Hi all,

I have purchased an Indian disc cutter from Cousins, it has arrived but I have yet to use it. It professes to be able to stamp up to 2mm and I can see that it has an angle at the cutting end of the punches so might be marginally better than the slightly cheaper disc cutter that are out there...or not!

Anyway, with a manual cutter, what are the typical limits in terms of sheet thickness one can belt out with a hammer? I'm thinking predominantly copper and brass discs but ideally the thicker the better.

This brings me onto the next question regarding annealing. I know why you would want to anneal (although I have seen some disc cutting YouTube videos where they don't appear to do it) and I know you can buy annealed sheet but is there a certain thickness, in terms of manual disc cutting, that one typically doesn't bother? Also, with annealing I see no reference to setting the metal back to the harder state once the cut has been made, but is it then in a permanently 'softer' state?

Ideally I want to stamp these discs with Impressart type stamps and possibly get some of my own designs custom made into a stamp, possibly to make a circular border to stamp onto the discs in a one or two blows. What is the typical sized stamp one can hand stamp up to? I know Impressart can custom design one up to 12mm but I have seen bigger. Just wondering what is achievable and practical without being built like Arnie or requiring a machine.

Talking of machines, if I did want to 'upgrade' from a manual disc cutter, what is the next step? I see that using a hydraulic press with the manual disc cutter is a bit easier than belting them out with a hammer but you still have the same clamp sheet/unclamp sheet process per disc cut so the press is only replacing the hammer (I think?). Is there a next step above that that isn't silly expensive machinery that is easier and quicker to cut out discs at a quicker rate?

Thanks

Dan