CHARLIE - Did the laser cut the mounting bolt holes too?
Supplier I used to deal with had a PAIR of BIG lasers fed by a stacking system all CNC. Load the steel sheets into the stack, load all the programs for the laser, turn the lights out at night and go home. Come in next morning and the LASER Fairy would have ALL the blanks cut and staged for that day's secondary work. All the trimmings would be tossed in the scrap bin too. Really nice system.
Laser produces a much nicer edge condition than the old turret punch press. 15-18 yrs ago I used to buy a family of 22 ga. 304 SS panels that had UL sharpness requirements on the edges for burrs. Deburring 22 Ga SS is about like deburring a razor blade. The laser would have been the right tool for that job! Waterjets are pretty cool too. Used to be tough finding a laser, but almost ALL fab. & stamping shops have them now. Rapid Prototyping at it's best! I used to have prototypes made on wire EDM machines. Talk about slow and costly. But for things that need to retain heat-treatment in the metal adjacent to the cut it's the only option. They have CNC packages now You can even make gears, straight cut spur & helical gears with wire EDM.
I've had gaskets cut with lasers, Imagine something about twice the size of the nasty Hydro cork gasket.... Took a bit of developement, the gasket material would put off a bit of smoke and interfer with the light beam.
Ohhh Last Purchasing war story. I had a machine tool spindle I was trying to find someone to gun drill a 1-1/2" dia hole seven feet long and a 2-1/4" dia hole eight feet long in. Spindle was over 15 feet long and eight inches in dia on the big end, 4-1/4" dia on the little end. This was for a BIG horizontal boring mill. I'm talking with this Guy in Ohio, and He said He could shoot a perfectly straight hole .003" in diameter thru the piece. Yep, with a laser. I kept the guys phone number for future reference!
Anyhow...The Cubbies are waiting patiently for all the leaves to fall to mow the last time for this year. The weather guys keep saying this "S-word", that white stuff....it's too hard to sift out all the leaves from snow. I have lawn areated before in heavy snowfall, and thru drifted snow in the yard.