I buy most mine on eBay and although the cost of shipping frequently exceeds the bid price of the stock I purchase, it's still cheaper than buying it from the metal dealers here in the Boston area.
Harry C.
If it'll fit in one of my chucks I really don't care WHAT shape it started as, it'll be round when I'm done.
I was doing a project that required some round Delrin, I found some nice square pieces at a scrap yard. The lathe didn't care nor did I.
Dave
I'm pretty sure I read that it was illegal more than ten years ago. It made sense to me because the perps were clearly intending to make the advertiser have to pay a Business Reply postage expense with no intention of it turning into a business transaction.
But you've challenged me, and I'm going to try and find out if there really is such a law. I'll report back later.
Jeff
Each steel supplier has their own colors, so you can get a chart from them. If you buy steel from some place else the colors are different, so you need their chart to. If you buy from several places then mark or stamp it on the ends so you know what it is. If you don't then you have problems telling what you have.
Richard W.
From time-to-tiome I stop by Pacific Steel and Recycling. They have a pile of short ends that they sell for reduced price.
Over in their metal salvage area the boys take good care of me. Whenever any of the local fabricators clean house they sell perfectly good virgin aluminum "short" ends that are sometimes five or six feet long. The crew at Pacific sets this stuff to one side for me.
They let me scrounge through their boxes of brass and bronze salvage. I've gotten a wide assortment of shapes, some of it new. One day I scored on 1/4" X 6" brass bar stock. They'd chopped it up in lengths to fit their tri-wall boxes. I wish now that I'd bought it all.
Another amazing find was unused 5" copper pipe with quarter-inch wall thickness. Again, they'd chopped it up with a Sawzall to fit in the boxes. Someday, if I ever get around to building a model boiler...
Out in the iron piles I look for truck axles. They're harder than heck, so I burn them to convenient lengths and throw them into the wood stove when I've got a good, thick bed of hot coals in there. I let the fire go out, allowing a nice, slow cooldown of the axle stock. After the anealing it machines very well.
Sometimes, I'll stop by at the local big truck overhaul shop. Generally, they'll give me anything I find in their scrap bin. I've found some very nice pieces of brass out there. Maybe a truck mechanic could set me straight on this, but I *think* they come from a two-speed differential overhaul.
Another of my favorite stops is a fabricating shop. After they got a computer-controlled plasma cutter they've started generating tons of good stuff.
Use your imagination. It's out there at a reasonable price.
Orrin
Have a cigar, Orrin, although they're better than brass, they are the shafts that the pinions run on in the epicyclic geartrain in a Eaton style 2 speed rear axle. Every toolbox should have one as an intermediary between a big hammer and something resisting movement.
Tom
The only thing I could find is this Cecil Adams piece on the subject. After reading it I guess I was wrong in saying it was illegal for you to suggest autofornication on a reply card, but it does sound like you might get in trouble with the eagle for "abuse of the mails" if you started dropping bricks in mailboxes and they cought you at it. (There are surveillance cameras all over these days y'know.)
Jeff
a very interesting article, thanks Jeff!
iIsn't that Gunner?
Isn't that Gunner?
Dunno. What makes you think that?
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