A PRIVATE PRESS AND MACHINE AND TOOL CONCERN - A STEEL IDEAL PRESS - GICZY M & T -
FINE PRESS WORKS & TOOLING
Socio-literature, private press work.
Tooling, Parts, Dura-Bar cast iron 1”x2”x6”. Both faces surface ground to .0003"
- PRESS WORK - - MACHINE & TOOLING -
A PRIVATE PRESS
Production of socio-literature. Chapbooks, prints, tracts and engravings of works in the public domain and by contemporary authors and artists. Self-publishing. Sole discretion over literary, scientific, artistic, and aesthetic merits. Printing primarily for pleasure and educational purposes. Hand-set via vintage and contemporary type foundry typefaces.
Member of the Private Libraries Association (UK) and registered with the International Register of Press Names
TOOLING - A36 Plates & The “Flip-It” Plate (2-Sides). Chicago Dura-Bar Cast Iron
Portable A36 Lapper. Single-sided only. Specifications: Low carbon hi-ductile A36 steel, 1”x2.5”x3”. Sides end-milled for vise-fixturing. Ground .0005” across 12” and hand-lapped.
Aluminum Lapping plates available at 1"x3"x6". Charge lap with abrasive and run dry or with WD40, mineral spirits, or kerosene as a slurry
Featured “Flip-It” Plate. Image of lap side. The honing side plain ground flat. Ball-end mill cut along sides for ease of handling.
Incredible value for lap and hone of small items such as tools, chisels, planes, bits, triggers, sears, and other tools. Unique product. Heavy but portable.
Dura-Bar cast iron (U.S.-made Chicago) or A36 in 2.5" width.
Option: Manufactured two-sided honing plate.
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The “Thicka” Precision Straight Edge
Thick manufacture. Specifications: 1/2" thick x. 6” long x 1 1/4”. Faces ground .0005” flat. American O-1 tool steel and hardened to approx. 55 RC.
Manufactured in Broward County, FL
Manufacture with manual vintage USA equipment, tooling and fixtures. Includes mid-century SB 9a lathe, Clausing and Benchmaster Mill, Harvey Butterfly Surface Grinder. Hardening capacity. Starrett, B&S, Mit, and Swiss metrologic equipment.
Offering tooling, fixtures and products to increase your capacity to build and manufacture.
ABOUT ME: Mechanical Engineering degree and background with previous employment in the heavy steel manufacturing industry. Exposure in Central NJ to early experiences in machine shop and tool & die environments led to an interest in metal.
Excellent for Small Lapping Service & Duty
Portable lapping and honing plates..
Please read my FAQs to better understand the make, process, use and why's of these items.
FAQs
Contact me at rob@steelideal.com for availability or custom requirements.
The HONING & LAPPING “FLIP-IT“ PLATE is rectilinear to hone chisels, plane blades etc & perfect to lap small items. Cast Iron SOLID THICK. HEAVY. Made in Broward County, FL.
Dura-Bar is top tier quality cast Fe production bar stock made by Wells Manufacturing Company in Woodstock, IL. I try to work all aspects of machining on US made stock and US old equipment, tooling, and metrology, some German and Swiss, some top names, some vintage machinist-made... primary machines are Benchmaster knee Mill from '53, SB Lathe from 48', Harvey Butterfly Grinder from early 50's - all manual, all the time. These are handmade.
And TWO SIDES, dual-use. Has one face Honing smooth surface and a 25 degree cross-cut Lapping surface on opposite face.
Sides are left as-cast from the foundry. Faces surface ground to .0005" over 12" and lap side is hand lapped. Each face ground X-Y and off-set 180 degrees at a 45 degree angle to cancel any table variations.
"Flip-It" Plates from A36 Steel for a slightly reduced price.
(Images shown nclude some of my equipment, as well as of my Hyprez applicators/compounds and Babcock lapping plate which are used to refine the FLIP-IT Plate lap side)
* Perfect for woodworkers, gunsmiths, turners, luthiers, chisels, plane blades, leather crafts folk, for machinists and hobbyists.
HONING SIDE - .0005" flat surface ready for hone processing of your items, like chisels, blades, planers, accepts charges of abrasive or carbide pastes, or simply a slurry of whatever paste you decide to create be it valve polishing compounds and oil and the like. Use uniformly as you would for your chisels and blades and other metal objects for bevel-work, etc.
LAPPING SIDE - .0005" flat then hand-lapped flatter.
About your use - Lapping is science and art. It involves not really permitting the item to physically touch the lap substrate. The item to be lapped is done by the abrasive in a film (a WET lap) and/or abrasive that is charged into the lap itself and used with a little bit of a liquid film (considered a DRY lap, but still using some nominal liquid). With steel and cast iron laps we're generally speaking to more or less a WET version of lapping. Make the slurry utilizing the abrasive compound in an oil film (or water, but oil is better to maintain the abrasive in suspension) no matter if you use a Silicone Carbide-based abrasive, an AO powder-base, a Clover-brand, a US Products, a diamond micron-like product, or a non-embedding abrasive. Your abrasive may be in powder form or already in paste. Note some compounds are pre-engineered with their slurry content that you don't need to add liquid like oil. "Feel" will inform you how much oil you've added is "right" and if it's working the item lapped. The process uses a consistent thin-laid charged film (how professional lapping is done, like on rotary Engis-Hyprez machines.
Keep in mind lapping here requires your compound held in a slurry medium, be it oil or water. Note however that some abrasive compounds sold are already in an engineered paste which do not require ANY added oil or liquid- and have the appropriate mix of particles and medium as a built-in design. Ask the vendor if such offered are these. Back to adding anything to your abrasive paste or compound, while this is getting wonky, I doubt it matters if you use a detergent or non-detergent oil (i.e., automotive oils are detergent and carry their pollutants in dispersion, meaning likely good for lapping, good since I guess it would help carry the abrasive consistently in it rather than letting it drop to the bottom of the film), gun oil, or WD-40. I just mix the powder or compound in a small plastic cup with some oil or WD-40, or just dab paste atop the lap and add oil (or spray WD-40) atop and begin.
In-use, add down pressure of but about 2 psi pressure. That’s not much. In general, if the item is heavy, just hold the sides of what you're lapping evenly for directional control. On this small a plate w small items, the item likely won’t even weigh a half-pound, but when you push down you introduce uneven pressures and wear. I’ve read 3psi and greater is considered hi-pressure which using hand methods likely will cause you to slag-wear and round the edges of whatever you’re lapping. I’m considering producing a holding fixture of sorts to adapt to round and rectilinear articles - a more professional way to hold your item and lap. If you press down hard, you'll abrade your item quicker, but you will also break down your abrasive faster and need to recharge your plate with your slurry more often. Use even pressure if doing so.
A thing about hand-lapping technique. Some theorize use figure 8's, others a circle or oval motion, some extend beyond the edge of the plate, and constantly reverse direction or shift the plate's directionals. Or all of these. One I've read makes sense that if you run circles or figure 8's, try to move the item lapped in a circular moton about itself, as well. This helps eliminate potential scratching grooving issues and makes for more even wear. I think it makes sense but it must be very difficult to manipulate your item circulalrly while doing figure 8's. That theory must be to emulate a proper lapping machine which runs items in their holders atop a circular plate, where the items are held around the circumference of the plate in holders as the plate spins underneath and the items themselves are spinning round likewise at the same time. This evenly spreads the action across all surfaces and at all the varying speeds you find at various circumferential locations when moving across the plate. I just don't happen to think it's very practical manually with one or two hands on a hand lapping plate!
About Honing Plates: I've seen thin low carbon steel honing plates for sale, most out of stock, which are said to be .005" flat. That's just not good enough if you can use a superior product. That flatness is a variance thicker than a sheet of paper. Further, the low carbon steel versions appear to be fly .They may not even be Blanchard ground which might get the tolerance down to a .001" variance - they certainly aren't surface ground.
Further, there are too many complaints about the Chinese and other make diamond Honing and sharpening plates - they sort of look like lapping or Honing plates, others not so much, and they sure are cheap, but the trouble is they lose their abrasive factor some after only several uses and quickly leave totally uneven contact surfaces. Not ideal and hard to say when it's given up unevenly.
* This plate at .0005" is 1/6th the thickness of a sheet of paper variance across the flat. Thick heavy 1" CAST IRON bar plate which does BOTH honing and lapping. This is not aerospace quality re cosmetics, I've left the sides as-cast.
A word about A36 Lappers and A36 "Flip-It" Plates - Normally you want a lap softer than the item you want lapped because some abrasive charge could embed in your item. A36 is a "soft" steel being low-carbon low measurable Rockwell C (so low as not on the C scale). Therefore, if lapping a steel using A36, you should be okay. If you check your item's Rc and it is "on the scale" then it should be harder than A36. If you're unsure, or for example you intend to lap brass or other metal that's soft like aluminum, just buy NON-EMBEDDING abrasive powder or a paste like a Garnet base version. Lookup non-embedding compounds online; many are sold via Amazon, Ebay, and McMaster-Carr.
Another word about cast iron and A36 Lappers and "Flip-It" Plates. These will tend to create a matte surface finish to your lapped item because of the "rolling action" of the abrasive slurry and compound between the two surfaces. It will not produce a faster abrading "cutting action" as may be the case in use of an aluminum lap, for example. This iis due to abrasive charging and embedding into the Aluminum which will then cut/abrade your item in the traditional sense. The more down pressure the more "cutting." With A36 and cast iron, as you use finer grits to 1200 and higher you will develop a shinier smoother finish but don't expect anything approaching a mirror finish. Expect your cosmetics to remain matte. If you lap steel, it will tend to a grey matte. Should you use a Silicone Carbide abrasive your finish will remain matter. Finish may not be indicative of flatness or smoothness. Matte grey can be as flat and smooth as a mirrored or shiny silver result.
Grey cast iron is the traditional material for lapping and even honing. Seek non-embedding abrasives (i.e., Garnet-base) if lapping items softer than cast iron. Those break down easily to become a polish which then break down further inertly. Then recharge your plate. With cast iron you are supposedly able to do Dry lapping where you charge the plate itself with dry abrasive or slightly wetted abrasive and maintain a fine film of naptha, mineral spirits, or kerosene on it and use the lap essentially like a stone to "cut" your item. I've always used mine using a Wet method slurry for a rolling action. You can just clean the lap and advance with a finer compound. If you embed your lap with a particular grit size, I believe you'll need to buy more laps for each grit - Coarse, or Rough, Fine, Extra Fine, etc. (or by size 120, 280, 500, 1,000...).
Clean faces prior to each use and before flipping it. Prior to advancing use of finer grits, recommend Carb Cleaner spray to forcefully remove abrasive slurry from cross cuts and surfaces to ensure no contamination remains.
Be sure to keep it oiled when not in use. Use motor oil, do not use WD-40 for storage.