Jeweling anyone?

[petriej]

The most impressive jewelling that I have seen done is with a center cutting endmill (this is only for flat stuff). Bolt your material on to the table and run a fly cutter over it first so that you have an extremely flat surface.

After that use an endmill (this is time intensive, so the larger the better). For each position run a plunge and move cycle. Then repeat repeat repeat. This will give you the most consistent finish available, no compounds, greases, or brushes to clog and become inconsitent.

[tr4252]

What a great idea; (slaps forehead) why didn't I think of that?

Tom

[gamel]

on softer materials such as brass or aluminum, I used the insert for a eraser pen, and just put short sections into a regular chuck, the eraser was the harder style designed to remove pen ink, not the softer pencil style more commonly available..n steel I used either the pen eraser or a very stiff 1/4" stainless cup brush with some shrink tube to get a more agressive bite on harder materials [case hardened receivers, bolts, etc..] In either case on harder materails I also used ordinary fine grade valave polishing compund, and basically just smeard it on and let the brush pick up some fresh compund on each move..I had made an indexing holder for bolts at that time, using the unit available from Brownells for a guide, they also have a good selection of jewelling accessories and supplies as well such as the cratex jewelling rods, cratex scrubbers can also be found at your local model train hobby shop as they are used [gently] to clean model train track..
here's a link to a brownells 'starter jewelling' kit...

[tikka308]

I remember reading about a fellow who was trying to jewel a piece of sheet metal (or possibly sheet aluminum) for a model airplane. He tried many different methods but ended up being happiest with a 'cratex' stick. I don't know any additional info (i.e. where he bought it, abrasive rating, etc) but I recall it being a video online and he was able to chuck the cratex stick in a collet/chuck...

[fretsman]

Cratex is good but you have to keep it "wet" with oil or something similar as it will load up with material and give inconsistant swirl marks.

Dave

[edferg]

I've had good luck with a 1/4" diameter wire brush and oil. I had to fabricate a brass tube to cover all but the last 1/16" of the brush. The tube prevents the brush from flaring out over time. I wrote a CNC program to give me the correct step & repeat pattern and depth of "cut".

Ed