I am tramming a Homier mini mill and the column is out vertically, leaning toward the front. I have exhausted all local supply house trying to find some .001 and .0015 shim stock, short of buying 50 or 100 ft rolls. I need about a foot of each max, 1/2 inch wide. I would be willing to buy some from someone for a reasonable price if you have it readily available. All help greatly appreciated.
Grady
ZigZag cigarette papers are reliably .001" and they cost about $1.10/pack at Wal-Mart. I use those as shims all the time. - GWE
Different weights of Al foil and oiled paper work fine. Assorted packs of brass shim stock are available from local welding shops and other sources. Bugs
Enco and MSC have $20 packages of shim stock that cover the sizes you need and up to about 25 thou or more, in sheets that are about 5 X 10 inches. These packages come in either brass or steel. You'll never be sorry that you invested.
Pete Stanaitis
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Grady wrote:
Don't think your subtle aspersions are going by me, Tom. I don't smoke. Anything.
GWE
One of our local hardware stores has a hobby section with packages of brass shim stock. 0.001 and up. Have you checked for such packs locally?
Paul
MSC, KBC, J&L, Travers, all the machine shop suppliers have this, in brass and steel. You can buy a set that has about 12 thicknesses, including .001 and .0015". Home aluminum foil is pretty close to .0015" McMaster-Carr most likely has this, too. The assortment packs are usually something like 4 x 8" sheets.
Jon
When I was over in England, I was introduced to "peelable shims", but I haven't seen them since. Steel sandwich of shim stock, glued together. Peel off as few or as many as needed to get the desired thickness. Does anyone know the real name for these, or were they a figment of my imagination?
Hey man, like, you know, um, who keeps track, ya dig?
I thought this is why we save and cut up soda cans?
Steve.
The assortment packs I have seen, and have, are all 6" x 12". Of course, you almost always run out of one size or another. For slightly bigger quantities, there are various makes of shim-in-a-can. A roll of one size in a round can between a V-8 and soup can.
Not your imagination. Great stuff when you need to sneak up on a particular shim. Shaping it is the problem. Snips are only good for very thin sections because the edges peel away and delaminate. Put the laminated shim between two sheets of brass, say and machine the lot to shape. Wonderful stuff at wonderful prices -- I think it is measured in dollars/square-inch. I have a few small pieces that I got out of a scrap bin from a guy who thought it was just inferior brass. When you see the price it makes you think twice about using this stuff.
Boris
You can buy them from MSC.
On Wed, 2 Mar 2005 05:32:49 -0600, the inscrutable "Grady" spake:
Aren't Pepsi (etc.) cans about that thickness? Give one a try.
-- Remember: Every silver lining has a cloud. ----
If you want to mail-order check out
Grady
So THAT's what you tell the police!
LB
An old VHS video cassette will give you a lifetime supply of precision shimstock of better strength and thickness tolerance than cigarette paper.
E300 thickness is 0.0005" with shorter time cassettes proportionally thicker. Precise thickness measurement is easy - measure the total thickness of a 16 or
32 multiple fold of the tape.Jim
Do not use any paper or polymer shim. Stick to steel.
I would even avoid brass for this.
Jim
Ah HAH! Noted and filed .. thanks, Jim! Although I never noticed *any* variation in good old Zig-Zags. (hak kaff) :-)
GWE
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