Where to get something machined?

NOMADIC

NOMADIC

Major Contributor
I know of emachineshop.com, and they are great, but there prices are a bit odd for somethings.... A basic 5"x5" 1/4" thick piece of steel is 150 bucks....


Does anyone know of some good machine shops in so. california? or ones easy to work with online?

I am making a VERY basic design...

thanks
-matt
 
You can try OnlineMetals.com. I priced a piece of 5x5x.25 hot rolled steel plate at $4.25. It's a bare piece of steel, unfinished, but I'm not sure what sort of additional work you would need. If you need more than that, your best bet is to just do a local search in your area. I've found that most machine shops that have a decent online presence are looking for more substantial work.
 
You want to go to the shops that can still do things manually. The ones that have mostly CNC machines will charge big bucks for tooling and setup and that's really only effective for large manufacturing runs. Go down the listings in the yellow pages and call each one and ask if they do hand fabrication or all automated. If by hand, you can ask them for a quote. You'd be wasting your time with the automated ones.
 
Try local community colleges and trade schools. They sometimes take on projects to provide their students with training. Unfortunaly high schools have all but shut down "shop" classes and have turned in to college prep mills.
Richard is spot on about CNC machine shops. What your looking for is a small one or two man shop with a couple of crusty old farts who may sound gruff but have hearts of gold. lol
 
Good question,
Anyone know of a shop in Los Angeles with a coulple of OLD Gruffs with a heart of Gold?
TIA
 
Every machinist charges different rates, most of the guys that have a good reputation charge more. The machinist I'm kind of apprenticing under fabricates all of the stuff for Hitachi medical. He charges anywhere from $50.00 - $250.00 an hour, but you get what you pay for. Don't forget that steel is a much harder material and takes more time and passes to mill.

What exactly are you trying to make?
 
Chuck,

A couple of years ago, I tried to do what you said but it was really tough to find a school that would take on outside projects in Houston. That really is the way to go if you can find one though.

Another thing to ponder about all this is that you really have two levels of shop here:

- metal fabrication
- machine shop

They aren't necessarily the same functions. A metal fabrication shop typically fabricates thin sheet metal into a "something" that a customer wants using breaks, punches and shears.

A machine shop usually works with lathes and other tools to form and sculpt large hunks of metal into something. If you're dealing with a 1/4" thick sheet of metal, that may indeed fall into the machine shop category for sure. A sheet metal fabrication shop may be able to do little with a thick piece of metal like that.
 
yeah... I was just throwing the 5x5 steel thing out there as an example... I am actually building a complete enclosure unit with a 35mm (actually 70mm) adapter, and XLR, rca, and all the other inputs/outputs for an HV20...so basically you just have to put your lenses on a go....

I used to work in a machine shop, so designing it isn't a problem, its finding a place to get it done,


---- oh, and no, I can't get it machined where I used to work....I used to date the owners daughter... yeah, that dident work out too well. ----


*** I just signed up for the adult ed. machine/tooling classes this summer!
 
that sucks about not being able to use that shop any more. I hope she was worth it.

So nomadic, can you be more clear on what you are trying to accomplish. As I understand it, its a camera inside a box. the box would have all the outputs the camera provides and also an attachment for 70mm lenses and the proper ground glass to project their images so that the HV20 can record that? did I get it right?
 
correct... it's sorta like what someone else was talking about one of the other posts about why panasonic should just make basically an hvx with 35mm adapter all in one, a nice clean, tight package. So you dont have to move around with a bazooka.

Thats what I am attempting. I think the hv20 isn't a bad choice to build one with because after seeing that brevis footage... man, I am sold.

I'm brew'n up some wax right now making some gg for the unit.
 
sounds like a cool endeavour.

Good luck with that.

keep us posted.
Also if you do find a good shop, let us know as well. I'd really like something close that was not super expensive, but we'll see if I can find one, one of these days.
 
yeah. I'm going to ask my roommate. He designs the eletronics that go in CNC machines, so I'm sure he's gotta be buddy buddy with some machine shops on LA/OC
 
your roommate ahh. Find out if he can get his hands on a cheap cnc tabletop machine. I've been looking for one, and I've found some stuff under $2500, but if he knows someone who is selling them, maybe I can get one cheaper. Then you can come over and use it some to get your parts built.
 
i too am in orange county looking to get some machine work done. nomadic, i sent you a pm. that would be awesome to get some work done together.
 
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