Suggestions for friend who wants to "engrave" on short railroad track sections ?

Suggestions for friend who wants to "engrave" on short railroad track sections ?

This guy actually has a decent size fabrication business but he knows little of CNC milling or pantographs. The local railroad tracks were taken up recently (for future "greenway" path) and somehow he got alot of the rails, so now he has the idea to cut them up in 1 or 2 foot sections and engrave something "historical" on each one (year and location and ?) and sell them. He apparently would be engraving or milling on a flat area.

So, he thinks he wants a cheap CNC mill...what do you think ? I told him he should just sub them out, but he's the type that had rather do them in house. So what would be the cheapest way out for some "production" on these things for a relative newbie who probably knows nothing about repairing electronics and is many hours away from anyone that does ?

I'm thinking Tormach for a newbie no fuss, no muss situation here....since any $5,000 used CNC mill is going to be subject to steep learning curve and breakdowns that would be no big deal for me, but a disaster for him. What say ye ?

High RPM is more important than rigidity, a low cost mill will probably compromise the opposite way. Perhaps a cnc router, or a dedicated engraving machine? I know nothing of either of those, so can't comment further on them, but I'm betting you know the routers. A cnc mill should have an electric or air spindle attached to turn an engraver at the proper rpm, unless he's using a large diameter cutting tool to engrave with, that's why I'm thinking a router would be a better fit.

Mud said:

High RPM is more important than rigidity, a low cost mill will probably compromise the opposite way. Perhaps a cnc router, or a dedicated engraving machine? I know nothing of either of those, so can't comment further on them, but I'm betting you know the routers. A cnc mill should have an electric or air spindle attached to turn an engraver at the proper rpm, unless he's using a large diameter cutting tool to engrave with, that's why I'm thinking a router would be a better fit.

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I'm not sure, but had the impression he actually wanted to mill out a "relief" situation...kind of like the appearance of a wood sandblasted signs, or laser designs... except in metal. That would certainly look more impressive than standard engraving anyway. But if standard engraving is really all he wants, then a cheap small stepper motor CNC router might be ok indeed.

he can actually engrave right on the curved surface if he runs a spring loaded 2L inc. engraving tool. I have no connection with 2L but have put a lot of hours on them things. If he mills a flat spot he can use a rigid tool. By "something historical" he is talking text or something more like logos/ photos/art? Logos photos and art take a lot more work and software than plain old text....

A contact cemented ruber template followed by a blast should give the desired affect

The way gravestones are ''engraved''

RR rail is likely to be difficult to machine (mill or engrave).

It is very cheap to have a brass or aluminum plate engraved by a specialist with a CNC engraver and cement it on the rail. Example: Engraved Plate art-trophy-Taxidermy 1"x 3" Silver alumi | eBay At that kind of price, why buy a CNC machine? You can get a pantograph for a few hundred bucks, but it gets old doing a lot of plates that way.

I have seen neat-looking souvenir rail where it was sliced thin crosswise and mounted on wood with a brass plate below it. A foot or two of full size rail would make a door stop, I guess, but rather heavy for a desk ornament or paperweight.

Larry

Engraving machines are made for plastic. The fake woodgrain, or the black stuff with the white layer inside. A New Hermes or similar will NOT do hardened railroad rail. And all railroad rails get work hardened- those things are really hard for the first ten thousandths or so.
A pantograph engraver, like a Gorton, also is pretty light duty for this kind of steel. I have a Gorton, and its great for plastic and aluminum, but its no VMC.
I think you need to go to a real milling machine for this. I suppose you could get away with a 2 axis CNC, like a Bridgeport style un-enclosed mill.

Other options to consider-

Acid etching.

Hot stamping- you said the guy is a fab shop- does he have a forge and a hydraulic press?
Heat em up, make a die holder for letter stamps, and hot stamp em.

Mr. Vanice makes a good point; that stuff is heavy.

Perhaps the idea guy should heft a foot or two of rail, and get an idea how heavy it is, before making any further business plans.

Ries said:

. A New Hermes or similar will NOT do hardened railroad rail. And all railroad rails get work hardened- those things are really hard for the first ten thousandths or so.

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That's the first thing that popped into my mind, so I asked him and he said he did some experiments and it drilled the same as 1018. If it matters, this rail was used very little in comparison to normal rail transport. The track was only for access to the port at Port Royal, SC where a train would travel maybe once a week for forty years or so...and even then at very slow speed.

Hum......
1 or 2 foot sections??

I'd go with 1/4" 'sections' that lay down on a desk and engrave on the 'face' or profile section of the rail.
I thought the top of the rail head was flame hardned for wear resistance.
Plus.......it goes a LOT farther at the shorter lenghts!

dk

There actually is a company near me that makes grinding wheels and abrasive cutoff wheels, and they slice 1" thick slices of railroad rail to test blades every so often- they look like slices of bread, only, well, railroad rail shaped. This is a good idea DKMC has- you can still totally tell that they are railroad rail, but they are manageable in size and weight, about 5" x 8", and the interior is going to engrave better than an outside surface.
But I still say, its going to take a real CNC mill to do this.

(Somebody once told me they were going to bring me a whole barrel of these, but they never showed up- I just have one kicking around the shop.)

RR Rail Bookends

Years ago, I saw an advertisement for RR rail bookends that were both attractive and practical. (At least if you had heavy-duty bookshelves!)

The item consisted of a cleaned RR tie plate cut neatly in half. There was a section of RR rail cut to the length of half a tie plate. The rail and the half tie plate were on a wooden base, simulating the RR tie. The square spike holes in the tie plate had cut-off RR spike heads in them. This gave the impression that the rail was spiked to the bookshelf, which of course it was not.

The edges were deburred. The bottom of the wooden base was covered with heavy white felt, as was one end of each rail section. (The books would rest against white felt.)

This is labor-intensive, for sure, The rail, tie plate, and spike heads have to be blasted clean and then there is a lot of cutting and deburring to perform. But the result looked cool. I saw that ad in the 1970's - don't remember the price, but it was not something I could afford with the proceeds of my paper route !

I've seen a similar pair of book ends which were a "government job" at bolt maker Russell, Birdsall & Ward. Those were short sections of heavy structural angle with four lopped-off bolt heads that made it appear that the bookend was bolted to the shelf with huge bolts.

John Ruth

Heavey Metal said:

A contact cemented ruber template followed by a blast should give the desired affect

The way gravestones are ''engraved''

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You can cut sandblast stencil on a medium duty vinyl cutter, ie all but the cheapest of cutters. The mask is self adhesive and can be used many times, subject to not tearing on removal, which depends on the design and operator removal skill.

This opens the opportunity for custom designs.

Most rail track is flame hardened on top, you need fair cut and rigidity to remove metal.

I wonder if you could modify a CNC plasma profile cutter to run a MIG wire feeder and write the text in weld (stainless steel text?), then surface grind the top of the letters, probably too hard to get the text below a certain size though. What about a high power laser engraver?.

My father had a book about a narrow gauge railroad. It came with a say one inch thick rail section. Small rail maybe four inches high. I can still remember it was stamped on the sawn face "Bridgton and Saco River Railroad". would make a good paper weight. So I guess it was a good marketing scheme. Of course you had to buy the book to get the rail so not sure if it was really good for business, not many repeat sales I would think.
Bill D.

PS: I did not remember the spelling exactly so looked it up, here is the link.

Bridgton and Saco River Railroad - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia