Need about 500pcs of 6" steel discs made via die press

F150Motocrosser
Edited Date/Time 8/19/2017 11:28am
I need to have about 500pcs made of thin steel discs, approx 150mm in length, 25mm arbor hole, approx 1mm thick, as shown in the photo. This is a mounting plate for a felt wheel that's used for polishing in flat glass fabrication.

Any advice what kind of metal fab shop to contact about this? The one in my photo is made with a die press. I need to have some made just like it. The steel must be treated so it's anti-corrosive. The felt wheel uses a cerium oxide slurry to polish the glass, which is corrosive by nature. The surface treatment must still allow for the felt wheel to be bonded to it with a weather stripping adhesive.

Thanks in advance for any advice on going about this in the most cost effective manner.




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borg
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borg 8/19/2017 8:03am
8/19/2017 8:03am
Metal stamping. Be prepared to purchase a die. Kind of expensive for 500 pcs. Maybe find out where that one came from? That looks like a plain black oxide coating. What kind of machine does the disc mount to? You might be able to find somebody that stamps out stock blank disc sizes and thicknesses and drill the arbor yourself. Are these for your own use or are you trying to enter the market as a supplier?
Ebs
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Ebs 8/19/2017 10:25am
8/19/2017 10:25am
Do they need to be stamped if they're just flat plate?

Have you looked at the cost/quality comparison to having them waterjet, or laser, or plasma cut?
Idaho747
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Idaho747 8/19/2017 11:28am
8/19/2017 11:28am
Ebs wrote:
Do they need to be stamped if they're just flat plate? Have you looked at the cost/quality comparison to having them waterjet, or laser, or plasma...
Do they need to be stamped if they're just flat plate?

Have you looked at the cost/quality comparison to having them waterjet, or laser, or plasma cut?
The shop I work at had a laser cutter that could whip those out so fast. That is if they're flat.
MR. X
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MR. X 8/19/2017 12:06pm
8/19/2017 12:06pm
So 500 and never anymore ? There are ways to get your number of 500 by coming up with a couple jigs and a lathe. Certainly would be less expensive then having a tool built . I cant even imagine what a shop would charge you to build a die . That 1mm thickness is the shitty part ,you could easily build 2 seperate tool for hole location and the second hit for trimming . That 1 mm thickness requires some ass to get through ,i dedicated stamping press would be needed as opposed to you standing in your garage at night and just knocking out parts with an arbour press.

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F150Motocrosser 8/19/2017 2:26pm
8/19/2017 2:26pm
Thanks for the comments guys. Long story short here, I sell fabrication machinery and supplies to the flat glass industry. The felt wheel mounts to a motorized spindle in a polishing machine, to put a nice bright polish on the edge of your nice shower doors, table tops, etc. One of my larger accounts will start buying their felts from my company, but we have to supply the felts on pre-mounted backer plates like how our competitor does for them (obviously, my competition won't want to sell me the plates they use). My minimum order for this felt wheel from the manufacturer is 500pcs, which is approx 2 years inventory I'll be holding for my customer. The total number of mounting plates I'd want to invest in on the first run depends solely on the economies of scale.

My buddy who owns a metal fab company also suggested water jet; I've contacted his water jet guy and am awaiting a quote on Monday for 500pcs.

I have a feeling that blanks and doing the arbor/mounting holes in house will be much cheaper then having the fabricator do them, as someone mentioned. Probably need cost down around $3-$4 each for this to make sense. Is that a realistic target?
FlickitFlat
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FlickitFlat 8/19/2017 7:21pm
8/19/2017 7:21pm
Silly question, Can the backer plates that you supply them be recycled and used again? They don't wear out do they? Could you have them send the cores back and do a run of 100 and refurbish them with deliveries of 50 at a time?
Just a thought, but if you sell them 50 at a time, they will have to replenish almost every 2.5 months if 500 is a 2 year supply. have them sign a 2 year service agreement on the purchase of them and this will enable you to have unsolicited interaction with them. This is a good way to keep in contact with a customer and work sales account while you do your bi monthly orders.
F150Motocrosser 8/19/2017 8:37pm
8/19/2017 8:37pm Edited Date/Time 8/19/2017 8:38pm
FlickitFlat wrote:
Silly question, Can the backer plates that you supply them be recycled and used again? They don't wear out do they? Could you have them send...
Silly question, Can the backer plates that you supply them be recycled and used again? They don't wear out do they? Could you have them send the cores back and do a run of 100 and refurbish them with deliveries of 50 at a time?
Just a thought, but if you sell them 50 at a time, they will have to replenish almost every 2.5 months if 500 is a 2 year supply. have them sign a 2 year service agreement on the purchase of them and this will enable you to have unsolicited interaction with them. This is a good way to keep in contact with a customer and work sales account while you do your bi monthly orders.
This crossed my mind regarding reusing the mounting plates, but that creates even more busy work (saving/shipping back old ones, scraping and cleaning them etc) not to mention the increased cost from smaller production runs. My customer currently commits to the 500pcs from my competitor via blanket orders, but honestly my relationship with this customer is strong enough that we have a gentleman agreement that they won't stick us with the inventory. We're they're primary vendor already; plus they have a couple million invested in our machinery, so I've got a strong relationship there on both professional and personal levels. Just want to diminish my price dropping whore of a competitor's presence even further at this account lol
Jack_Wagon
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Jack_Wagon 8/19/2017 10:04pm
8/19/2017 10:04pm
EDM? Dean at Tricon Tool McDonough, GA (770)787-1002
ns503
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ns503 8/20/2017 6:33am
8/20/2017 6:33am
Seems a bit odd to me that the felt wheel manufacturer doesn't have a disc to go with their wheels?
ToolMaker
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ToolMaker 8/22/2017 8:08pm
8/22/2017 8:08pm Edited Date/Time 8/22/2017 8:13pm
F150Motocrosser wrote:
Thanks for the comments guys. Long story short here, I sell fabrication machinery and supplies to the flat glass industry. The felt wheel mounts to a...
Thanks for the comments guys. Long story short here, I sell fabrication machinery and supplies to the flat glass industry. The felt wheel mounts to a motorized spindle in a polishing machine, to put a nice bright polish on the edge of your nice shower doors, table tops, etc. One of my larger accounts will start buying their felts from my company, but we have to supply the felts on pre-mounted backer plates like how our competitor does for them (obviously, my competition won't want to sell me the plates they use). My minimum order for this felt wheel from the manufacturer is 500pcs, which is approx 2 years inventory I'll be holding for my customer. The total number of mounting plates I'd want to invest in on the first run depends solely on the economies of scale.

My buddy who owns a metal fab company also suggested water jet; I've contacted his water jet guy and am awaiting a quote on Monday for 500pcs.

I have a feeling that blanks and doing the arbor/mounting holes in house will be much cheaper then having the fabricator do them, as someone mentioned. Probably need cost down around $3-$4 each for this to make sense. Is that a realistic target?
We have a waterjet, we could quote it for you.
Any good reason to not just use Stainless and forget
surface treatment?
TM
F150Motocrosser 8/24/2017 6:30am
8/24/2017 6:30am
ToolMaker wrote:
We have a waterjet, we could quote it for you.
Any good reason to not just use Stainless and forget
surface treatment?
TM
ToolMaker, thanks for the response - Can you send me an email so I can send over some other pics with specs for you to quote from? My email is blake@degorter.com. I really, really appreciate your offer to quote this. Don't want to waste your time, so we'll try to figure out quickly if this is worth pursuing..

Funny you bring up Stainless. Yesterday I was talking with the shop that is currently working on quoting this, and the guy made the same comment. He was going to contact his metal suppliers and see if he could find an 18g steel that was already pre-treated.... but he seemed to feel like they'd likely have to buy untreated steel, make the 6" discs, then send them back out to for treatment.

As long as stainless doesn't become cost prohibitive to the project, I'm all for whatever works best and is within the required budget. Thanks again!
borg
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borg 8/24/2017 7:32am
8/24/2017 7:32am
My guess is that they use a surface treatment because plain, uncoated steel will rust in any environment. It's probably not the cerium oxide.

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