Our People
18 September, 2025
Working at the cutting edge
A knack for picking up new skills and a can-do attitude has seen Stawell’s Adam McGaffin turn a potentially expensive pastime into an impressive side hustle.
Set on a picturesque property a few minutes out of Stawell, Rapid Cut CNC is a CNC plasma cutting service that can take care of detailed cutting work on all types of metal, able to process any two-dimensional design on plates up to 20 millimetres thick and three metres long by 1.5 metres wide.
Investing in a huge CNC machine for cutting metal meant also investing in a massive industrial shed to house his ambitious endeavour, which as soon as you set foot in the premises you realise no expense has been spared.
“My budget probably blew a little bit out of hand,” Mr McGaffin said with a laugh.
“You start these things, and you don’t really realise how it can escalate a little bit.”
“I just thought I’d have a crack at it.”
As a qualified Stonemason and currently a mill operator at Stawell Gold Mine, Mr McGaffin admits getting into the CNC metalwork business hadn’t been on his radar until a thought-provoking conversation with his father, Murray - a Fitter and Turner by trade - who had seen a demonstration of CNC plasma cutting technology at the Wimmera Machinery Field Days.
“He just saw one there one day and he said ‘you’re good at computers, I can handle the metal side of things and teach you a few things about that’,” said Mr McGaffin.
“We had quite a few CNC machines in the stone industry but I didn’t actually operate them myself, I was more on the tools.
“I play around a bit with computers and stuff, I always did when I was growing up, so I find that stuff pretty easy to do.”
Since getting started in 2023, Mr McGaffin has finetuned his processes to ensure a great result every time and he says he’s more than happy to discuss all types of jobs big or small.
“I pride myself on a quick turnaround time and there's never a job to small,” he said.
Some other people that I didn't mention that I'd like to reach with my business are farmers needing parts for repair jobs and even just blokes in their shed wanting to complete their home projects without having to cut all their pieces out by hand.
Rapid Cut CNC has steadily attracted new clients over time including local independent fabricators, all the way through to farmers who need everything from metal signs through to replacement parts for machinery repairs.
“We even just have blokes in their shed wanting to complete their home projects without having to cut all their pieces out by hand,” Mr McGaffin said.
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