G’day; I have cut steel from 3/8" down to about 25 thou., in
thickness, using a common or workshop hand held jigsaw. I use a
fine toothed blade - around 22 teeth per inch available from any
DIY (Do It Yourself) store, and there is a similar toothed blade
available that is only 17/64" (about 5mm) wide, with which I have
cut curves of one inch radius in 1/8" tool steel, in the well
annealed state of course. Use a slow stroke, if you have a
variable speed saw, and use plenty of cutting oil - even WD40
works well and don’t try to rush it. For cutting very thin
metals use the trick told by David Arens and sandwich it between
a couple of bits of wood - even three ply is OK, so long as the
wood is well clamped against the metal. The blades last
surprisingly long if you treat them nicely. If you don’t
happen to have cutting oil handy, then try using a strong
solution of ordinary soap applied with a small paint brush to
remove the swarf as you go. It may also help to clamp the work
down solidly - you don’t really want it jigging about in time
with the saw. I’m lazy; I try to let the Power Company do most
of the hard work whenever I can - it’s cheap labour. Cheers,
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/ /__|\ @John_Burgess2
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At sunny Nelson NZ