Taking stock

Well, buying it actually.

As you can see from Pootube, real CNC warriors use loominum, rather than steel. It's a lot easier and quicker to machine and gives a beautiful finish in the right hands / machinery. And for older machinery like mine with suspect backlash etc, its got to be a safer option. The Startled Man toolsetter I completed recently came out well in steel but obviously I'd like to be able to run stupid and unnecessary feeds and speeds so I can do some willy waving myself.

Couldn't find any non-ferrous stockholders near where I live. Although there may actually be one right under my nose, I failed to find any. However, there's a decent looking place in Bamber Bridge, not far from where I work. Family business, stocking only aluminium called Simmal (= Simmons + Aluminium: see what they did there?).

Slick looking website seems to work well enough. The only issue I had was that you can't sign in and save the contents of your basket until you've actually placed an order. It's only when you finally place said order that you can actually register. So you can't save the basket and take a few dry runs at the first order. Hardly a massive issue but hey. And collection avoids the £18(?) cost of delivery. Order online and they will tell you when it's ready to collect - usually next working day by the looks of it. I ordered over the weekend, so it was ready Tuesday mid morning.

Big range of sizes, half reasonable pricing and above all, none of this 5m minimum order quantity (MOQ) lark. When you are looking for large-ish sections such as 2"x3" or 4" x 1 1/2", such MOQs would break the bank. They charge for handling and cutting but at least you can order any length - it's factored into their costing model.

A quick bit of spreadsheeting appears to reveal the formula:

Cost of order = (£6 per bar size) + (£0.36 per cut) + (£6.90 per kg)

(prices include vat)

The £6 is effectively for manhandling the stock from the shelving, setting up the saw and handling the order. The 36p per cut is fair enough. And obviously the bulk of the cost is down to the bulk material cost for loominum - unless you insist on a tiny piece.

So I got a range of sizes for upcoming jobs:

• X, Y and Z axis housings / brackets for my Blidgeport CNC conversion (including some spares to cover cockups). These are all 6082T6, which is described as good machining.
• Some soft jaw stock for my 6" vise. I know, I know, that's very trendy amongst the Youtube celebs these days but some of the Blidgeport parts could be tricky to machine otherwise.

They also had an interesting cut-off / scrap bin. Their range of stock sizes was staggering, so the bin I saw had a large range of pieces, ranging up to 500mm diameter round stock. The nice thing about offcuts is that the bulk material price is about 50% of the new stock - and there is no handling or cutting charge. I was charged £3.65 / kg inc vat, so it would have been downright rude not to have had a good rummage. Then the guy from the sales office weighed it and took the payment. Cool.

Here's the day's haul:

24kg of offcuts. I believe these are mainly 6082T6 again, with the possibility of some 7075 - naturally, none of it is marked. The latter seems to be an aerospace grade alloy. Although that makes it a stronger material, it sounds as if it is a little more difficult to machine:

Stock for the Blidgeport work:

And I've also dug out and identified some of the loominum I acquired in Canada (mostly 6061). Together with today's offcuts, this is my loominum odds and sods collection:

All I have to do now is start converting some of it to swarf.