plasma cutter use in rescue

[billy]

Is anyone using plasma cutters in rescue? What experience have you had? What advantages over exothermics do they have? Suggestions or comments?

[adarty]

I have only used a couple of plasma cutters, and it has been a while since I've used 'em at all, but I don't think that they would be practical for rescue use.
One cutter was owned by the manuf. facility that I worked for, the other was a loaner that we used for several weeks while ours was repaired.
1. Power requirements - unit that we had, if I recall correctly, needed 220V 40amp power. While a lot of gen. carried on apparatus may be able to supply this you would have to have very large extension cords to carry this amp load. Also, most of the generators would not be able to run any other tools while the cutter was in operation.
2. Air supply - unit that we had needed an external source of compressed air. I don't recall numbers on air consumption, but it seems that it was pretty high. Rate of air consumption would probably be to high to use anything but a compressor (probably couldn't use SCBA bottles regulated down to working pressure)
3. Size - I'm sure that there are small lite weight units out there, but the unit we had was pretty bulky.

If you could manage these factors a plasma cutter would work. There may even be some units out there that already address these problems.

[pvfd56L7]

The department I work for just bought one and I think the biggest problem that they incurred was the extreme heat generated caused some small fires. So I guess it wouldn't be very benificial to use in a rescue situation.