From my first experiences with welding practice, the hardest part was cutting the 4130N steel. Since then I have viewed a video on the EAA website about cutting steel using a table saw and a metal cutting blade. I don't have a table saw, but I do have a miter saw and so I got a 10" metal cutting chop saw 1/8 thick to do the job. What was a pain is now a piece of cake. I spent the rest of my time tonight making the extrusion latch hinges. The tricky part is cutting the matching 1/8" wide slots in the top and bottom of each one. I pre-drilled my end holes to 1/8", drilled out some intermediate holes to a smaller size and then cleaned out about 2/3rds of the length using the chop saw blade. The clearing and hand filing was still a very manual task, but nothing like it would have been without the saw. Next I'll make the actual latch from 1/8" steel.
