What's the cost of milling small stock?

[applebuilder]

Hey new kid on the block wants to know what it would cost to mill 1"x3"x30" metal stock for straightness and square. Basically it's a straight edge so I'm looking for decent tolerances. Are there any other maching methods other than CNC I should look at? Thanks.

[applebuilder]

Might as well figure out what the stock would cost as well. I'm guessing stainless steel would be good but I know nothing of metal so feel free to suggest.

[kling8]

you should be able to get that part fairly cheap, I would go to a smaller shop, and get a bid, or a friend and a favor may do the trick. stainless is a lot more money, and more of a pain to machine, depending on your application I would try to stay away from stainless. Just my opinion.

[RICHARD ZASTROW]

Don't forget the cost of stress relieving. This will "spring" after machining, you may have to relieve it more than once.

Dick Z

[applebuilder]

Thanks for the tips. What kind of metal would you suggest? I don't need anything fancy, whatever gets the job done. Unfortunately I don't have any metal working friends so with the milling, stress relieving and whatever else what's the rough price tag I'm looking at? Thanks.

[jdr]

You might want to try Starrett Precision Ground Flat Stock.

Comes in 1" x 3" x 36" pieces. They also sell 18" long sizes.

Several choices of steels.

[applebuilder]

Thanks, I'll take a look.

[warrenb]

Get this off the shelf. There's no reason to have this machined. Like JDR stated you can buy this stuff.

If it's not cuper critical you can get extruded aluminum

[PixMan]

For that matter, why not just buy a good Starrett straight edge?

http://www.starrett.com/download/308_p340_342.pdf