Sources for soft (<1018) .065" flat barstock (small quantities)

[fieldwrangler]

Folks -

Need some permeable stuff for blades...

Bob Palmieri

[David King]

Bob,
Unfortunately barstock starts at 1/8". You could go with 15ga if you can find it, otherwise 16ga sheet metal which is .0598", about the same as 1.5 mm, common to metric parts of the world. Any sheet metal place in the US will probably have scraps of 16ga that they can sheer up into the exact width you need.

[David King]

Cold Rolled 1008/1010 Steel - Mead Metals, Inc has 1008-1010. Ask for a sample and get it sheered to width locally. Maybe we should all go in on a bunch?

You won't find .065, either .0625 or 15ga which is .0675". You could also laminate .020" transformer steel.

[fieldwrangler]

Bob,
Unfortunately 1/16" barstock (.0625) is as close as you're going to get unless you jump up to 15ga (.0675) sheet metal and have it sheered into strips. The much more common 16ga is only .0598", about the same as 1.5 mm which is also common in metric parts of the world. Any sheet metal place in the US will have probably have scraps of 16ga that they can sheer up into the exact width you need.

Dave -

Yeah... I knew that .0650 was unlikely, but I didn't know about the 15 & 16 ga. specs. Thanks for this.

Bob Palmieri

[Bruce Johnson]

As the others have said, I doubt that you're going to find any off-the-shelf 0.065" mild steel strip stock. You could go with the sheet metal and shear it into strips, but there'll be heavy burrs on the edges and the strips will curl. You'll still need to do some hand flattening and filing to get what you want. I have a couple of nice metal shears, and could do that for you, but I don't think you'll be happy with the results.

If you know the specific size of the blades that you want, it's not a big deal to machine up a small batch of them. For example, if you wanted some blades that were 2 1/2" x 1/2" x 0.065", I'd start with a chunk of 2 1/2" x 1/2" 1018 bar stock. I'd clamp it in the mill vise and use a slitting saw to cut off 0.065" slices. They'd come off flat, with decent surface finish and minimal burrs. If that's what you want, I can quote you on a small batch. As a quick guess, I could probably make you 20 blades of that size for $50. If you're looking to spend $0.20 each, well, I can't help you.

[David King]

If someone we knew had a hot rolling mill, we could import a few sticks of the 1/8" wrought iron out of the UK and have it rolled out to 1/16" and then have it waterjet cut into blades with a nice radiused top. The best thing about the wrought iron besides the very low carbon content is that it's virtually rust-free. Of course it might sound like hot doo-doo in a pickup.

[Joe Gwinn]

Low Carbon Ground Flat Stock

Try "Low carbon ground flat stock" (MSC item number 06200059): MSC Google Search Results.

This is C1018 alloy, and is ground to 0.5" by 0.0625" by 24" long. Other widths and thicknesses are available.

While the ground to size material is more expensive, it will save a lot of hand labor, and is perfectly repeatable.

Ground flat stock is a commodity, available from many sources.

[Bruce Johnson]

This is probably the closest you're going to find:
It's 1018 strip stock, precision ground to 1/16" (0.0625 +/- 0.001"); 1/2" wide x 24" long. It's at McMasters for $8.24.

McMaster-Carr

[David King]

Can't 1018 be heated up to knock some of the carbon out of it? Perhaps that only works near the surface.

McMasters also sells "laminated" steel plate .063 thick out of 1008. That ought to be interesting.
http://www.mcmaster.com/#steel/=al8he0

[fieldwrangler]

As the others have said, I doubt that you're going to find any off-the-shelf 0.065" mild steel strip stock. You could go with the sheet metal and shear it into strips, but there'll be heavy burrs on the edges and the strips will curl. You'll still need to do some hand flattening and filing to get what you want. I have a couple of nice metal shears, and could do that for you, but I don't think you'll be happy with the results.

If you know the specific size of the blades that you want, it's not a big deal to machine up a small batch of them. For example, if you wanted some blades that were 2 1/2" x 1/2" x 0.065", I'd start with a chunk of 2 1/2" x 1/2" 1018 bar stock. I'd clamp it in the mill vise and use a slitting saw to cut off 0.065" slices. They'd come off flat, with decent surface finish and minimal burrs. If that's what you want, I can quote you on a small batch. As a quick guess, I could probably make you 20 blades of that size for $50. If you're looking to spend $0.20 each, well, I can't help you.

Bruce -

In fact, I want to try a few different materials for this application before committing to a run, but we'll likely be doing business in the near future.

Bob Palmieri

[Joe Gwinn]

Can't 1018 be heated up to knock some of the carbon out of it? Perhaps that only works near the surface.

Doesn't work at all in practice, as the carbon is already pretty low.

[ScottA]

Go with steel "flat wire".

The nominal composition is 1010, the edges are radiused as it comes, it comes in a variety of thicknesses and widths (including 0.062" x W), it is relatively inexpensive and you should be able get it off the shelf in small quantities.

Mead (linked above) has it and you can find other sources on line. Central Steel has a good selection.

http://www.centralsteel.com/cfbar.htm

Click on "check sizes" on the left, and go to page 75.

You'll still have to cut it to length (metal shears are not too expensive - I bought one recently from Northern Tool for < $100 and it goes through 0.062" material like butter), clean up those edges and flatten it out a bit, but I think it is a more straightforward way to go.

[David Schwab]

Bob,
Unfortunately barstock starts at 1/8". You could go with 15ga if you can find it, otherwise 16ga sheet metal which is .0598", about the same as 1.5 mm, common to metric parts of the world. Any sheet metal place in the US will probably have scraps of 16ga that they can sheer up into the exact width you need.

I buy 1/16" low carbon steel bar stock from McMaster-Carr on a regular basis. Part # Part Number: 6511K25. They list is as "1008-1010 Carbon Steel". Not 1018, but it works just fine.

McMaster-Carr

[fieldwrangler]

In fact I think I ordered 6 feet of this stuff from McM/C last week; should be here any day now.

[David King]

McMaster stocks a lot of things that aren't available anywhere else. The result is their price is about 8-10 times the $.50/lb steel usually costs. I'm glad they exist but I'd want to look at other options if I were headed for larger scale production.