John Cleston
Member
I need to make and polish a few practice plates for a class I am taking later this year. I think I am supposed to use cold rolled but I am not sure.
John
John
Help for a rookie
- Thread starter John Cleston
- Start date
Hi John,
Cold rolled would be fine in the beginning. You will have to become familiar with many metals before you are through. They will come in turn.
I would say practice on and familiarize yourself with whatever you can get your hands on. After you gain skill and confidence on one metal, move on to another.
Up the scale of possibilities:
Copper and silver for jewelry engraving and cold rolled for steel would be at the bottom, working your way up the scale to the harder more difficult metals later. The differences in gun and knife steels will amaze you. You will graduate naturally I think, as you get more confident in your skills.
It is probably a good idea to stay with one long enough to learn it's characteristics before moving on.
Ron S
Cold rolled would be fine in the beginning. You will have to become familiar with many metals before you are through. They will come in turn.
I would say practice on and familiarize yourself with whatever you can get your hands on. After you gain skill and confidence on one metal, move on to another.
Up the scale of possibilities:
Copper and silver for jewelry engraving and cold rolled for steel would be at the bottom, working your way up the scale to the harder more difficult metals later. The differences in gun and knife steels will amaze you. You will graduate naturally I think, as you get more confident in your skills.
It is probably a good idea to stay with one long enough to learn it's characteristics before moving on.
Ron S
cr is ok, but porbably more expensive than mild steel. unless your source is not an expense. for most practice, you probably need not go finer than 6-800 grit wet/dry paper or similar abrasive. newbies think of steel as being tough to engrave, but mild steel is actually very easy to cut. it begins to get tricky when other materials are added to it to form an alloy.
Try going to your local metal salvage. Many times they have buckets of small pieces they have cut out or punched out that you can get pretty cheap.
You will have a mound of practice plates over a period of time and this is a pretty cheap way of gathering material to practice on. Refinishing the peices for engraving is the hard part, but necessary and gives you finishing skills if you don't already have them.
You will have a mound of practice plates over a period of time and this is a pretty cheap way of gathering material to practice on. Refinishing the peices for engraving is the hard part, but necessary and gives you finishing skills if you don't already have them.
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