Drilling: Very sharp cobalt drill bits will do the trick if applied to the metal. Do this slowly and firmly and with a lubricant. Start with a small (1/8-1/4 in.) hole, then step up the diameter with larger and larger bits until you reach your finished size. Stainless steel gets harder as it heats up, so curb your natural inclination to speed up the drilling. I have transformed cobalt bits into red-hot nuggets of useless space-age metal by misapplying my frustration this way.

Threading holes: Tapping (threading holes) is exceedingly difficult and may not even seem worth it if you inadvertently break off a hardened steel tap in the hole; some steps can be taken, however, to improve your odds. Spiral taps, if you can find them, work much better than straight ones because they clear the chips out of the hole and prevent them from gunking up the tap. Spiral taps are strictly an industrial item, but they do occasionally show up at the junk shops. You absolutely must use a lubricant and very gentle pressure, backing the tap out of the hole frequently to clear the chips. Whatever the recommended drill hole size is for a given finished threaded hole (check your hardware store for this), you can make it a little oversized, relying on stainless steel's superior strength to keep the threads from failing. Some taps are also available in sets of three; each tap is designed to take a slightly larger cut than the preceding one until you reach the desired thread size.

Cutting: Stainless steel may be cut in a number of ways. For sheet metal, the slickest device is a plasma cutter, an electrical unit that sends a needle of 12,000°F (6,650°C) ionized gas shooting through the metal. At $1,000, plasma cutters are obviously too pricey for a buck-a-pound homebrew lark, but they often may be rented from welding supply houses. With a plasma cutter, slicing through metal is literally like cutting butter; the metal simply falls apart as you move your hand. It cuts so effortlessly that it's easy to forget that the just-cut metal is hot enough to seriously burn you if you drop your guard.

For us normal folks, simpler tools will suffice. A saber saw fitted with a bimetal blade and run at its lowest speed will do the job. (If it's not making a hell of a racket, you're doing something wrong.) Carbide grit blades are a little slower, but are more forgiving in terms of speed and technique. My low-rent tool of choice is a 1/4-in. die grinder with a 3-in. cut-off wheel. The wheel will give you a very precise cut once you get the hang of controlling it. The die grinder itself (essentially a 25,000 rpm motor with a chuck on the end) is also good for many other fabrication tasks (more on this in the main text).

An abrasive cut-off saw is the first choice for cutting rods, tubes, and other stock shapes. This tool is just a scaled up version of a die grinder, with a clamp to hold the item to be cut and a far larger motor and disk. An old circular saw can be fitted with an abrasive cut-off saw, but be sure to set up the project safely in an area that can endure a serious shower of sparks.

Rolling: Rolling and bending parts requires specialized tools and is not a realistic possibility because of their size and expense. Keep in mind that stainless steel is quite tough, and a tool designed to contort a certain thickness of mild steel will be able to handle stainless that is only two-thirds as thick. If you want your sheet metal rolled, bent, or sheared, a sheet metal shop may be willing to handle the job for a small charge.