For anyone engraving the old stuff, Engraving Historic Firearms by John C. Schippers (available on atFEGA.com and engraver.com websites and other places) is a great resource. It is full of photos of both original and reproduction engraved firearms and includes instruction on how many of the cuts...
Brother printers do NOT work. I haven't heard of a Canon or HP laser printer recently that will not work with acetone to transfer a design. Go to your local office supply store, have them print out a test page for the printers of interest to you, and try them. That way you will know that the one...
Don't be discouraged. That is a better cut and design than my first ones and I know that is the case for many others as well. It takes a while to get your muscle memory working to help keep the graver at the same angle, etc.
As to the design itself, take a look at the progression of scrolls--on...
You mentioned that you wished you had gotten the armored Zippo with the thicker metal. What was your issue with this one? Did the metal flex too much to get clean cuts? Did you take out the guts and insert a wooden or other type of filler to dampen vibration?
Not a big deal, but, if you do it again, think about making the bud larger and reshaping the first inside leaf to fill up a little more of that adjacent left lower background area. To my eye, the bud looks too small relative to the first inside leaf, which consequently looks too large. Enlarging...
I got lost trying to follow the scroll. It looks like you started at the lower right. Then you doubled back and upward twice from the inner side of the scroll. However, the second upward double-back scroll rolls around to intersect the primary initial scroll right where the initial scroll...
John, sorry to hear about the FEGA website woes. My site still isn't back up due to both it and my host being hacked months ago. My vote is to bring back the rack. Then all hackers (and robo-callers) can be drawn and quartered on the 6:00 pm news for all to see. The only problem with that is...
That sounds like a great idea for something short term, because it is easy, but it would go away when my Dropbox goes away (sometimes I think that I'm getting older by the minute). Something like this needs to stay available for everyone to use, which is why I put it up on this site. I hope that...
Andrew, would you elaborate on your last warning not to use oil? Does this apply only to sandpaper backed with a hard surface or to a stone as well? Why does oil help to dish out the inlay? Does water have the same issue?
Try using something that woodcarvers use to protect fingers. I suspect that you don't want to use a full carver's glove, but the protective tape also works well and can be used only on one or two fingers, if desired. Woodcraft.com has it...
Ah, the glories of using inkjets!
I assume you meant you had not been successful in keeping the head from drying out, not with making the transfer. Your suggestion is time consuming but very useful if the printer won't be used for a while.
If you meant that you are having trouble making the...
True, dries is a better term. Some of the industry info indicates that it is easy to clean up and get going again if it hasn't dried more than a month. After that, it tends to harden to a point that more rigorous cleaning is needed. It really isn't an issue if the printer is used frequently...
I am not sure that the larger tank changes the tendency to clog when not used enough. What it does is greatly reduce the cost of ink to a point where it is claimed to be less expensive to use than a laser printer. That means that I will use it several times a week instead of going weeks without...
The question of which inks work and which do not comes up often. To print on transparencies for transfer to metal, pigment inks are required; sublimation dye inks do not work. Many of the color inkjets use pigment black and dye colors, but all do not. Some use all dye and a very few use all...
Thanks for the kind words. Please feel free to share.
I am an engineer and I cannot stand to not know how things work. Sometimes things like this drive me crazy until I figure it out.
If you type the formula into an EXCEL spreadsheet, you can figure out the required rotation angle for parallel...
In a couple of recent posts, the subject of graver rotation angles needed to produce parallel heels has come up. A while ago, I worked out the angles and put them into tables. The required graver rotation angle is a function of face angle, included vee shape angle, and heel post angle. These...
60 decibels is considered to be like the sound of two people in normal conversation at a distance of 1 meter. Ask yourself if people talking in your studio room would disturb folks in another room. Also ask your self if someone coming up behind you and starting to talk would startle you...