Model Forum / General / Models / March 2006

Silver steel isn't tool steel though. At a pinch it'll make a cutting tool
for light or occasional use but it won't behave like tool steel in hard use.
If the OP said what his application was it would help to determine what he
really needs.

As for grinding down bigger diameters your best bet is a place that has a
centreless grinder and regularly does those sorts of sizes. 5 and a bit mm
is a common enough size for motorbike and some car engine valve stems these
days and a valve manufacturer called G&S Valves Ltd has the right equipment.
Google will find them and maybe they can drop a couple of bars through the
grinder when they're running a batch of valves off for not too much money.

I've enquired about this sort of job at dedicated grinding companies and
they usually want an arm and a leg for set up costs.

Great. Thanks. I'll get onto them in the morning.

Thanks, Peter, but I need 6" lengths.

The problem with the EKP catalogue was that Winzip was labelling it a
Wordpad file, but Wordpad couldn't handle the macros. OK on Word, though.

Thanks again, everybody.