Who laser cuts their control panels?

Just curious, who has their control panel cutouts laser cut?

I just had four doors with rectangular cutouts for panelviews and push-button holes done for 125 bucks total. I was surprised at the low cost.

We have a Water Jet in our plant and we utilize it for doing all of the cutouts and push button holes for our control panels. Works great and saves time and money for the panel builder to build the panel.

water jet here

how are the edges after laser cut? (sharp, paint burned etc.)

Edges are smooth. There is about 1/32 inch (.7mm) of paint damage at the edge.

I think that round holes including for pushbuttons and for conduit should be done with Greenlie slug busters for sizes thru 2". Above that and with a pattern you can do well with plasma. For oddball or square cutouts plasma is great especially so with pattern or straight edges. Even handheld and slightly undersized and finish with die grinder there is no visible paint damage and NO warpage.

ONLY way to go triply so on stainless or aluminum.

Laser is even better provided you can justify machine cost or have a nearby shop.
Dan Bentler

A large number of our machine components, including control panels are laser cut. The quality is great for any sheet width less than 5mm, however you'll need to refinish the edges/sides of anything 5mm and over. The largest we have gotten cut is 10mm Mild and Stainless steel.... As for plastics, well I can't really comment.

We have hole punches and a plasma cutter but I find that the quickest way to deal with individual panels is with a hole saw (I use high speed metal saws) for the holes and with a jigsaw for the cutouts. I don't have to take the door off, and I can do the whole door pretty quickly. However, $125 for four doors isn't bad at all. I would be more inclined to do that if I had a lot of doors to punch at once. Also, we usually paint our enclosures rather than leave them gray.