been very impressed with RapidDirect’s quality of work and timely deliveries. We will definitely keep you in mind for future sheet metal projects and recommend you to other companies. Derek Armstrong– Project Manager
RapidDirect has been a creative and trustworthy partner for both unique ideas and quality parts production for many years. We heartily endorse RapidDirect as a one-stop shop for both straightforward and intricate designs. They offer services for design enhancement, large selection of materials and finishing services, and quick responses. Kleng Ellwood– Product Engineer
RapidDirect is an essential part of our supply chain. They regularly deliver on schedule sheet metal parts and with top-notch quality. They are easy to work with and considerate of their client’s demands. Whether it is repeat orders for parts or one of our numerous last-minute orders, they always deliver. Feri Russell– Director of Product Development
I am happy to say that RapidDirect is one of our top sources for fabricated metal parts. We have a 4-year relationship with them, and it all began with excellent customer service. They do a fantastic job of informing us about our order progress. We view RapidDirect more as a project partner than just a supplier for us in many ways. Rahim Smyth– Designer