john , i still do that a lot it works good but as allen said with the big drift and it's hot just takes a big hammer and rounds out nicely . just after he had posted that we were setting up a 70' truck scale that my brother bougth at an auction , had to do a lot of metal repairs on it . we found out why they sold it , they had put on a new steel deck plate top and had warped it so it would never certify . long welds and bracing under the plates , long seam welds and had actually welded bracing in the adjustment area it was warped about 10" in each 35"section we cut off the braces at the section adjustment and set up our track torch and split them ,like magic they leveled out , and was easy to certify . put guard rails on to meet MSHA specs., lots of holes to burn and round out . i wanted to post on here then but too busy . we hauled 30,000 tons over it 2 years ago . we moved it last year re-setup certified it and hauled about 65,000 ton across .i may move it again this year but to early to know now . we also have 2 other truck scales . good luck . willie 

I like to use a set of Miluwalkee hole saws to "mark" the hole I need to cut out. I was re-doing the undercarriage on a link belt track hoe( 14 rollers X 4 =5/8" bolts was a lot of hole cutting). After laying out the holes and center punching them I set the pilot bit shallow (1/4") on the 1/2" size hole saw and drilled untill the hole saw cut into the metal about a 1/16". Perfect round mark that the torch wouldn't blow away and the pilot hole was a good place to start cutting. Worked even better if I took the time to drill the pilot all the way through the 1"X4" members.