Built for lines that can’t stop

Thin-gauge metal and foil need burr-free, precise edges. Our custom blades for metal and foil are made from carbide or tool steel to your exact spec. We can reverse engineer the blade from your worn sample when the drawing is gone.

Why buyers in Metal & Foil choose HIBO

• Free sample — a working blade on your machine before you commit to 100 pcs.
• 24-hour quote — from the day we receive your drawing.
• 30-day lead — vs. the 35–45 days peers quote.
• Reverse-engineer — send the worn blade, get the drawing and a sample.

Typical applications

Aluminium and copper foil slitting, thin metal strip slitting, and precision converting of metallised web.

What wears first on a metal line

Metal does not wear a blade the way paper does. Aluminium and copper are soft enough to adhere to the edge under pressure, so the first change is usually a built-up layer on the bevel rather than a worn edge. Once that layer forms, the effective rake angle changes and burr height starts to climb.

Thin strip and foil add a second problem: the edge does very little work per metre, so it stays sharp for a long time and then fails suddenly when the coating or the micro-geometry gives way. That is why a blade that behaved for weeks can start throwing burrs within a single shift.

How a metal blade fails — and what it tells you

• Burr height rising across the whole strip. Edge wear or a build-up layer. Look at the bevel under magnification before touching the clearance setting.
• Burr on one side only. Clearance is off, or the top and bottom knives are no longer a matched set.
• Aluminium smeared along the bevel. Adhesion, not wear. Usually surface finish, lubrication or edge radius — a harder steel alone rarely fixes it.
• Fine edge chipping on coated or hard strip. The edge is too hard for the impact it sees. Toughness, not hardness, is the lever here.

Blades we supply for metal and foil

Everything is made to your drawing or matched from a worn sample. Common shapes on these lines:

• Slitting circular knives — driven and idler, for foil and thin strip.
• Shear and cross-cut blades — flying shear and cut-to-length lines.
• Edge trim knives — the pair that sets finished width.
• Scoring and slitting wheels — for metallised and coated web.

Metal and foil blades — common questions

Carbide or high-speed steel?

It depends on what is actually failing. If the edge wears evenly, carbide buys you life. If it is chipping, carbide usually makes it worse — you want toughness. Send us the failed blade and describe the failure; that tells us more than a material spec.

Can you hold a burr tolerance?

We can hold the geometry you specify and the clearance the pair is designed for. Final burr height depends on your machine, tension and material as much as on the blade, so we do not promise a burr number in isolation.

My drawing is in a different standard.

Send it as it is. We convert dimensions and tolerances on our side and send the drawing back for confirmation before production.