brass came

"G^2" wrote in message
...
I agree with most of what you say here. However, hand cutting with a
hack saw would tend to be tedious on a large project. Could you identify
a circular blade with the same properties and a thin kerf that would do
the job? I only wish that there was a small saw with a slower speed.
The abrasive saws all turn too fast in my opinion to use the toothed
blades. I would think only a few hundred RPM on a 6-8" saw would do the
trick. What say you?

A few years ago, when I was doing alot of Brass camed panels for entry
doors, I bought a custom made blade, don't remember the tooth now, but it
was alot, on a 7 1/4" circular blade for a Delta chop/miter saw.

WAYYYY too much hp for the cames, even though there was alot of 3/8" U came
involved, it was still too much saw for the job, it was a plain steel blade,
not carbide either.

There was a small chop saw on the market for a time from Hoy's, they used
small 4" blades from England, they got dull and loaded up, but the little
motor on that was too weak for the job.

I turned to a dremel type rotary tool when I got tired of putting a piece
down, forming/measuring and then walking "over there" and cutting then
coming back and fitting, then do it again for the next piece. Now I move 90
degrees to my left and cut it with a rotary tool, then put it in place. Too
much time walking back and forth to a bigger saw, and a hacksaw across the
leaves on the face of the brass will deform it unless you clamp it in a
miter box, but too many of my cuts don't fit the typical angles of a miter
box either.

Whether or not and what scratched the bevels on a job, I have no idea, but
there were brass particles at my helpers table so I assumed it was from the
brass, if not , Oh well, I still had to re-bevel the entire window.

Don't know all the ins and outs of every little piece of material, but what
works for me is the fiber cut off wheel on a rotary tool, Dremel or other.
If I run it faster, the wheel is not in contact with the metal as long, and
loading is reduced, but temperature of the piece does go up, if there is
discoloration, that is where I am soldering anyway, and it cleans off.

By the way, annealed some brass, twisted it, tied it in a simple over hand
knot, and wrapped it around a piece of bent lamp panel like stiff copper
foil , worked just fine, cleaned it up with a green scrub pad, and damp
cloth with whiting , didn't have to rub that hard either. So it will do what
the copper did just fine.

I have a small steel table saw. The surface is about 15"x12". I've
converted it to a came saw with a sliding table and cantilevered 6"
arm.I use Inland "carbon tuff" very thin kerf toothed (is this a
word?) blades. They make 4",5" and 6". It cuts lead,brass and
aluminum. If cut lots of 1/16" walled "hard brass" U channel with it.
Jarmac is a company that makes this type of saw.

Assuming red or yellow brass:
According to Machinery's Handbook (23rd edition), cutting speed for cold
drawn red or yellow brass is 250 feet/minute with a High Speed Steel blade.
With a Dremel blade diameter of 1", that would make an optimum speed of 955
RPM. With your average Dremel cranking away at 15000, you can see now why
they burn up.

And you're right...that would put the speed on a 6" blade down to 160 RPM.

If you have to do a lot of this stuff, maybe you could connect one of those
Dremel flexible shaft attachments to a low speed motor. There's a lot of
1045 RPM motors out there. Your 1" or 1/2" Dremel blade should do a lot
better there.

Of course, all this is assuming that a Dremel blade is actually High Speed
Steel and not stainless or some other crap.

I was just looking through my Enco book, and found a little item I had
forgotten about. They're called 'slitting saws'. They range in size from
2" to 8" in diameter, widths from 1/16 to 1/8 and range in price from $7 to
$50. Normally, they are mounted on an arbor and used in a milling machine,
but they could be adapted to other saws/motors.

Look at www.use-enco.com and do a search for 'slitting saws'

Hope all this rambling helps.

--
Bill Browne
Computer for work http://excalibur-dbf.com
Metal & glass for fun http://w.browne.home.att.net
"G^2" wrote in message
...
I agree with most of what you say here. However, hand cutting with a
hack saw would tend to be tedious on a large project. Could you identify
a circular blade with the same properties and a thin kerf that would do
the job? I only wish that there was a small saw with a slower speed.
The abrasive saws all turn too fast in my opinion to use the toothed
blades. I would think only a few hundred RPM on a 6-8" saw would do the
trick. What say you?


G^2


"Bill Browne" wrote in
news
While I am not experienced in stained glass, I am experience in
cutting metal. Brass, in _any_ form, will be no match for a good
hacksaw blade. My personal favorite is the Lennox Hackmaster II. And
there are 'close quarter hacksaw handles' which allow one handed
operation of a hacksaw blade.

Abrasive cutting of soft metals such as brass and aluminum is not
recommended. These metals tend to clog abrasive wheels, which then no
longer cut, they just produce friction. That may be why the brass is
getting hot enough to discolor. And the risk of scratches on the
glass that someone spoke of were probably not from the brass chips,
but the abrasives from the cutting wheel.

I doubt the diamond wheel was destroyed by the brass...more than
likely just clogged up with it.

Get yourself a handle such as:
http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/cta...emnumber=46138
The 32 TPI blade that Mike described will give a clean smooth cut.
Note the direction of the blade (it makes a difference) as a hacksaw
cuts on the push side of the stroke, not the pull (tho, for your
purposes, it may be easier to put the blade in backwards and cut on
the pull stroke...experiment a bit). You will have no problems
cutting brass with this.

--
Bill Browne
Computer for work http://excalibur-dbf.com
Metal & glass for fun http://w.browne.home.att.net

"Moonraker" wrote in message
.. .

"Mike Firth" wrote in message
...
Brass may take the teeth off some saws, but a 32 tooth hacksaw
blade
thinks it is second cousin to butter and I have cut soft sheet with
hole saws and pocket knives without a lot of damage to the tools.

The brass came, as it comes out of the box, IS work hardened by
virtue of it's extrusion into it's HR shape. I've never been very
successful in cutting brass by hand (or with a chop saw) with
anything that has a
toothed
blade. Only thing that I've ever had success with is the thin fiber
abrasive blades/wheels. I have even used the small thin diamond
wheels
from
Harbor Freight in a Dremel, and the brass will just destroy the
diamond wheels in a matter of a few cuts. Soft, sheet brass like
you buy in a hobby shop is not nearly as tough to cut as is formed
came. You can cut that stuff with scissors.







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"Bill Browne" wrote in message
...
Assuming red or yellow brass:
According to Machinery's Handbook (23rd edition), cutting speed for cold
drawn red or yellow brass is 250 feet/minute with a High Speed Steel
blade.
With a Dremel blade diameter of 1", that would make an optimum speed of
955
RPM. With your average Dremel cranking away at 15000, you can see now why
they burn up.

And you're right...that would put the speed on a 6" blade down to 160 RPM.

If you have to do a lot of this stuff, maybe you could connect one of
those
Dremel flexible shaft attachments to a low speed motor. There's a lot of
1045 RPM motors out there. Your 1" or 1/2" Dremel blade should do a lot
better there.

Of course, all this is assuming that a Dremel blade is actually High Speed
Steel and not stainless or some other crap.

I was just looking through my Enco book, and found a little item I had
forgotten about. They're called 'slitting saws'. They range in size from
2" to 8" in diameter, widths from 1/16 to 1/8 and range in price from $7
to
$50. Normally, they are mounted on an arbor and used in a milling
machine,
but they could be adapted to other saws/motors.

Look at www.use-enco.com and do a search for 'slitting saws'

Hope all this rambling helps.

--
Bill Browne

Bill,
I work with metal also, brass, bronze and copper, in a lathe,mill, and a
drill press, but I also work with brass cames, which is hard brass, and
thin. The hardness does not lend itself well to a saw, even with small
teeth, and the thickness being so fine, bends and flexes under a decent saw.
I have tried a jewelers saw, but with such fine blades they don't hold up
long.

With a project, the desire is generally to not waste time, and hand saws,
while cutting well, are notoriously slow. Hence, the search for the best
method of working with these metals.

If you can come up with a good saw for hard metal cames, brass, copper and
zinc, you can market it to a great many studios, worldwide. But as I said
earlier, Hoy's used to sell a saw, for several years, but it wasn't
feasable. and if your going to make a saw, make a bending jig too, then you
could really make some money!!

Now I am going to see what these "slitting saws" are, I just knew these was
a tool I don't have somewhere.

Hmmmmmm. Describe this bending jig to me. While you're doing that, I'll go
check my motor supply.

--
Bill Browne
Computer for work http://excalibur-dbf.com
Metal & glass for fun http://w.browne.home.att.net
"Javahut" wrote in message
...

"Bill Browne" wrote in message
...
Assuming red or yellow brass:
According to Machinery's Handbook (23rd edition), cutting speed for cold
drawn red or yellow brass is 250 feet/minute with a High Speed Steel
blade.
With a Dremel blade diameter of 1", that would make an optimum speed of
955
RPM. With your average Dremel cranking away at 15000, you can see now
why
they burn up.

And you're right...that would put the speed on a 6" blade down to 160
RPM.

If you have to do a lot of this stuff, maybe you could connect one of
those
Dremel flexible shaft attachments to a low speed motor. There's a lot
of
1045 RPM motors out there. Your 1" or 1/2" Dremel blade should do a lot
better there.

Of course, all this is assuming that a Dremel blade is actually High
Speed
Steel and not stainless or some other crap.

I was just looking through my Enco book, and found a little item I had
forgotten about. They're called 'slitting saws'. They range in size
from
2" to 8" in diameter, widths from 1/16 to 1/8 and range in price from $7
to
$50. Normally, they are mounted on an arbor and used in a milling
machine,
but they could be adapted to other saws/motors.

Look at www.use-enco.com and do a search for 'slitting saws'

Hope all this rambling helps.

--
Bill Browne

Bill,
I work with metal also, brass, bronze and copper, in a lathe,mill, and a
drill press, but I also work with brass cames, which is hard brass, and
thin. The hardness does not lend itself well to a saw, even with small
teeth, and the thickness being so fine, bends and flexes under a decent
saw.
I have tried a jewelers saw, but with such fine blades they don't hold up
long.

With a project, the desire is generally to not waste time, and hand saws,
while cutting well, are notoriously slow. Hence, the search for the best
method of working with these metals.

If you can come up with a good saw for hard metal cames, brass, copper and
zinc, you can market it to a great many studios, worldwide. But as I said
earlier, Hoy's used to sell a saw, for several years, but it wasn't
feasable. and if your going to make a saw, make a bending jig too, then
you
could really make some money!!

Now I am going to see what these "slitting saws" are, I just knew these
was
a tool I don't have somewhere.

I wonder if you might fond something that would work at Micro Mark.

http://www.ares-server.com/Ares/Ares...partment&ID=30
Maybe the one of the rail cutters might work or...
http://www.ares-server.com/Ares/Ares...oduct&ID=81556

It's a fun catalog to look through anyway.

Chunk Kiesling

Looked around some more and this miter/cutoff machine looks good
http://www.ares-server.com/Ares/Ares...oduct&ID=15218

Chunk

"chunk" wrote in message
...
I wonder if you might fond something that would work at Micro Mark.


http://www.ares-server.com/Ares/Ares...partment&ID=30
Maybe the one of the rail cutters might work or...

http://www.ares-server.com/Ares/Ares...oduct&ID=81556

It's a fun catalog to look through anyway.

Chunk Kiesling

"chunk" wrote in message
...
Looked around some more and this miter/cutoff machine looks good

http://www.ares-server.com/Ares/Ares...oduct&ID=15218

Chunk

"chunk" wrote in message
...
I wonder if you might fond something that would work at Micro Mark.



http://www.ares-server.com/Ares/Ares...partment&ID=30
Maybe the one of the rail cutters might work or...


http://www.ares-server.com/Ares/Ares...oduct&ID=81556

It's a fun catalog to look through anyway.

Chunk Kiesling



I see what you are getting at, but, and a big "but" it is, the railroad
tools are very small, and those rail cutters are small too, the nibbler
needs a flat surface to work, not 3d like in a came. As far as the saw with
2" Hss blade, look at this one,
http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/cta...emnumber=42307 and
tell me the difference. Bet BOTH are made in the same Chinese factory. But
that wheel would get a workout and I would spend all my time changing
blades.

Vic mentioned a saw, or one similar to a Jarmac, that is the blade I use on
my small power miter box, about a 4" blade, great for zinc, gets dull real
fast with brass. This set up is what led me to try a custom made hss blade
on my Delta Power miter box, which was downright scary. Too much power, and
too fast for the material.

All these tools and experiments led me to the Enkay abrasive wheels and the
Harbor freight rotary tool, which is what I use today, I can work faster
with that set up than with anything else, and adjust angles on the fly!