I am more or less with MikeB on this one.
So many variables to give an exact answer
Have you priced the steel at your own local stockists ? , was thinking about building another chassis for my own build last year ( Not happy that my chassis had become rusty because of a long period of illness )
I was quoted £155.14p inc vat, Febuary last year & know that prices have increased a fair bit since then.
That was just for the square tube alone but it did include £10 for delivery !!
As for cutting, a simple hacksaw fitted with a good quality blade will get the job done, going to be slow going & quite hard work.
If you are going to start laying out on the likes of bandsaws or compound mitre saws, then it is a bit of a no brainer really, may just as well go the flat pack route ( Unless you have future plans for them ) .
No idea of your background ( Engineering wise ) If you are not used to working with metal it may be a golden chance to learn some new metalworking skills
Having worked with all things metal for over 40 years the novelty of cutting steel has long since worn off, I now view this as an evil task that needs to be done before I can start doing the fun stuff
That said, I can still see the attraction & sense of achivement it will give to the novice.
My own chassis was square cut in the bandsaw & all of the angles were cut with my trusty hacksaw & lightly fettled with a flap disc in the grinder.
Could have cut most of the angles on my bandsaw but found out that by the time I had adjusted the cut angle, it was just a quick to use the hacksaw !!
Flat pack was not an option when I started my build over 3 years ago, I had no choice.
If I had to build another chassis it would be flat pack for sure .... It will save so many quality, sometimes precious build hours & removes the constant double checking, have I cut this right, why is this wrong, not to mention the potential heartache of cutting the compound mitres
