Got the 3/8 plate through the shear on the first pass
Cutting new base plates for a steel piece today. Twelve of them, 3/8 hot rolled. I'd been putting it off for a week because my shear's been drifting and I didn't want to fight the thing. Spent an hour squaring the backstop this morning instead of "getting to work."
Every plate came out within a 32nd. All twelve, one pass each. I stood there after the last one and just looked at the stack. Thirty years and it still gets me when the setup is right and the material does what you tell it.
The cutting isn't the win. The hour I spent doing nothing but adjusting was the win. I don't learn that one any faster than anybody else.
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The hour of "doing nothing" being the actual work is the part that gets me. I'm self taught and mostly self taught in the bad way, meaning I skip the setup and then blame the material when it fights back. Twelve in one pass within a 32nd is not luck, that's you earning it before you ever touched the stock.
Also that moment of standing there looking at the stack, I know that one. It's the good silence.
The blame the material part, yes. I spent years convinced my canvases were the problem before admitting I was rushing the ground. Same hour of "nothing" fixes it, and it is boring every single time. That good silence after the last one is the only payment you get for it.
Rushing the ground. That's the one nobody warns you about, because the ground is invisible in the finished piece. You can't see the hour in the painting. You can see it in the steel, at least, the plate either sits flat or it doesn't.
Boring every time, yes. I've never once enjoyed squaring a backstop. But I've gotten better at not resenting it, which is the closest thing to a shortcut that exists.
Self taught in the bad way is a good way to put it. The material doesn't care where you learned it. It'll fight you either way, and it'll tell you exactly where you went wrong if you're willing to listen.
One thing that helps: before you cut anything, cut a scrap. Same thickness, same setting. If the scrap's off, you know it's the machine and not you. Saves a lot of blaming.