'First catch your camel' :-) There is of course no techncial reason why they can't be made for just abotu any solid substance. Engraving a set on a suitable pile of metal bars would be rather nice. -tony

Hm, has he considered other metals? Saving on the anodizing might make brass, or a mild steel, or some such, cheap enough to be worth doing. I'm just thinking that I probably would not buy a set at $150 but very well might at $50.... For that matter, what about non-metals? A hard wood might make for a nice set too, especially if the engraving is filled with paint and the whole thing lacquered, or some such. Perhaps even plastic, though that seems a bit d?class?, and quite possibly not suitable for garage machine-shop production anyway. /~\ The ASCII Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B

My experience with buying small quatities of metals and machine them suggests : Aluminium : Farily cheap, Soft, and fifficult to machine well, it 'clogs' the cutting tools Mild seteel : Cheapest of the lot. Harder than brass or aluminium, but still not hard to work. Worst problem is that it rusts far too quickly Stainless steel : More expensive than mild steel or aluminium, but chealper than brass. A hard mataerial, but not difficult to machine if you have sharp tools. I like it Brass. Most expensive of the common materials. If you pick a 'machining brass' like CZ121, it is bautiful stuff to work. I'd use it a lot more if I could afford it. But it does tarnish in air. That's basically my view. I'd like a set, but there are many more things I could send 100 quid on... Actually, a lot of 'enginering plastics' can be machined like metals. Things like Nylon and delrin are worked in much the same way and certainlt can be machined i na home workshop. If anything, it's wood that taat's the 'odd one out' in terms of machining it. -tony

Although even nylon would be OK, once we've ruled out rosewood, brass would be real nice.

On 6 Aug 2012 at 18:36, Tony Duell wrote: There are plenty of nice tough antique non-metallic materials that might make good candidates. It's just that they're a bear to handle on the small scale or under very tight supply restrictions; e.g. bone or ivory. But I think we're getting off-topic here. Napier's bones are very simple, shape-wise. Just engraved slips of metal and probably one of the stock shapes available, so quite possibly just cutting, finishing and engraving. Brass engraving has been practiced for hundreds of years, so that would be my choice. Here's an example of some fairly modern stuff: http://www.electrotheremin.com/184cornet_01.jpg --Chuck .

________________________________ From: Chuck Guzis <cclist at sydex.com> Brass engraving has been practiced for hundreds of years, so that would be my choice.? Here's an example of some fairly modern stuff: http://www.electrotheremin.com/184cornet_01.jpg --Chuck C: Again I haven't followed this thread from the beginning. You can conduct simplified etching by encapsulating a piece of copper/brass w/packing tape, almost any type will work, and cut out shapes and whatnot w/an exacto knife. Then you submerse it in etchant. Depending on how well the tape/adhesive adheres, and how long you keep it in there, you may have good success. It works and is reasonably precise. But although I know who Napier was, I don't know what is meant by "bones", so I don't know if it's suitable for these purposes. .

________________________________ From: Chuck Guzis <cclist at sydex.com> Go to WikiP--they've got a nice explanation. You'd want to do the brass etching using an overlay of wax, with the design carved into it.? At least when I've had to etch brass, that's the way I've done it. C: That's another method. But you can get your hands all over the taped surface, whereas you might need to keep your distance if it's wax. There are different kinds of wax of course, some much harder then candle wax for instance. But brass engraving is ever so much more pleasing to the eye than is etching.? The lines are crisp and the engraving line itself? has a V- shaped profile.? C: True but it takes a lot more skill. I have seen articles on how to build pantograph engraving machines, but that's really getting complicated.

C: True but it takes a lot more skill. I have seen articles on how to build pantograph engraving machines, but that's really getting complicated. The flatbed plotters of my youth were certainly robust enough that one could easily be modified to take a small dremel-like device, instead of a pen.

On Tue, 7 Aug 2012, David Riley wrote: \o/ (you can lead a derp to google, but you can't make him think) g. -- Proud owner of F-15C 80-0007 http://www.f15sim.com - The only one of its kind. http://www.diy-cockpits.org/coll - Go Collimated or Go Home. Some people collect things for a hobby. Geeks collect hobbies. ScarletDME - The red hot Data Management Environment A Multi-Value database for the masses, not the classes. http://www.scarletdme.org - Get it _today_! Buying desktop hardware and installing a server OS doesn't make a server-class system any more than sitting in a puddle makes you a duck. [Cipher in a.s.r]

And mine. It has uses, but it's not one I use if I don't have good reason to. True, but that's one more operation to do. Some finsing methods slightly alterh the dimensions of the part, this may not matter (it wouldn't here). but it might. Actually, electroplating is not that hard to do at home. The main enemy of all plating processis is grease o nthe surface, of course. So do I. Of course there are many differnet brasses and not all machine nicely, but if ouu pick one that does it's a joy to work. The swarf comes off as a find dust [1] it doesn't clog anything. [1] This can be a problem. That dust flies. Everywhere. Not only do you want ot keep it out of anything electical (it is conductive, after all), but also out of your eyes. A bit of steel swarf can be removed wtih a magnet, brass cannot and might involve a painful trip to the local A&E department. After which you invest in goggles... Pure gold is far too soft for most uses (apart from being too expesnive). You cna of course plate such metals onot a base metal object, but in genral the chemicals involved are nasty to say the least (AFAIK there is no reliable gold plating process that doesn't involve cyanides). You do _not_ want a magnesium alloy object ingniting when you are machining it. It is almost impossible to extinguish. Steer clear unless thjere are very good reasons for needing such metals. -tony

I haven't followed this thread until now. Not sure what it's about. some aluminum-s machine quite well. I remember taking a cut on an aluminum faceplate on my old Unimat 3 ?(can't give any specifics, but it didn't seem that hard) and fine angel hair shavings came off. I was using a brand new pre-cut German made cutting tool I'll point out, and was turning at fairly high speeds. ?The stuff that turns best IMHO is stuff w/lead in it's content. Yellow brass, leaded steel, etc. It "spits" the metal as opposed to creating continuous shavings. It's has to do w/the way the lead adjoins other metals w/i the crystalline matrix. ?Ok I'm going back to sleep.

My personal favourite is 12L14 steel, followed by a brand of cast-iron called Durabar. Durabar is a little nicer to machine than 12L14, but being cast iron its messy. I do not like brass, the chips spray *everywhere*. Aluminum hasn't given me too many problems with appropriate cutting fluid. Stainless and 4140 are probably my least favourite. They're gummy, and the tool wants to tear as much as cut. Free machining stainless steels, however, are every bit as nice to machine as 12L14. These days when I need a part in steel, it's 12L14 or nothing. I'm not touching 1018. -------- Paul Anderson -- VE3HOP On 2012-08-06, at 1:48 PM, ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk (Tony Duell) wrote:

Tothwolf wrote: If you don't mind a burnt finish.