cutting with a cutting tourch

You've got your gas pressures set at exactly what Victor recommends in their booklet "Oxy-Fuel Welding, Cutting & Heating Guide." In my experience those settings are right. Those settings apply to a size 0 cutting tip, and a travel speed of 18-26 inches per minute.

Turning up the oxygen pressure by 15 lbs puts you in the range (40-45 lbs) that Victor recommends for cutting 1-1/2" plate, four times as thick as you're cutting. The first thing I'd do is to get out your tip cleaners and clean all the orifices in the tip until you get a neutral flame that has perfect shape. If even one pre-heat orifice is less than completely clean it can deflect the stream, causing a number of potential problems including incomplete penetration and excessive slag. The orifice for the high pressure stream of oxygen is even more critical.

The other thing you can do to make the cut go better is to preheat the metal a bit. Heating it along the path of the cut until it's hot but not too hot to touch will sometimes make it start behaving itself.

All the best, Stan

• Hobby farm

Using the knobs on the torch,

Turn acy on a small amount, light torch.

Turn oxy on all the way.

Use the third knob at the top of the torch to adjust for a neutral flame.

If flame is not hot enough or too hot, adjust acy knob.

This should blow the cut metal away.

KEH