Making A Rectangular Bluing Tray
Added 2015-11-26 20:09:18 +0000 UTCHey Folks,
Its a bit tricky to get a consistent, uniform blue on long slender parts like clock hands. So I made a third component for the bluing tray set, to do the job right.
Cheers,
Chris.
Comments
Huh...I guess that goes to show that with only a few mm of lever to work with, even thin sections take some oomph to bend.
Tom Colson
2015-11-29 01:45:12 +0000 UTCIt was only 0.4mm, I really should toughen up!
Clickspring
2015-11-29 00:23:59 +0000 UTCHey Chris, what was your target web thickness for the bends? It looks like you were working pretty hard to get the sides bent up!
Tom Colson
2015-11-28 23:41:36 +0000 UTCThose long chips are sharp little blighters! I collected them from the v-groove machining, not sure if the size makes a difference, but the cleaner they are the better. I've heard of some people rinsing them in solvent, but I just cook them off first in the tray before use. Cheers mate!
Clickspring
2015-11-27 19:53:44 +0000 UTCNice re-purpose of the spare plate, Chris! Great addition to your kit, too. Noticed the chips in the long tray are long & thin, are you sorting chips too and does it make a difference in bluing the longer pieces? You never cease to amaze my friend!! Thanks for the Thanksgiving gift! Hope yours was great too!!! Congrats on the >$1k, so well deserved!! ~PJ
PJ
2015-11-27 17:19:15 +0000 UTCYes saving material, brass is crazy expensive. The brass I used for this was a cut out left over from the plates, so it's kind of like "bonus brass"!
Clickspring
2015-11-26 21:08:19 +0000 UTCGreat Idea George, wish I'd thought of it!
Clickspring
2015-11-26 21:03:55 +0000 UTCThanks for you answers, Chris. I thought all the pieces you blued were made of brass, like the screws. Are they made of steel? Maybe I should watch your videoes once more from the start ;) And my second question was not clear: what is the benefit of bending the tray instead of having a big solid block of brass and milling out the inside to make the tray? Saving material?
Ørjan Fredheim
2015-11-26 21:02:25 +0000 UTCGreat vid by the way!
George Harris
2015-11-26 20:58:16 +0000 UTCPushed enter to change to the next line...oops! You could make an inset lid for the top of the tray while storing it so the filings dont fall out and so you dont have to keep emptying out the metal filings. Just an idea.
George Harris
2015-11-26 20:57:16 +0000 UTCHey chris
George Harris
2015-11-26 20:52:49 +0000 UTCHey Ørjan, the blue color comes from a very thin layer of oxide that forms on the surface of steel. The oxide gets thicker with temperature, and generates a color effect known as thin film interference (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thin-film_interference)" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thin-film_interference)</a> Brass doesn't form the oxide in the same way, so there's no color transformation. The benefits of doing it in one piece is that if it was made of separate pieces, it would be very difficult to keep them all together during the silver soldering. The various bits would fall out of alignment, making getting square corners very difficult. Great to have your support mate :)
Clickspring
2015-11-26 20:47:29 +0000 UTCChris, why doesn't the blueing tray itself become blue? And just for my understanding, what is the benefit of bending the tray over milling it out of a solid brass piece? Thanks for sharing! I see your subscription number is rapidly increasing! Well deserved. Are you sure you don't have a background in movie making or something? Your videoes are the highest quality videoes on YouTube.
Ørjan Fredheim
2015-11-26 20:25:08 +0000 UTC
