Hi all,
I had a request for brass came panel, but I have never done a panel before, and I would have the following questions:
How do I cut the came?
How do I bend it to contour each glass piece.
I guess it is much longer to make a panel than with lead.
How much higher price shall I charge compared to a lead came panel? In percentage, please.
Any additional tips would be greatly appreciated.
thanks
Marc
Brass will destroy any teeth on a sawblade. You will have to use a fiber abrasive blade. The thin abrasive blade for the Gryphon came saw works as well as anything I've ever used. There is a fiber blade for the Dremel that will work, but they don't last too long. It will take you 45 seconds to a minute per cut, vs. 2 or 3 seconds with some nippers cutting the lead. And the brass gets hot to the touch while cutting it, sometimes hot enough to discolor..
It's damn difficult. I have used the brass-clad lead came, but even that is tough to bend. Do you have a came bender?
Much! And don't forget you will have to paint each solder joint to match the brass. Use a gold paint-pen you can get in any hobby shop.
I built 16 windows for a church about a year ago, using brass. I wouldn't do it again for twice the money.
Brass costs 3 or 4 times the price of lead, and your labor is easily twice as much time. If I were pricing the design in lead at $80 per sq ft, I personally would price the same design at $200 in brass. (Unless I was flat out of something to do and needed the work, then I might reconsider.) So,
150 to 200% wouldn't be out of the question.
Talk them into something else? ;>) Did I make it clear that I don't like working with brass?
All of the above tips from Moonraker, I agree, BUT there is always that customer that "wants it, and will pay for it." SO.... here is a thought or two.
Put a small vacuum on or near the table, the "grit" from cutting the brass will scratch your glass, (makes a mess of bevels, on the face too!) and use it frequently.
Look up a company called ENKAY, their abrasive cutoff wheels that fit in a Dremel are much, much better than dremels, also look at Harbor Freights, Rotary tool. It is a bit longer than a Dremel brand but it stays in balance very nicely and costs only $30, $20 when on sale.
The thought of annealing the brass to bend curves came upon me when I built a very curvy panel in copper H came last spring, haven't tried it in brass, but it should clean up the same way. Heat the brass from one end to the other to a temp just under cherry orange, keep that heat spot moving along the length of the piece until you reach the other end. Good pliers are a must, cotton gloves help too. Let the metal cool on its own, no quenching, it will bend and twist as you are heating it, (I usually do 1/2 length pieces) . Once its cool it will be a darker color, but in the copper, that cleaned up nicely with whiting when I cemented the panel, tried a green scrub pad on it before I built the panel and it took alot off then. Color was back to where I started when I was done. This was with copper came, so it should work with brass the same way, but I haven't tried it. Do a small test panel before committing to a larger one.
This annealing thing doesn't seem to be all that well used, given the number of benders on the market, but if you have a piece of H brass laying around fire up a torch and try it, and no, I haven't tried it in the kiln....yet.
What Javahut says about copper annealing is quite true. Annealing is a common practise to soften copper. I have worked as a welder for 33 years and what you are suggesting for brass may not work. One of the properties of brass, when heated, is that it becomes very brittle at a certain temperature range.This is called it's "hot short temperature". Right of the top of my head I think it is in the 400 to 500 degree F range. If you so much as drop it at that temperature it will shatter. Whenever I found it necessary to form brass, in my working days, it was always done cold with hydraulic or mechanical benders. If you do use heat and it discolours it will polish right up again with steel wool.
Daymon
Damon! Just the guy I want to talk to, If you haven't done the brass, then I need to try it, will do it today and report back.
The reason is, I bend alot of glass for lamps. Some have a piece of "u" brass all around the edge, and alot of those are "serpentine" bends, so there are 3 separate bends going on, with the brass wrapped around the edge of all those bends, and this means the u brass is bending "counter" to its form. The heart isn't designed to bend that way. I have annealed 1/8" brass u, but always kept it dark, never tried to polish it back.
When I anneal brass, I take it to a temp that just shows a "rainbow" on the metal, a few practice tries and one will know the temp, if not enough heat, it doesn't bend, if too much heat, it falls apart. I haven't tried this with the "H" came, but I will now. What is brass besides copper and zinc? Zinc can't handle this, and copper will at a different temp, sooooo.??
kiln....yet.
Well, coming from another direction, brass anneals very nicely although there may be a temperature range in which it is "short" and fragile. Instructions for working brass in metal working books make it clear that it work hardens and must be annealed and that is exactly my experience. I have been hammering brass sheet and forming bowls and other shapes and after a while the stiffness can be felt. I have heated with torch and built a small insulating castable "hole" [
I knew you'd suggest annealing. But that adds a lot of time to the project, too. I'd rather french-kiss a rattlesnake than work with brass, unless it is something simple, and all straight lines. I'd do a FLWright type design in brass, but the first curved piece would call a halt to me working on it. Noooooo thankya.
Harbor Freight has a flexible shaft tool with a foot control that I looked at. I think it was 1/3hp motor and had a 48" shaft that would take the Dremel type bits. I just bought a Black and Decker hand grinder like the Dremel. I wear out a Dremel in just a couple of months. The front bearings in a Dremel are a joke. The BD is quieter than a Dremel, so far. We shall see how long it lasts.
The brass came, as it comes out of the box, IS work hardened by virtue of it's extrusion into it's HR shape. I've never been very successful in cutting brass by hand (or with a chop saw) with anything that has a toothed blade. Only thing that I've ever had success with is the thin fiber abrasive blades/wheels. I have even used the small thin diamond wheels from Harbor Freight in a Dremel, and the brass will just destroy the diamond wheels in a matter of a few cuts. Soft, sheet brass like you buy in a hobby shop is not nearly as tough to cut as is formed came. You can cut that stuff with scissors.
look at
Hi Javahut,
There are many different grades of brass. Some of the other common elements in brass are silicon and alumnium. Aluminium bronze is quite hard and ridgid and is used in a lot of bushings. Silicon bronze is extruded into tubing and other structural shapes. I am just a novice in the stainglass field and have never used brass came. I have no idea what it's compisition is. As Mike said the came is workhardened in the extruding process. I do know that rolled sheet brass is very soft and mallable but once it is formed it becomes hard very fast. If you bend it 90 degrees you cannot flatten it out again without heating (annealing) or it will crack.
Daym> Damon!
I've tried and gone through Dremels, Ryobi,Craftsman,B & D Wizards. My B & D RTX (I think) is starting to go, but it's still my favorite to date. The problem with all these tools is that the air intake (cooling) is in the front of the tool near the bits and all the crap that you cut and grind gets sucked into the motor.
Whichever tool you use, be sure and get the little bushings that go between the motor shaft and the drive shaft, those wear quite quickly if you use it much at all, and it is a 50 cent part.
the foredom has the motor about 2' away from the cutting head
I missed the other responses Java, but when I need to do those lamp bend brass borders, I use the soft brass came. Works 100% better.
Greetings:
Anyone know a source of brass 1/2" X 1/2"angle or even copper? I've searched the web and while angle can be bent there is nothing like the crisp edge of mill rolled angle.
While I am not experienced in stained glass, I am experience in cutting metal. Brass, in _any_ form, will be no match for a good hacksaw blade. My personal favorite is the Lennox Hackmaster II. And there are 'close quarter hacksaw handles' which allow one handed operation of a hacksaw blade.
Abrasive cutting of soft metals such as brass and aluminum is not recommended. These metals tend to clog abrasive wheels, which then no longer cut, they just produce friction. That may be why the brass is getting hot enough to discolor. And the risk of scratches on the glass that someone spoke of were probably not from the brass chips, but the abrasives from the cutting wheel.
I doubt the diamond wheel was destroyed by the brass...more than likely just clogged up with it.
Good info. The diamond wheel can be dressed with a silicon carbide bar.
I'm experienced in stained glass. And cutting the metals that go with that art/craft. Maybe you ought to be listening to those who actually have some hands-on experience?
Brass, in _any_ form, will be no match for a good hacksaw blade. My
Let's see you build 16 windows out of brass with about 900 individual miter cuts in each window and do it with a hacksaw.
These metals tend to clog abrasive wheels, which then no
Maybe...
How 'bout I just post a picture of the wheel and you can see for your self? If I say it was destroyed, who are you to tell me you doubt it? Are you metallurgically clairvoyant?
Aw, jeez. I shoulda known. Lemme guess..."I've been doing this for ??? years and I know all there is to know about..."
I thought we could all share ideas in a reasonable, adult discussion on this (that's what the internet is for, right?). But if you insist...
I have plenty of hands on experience...cutting metal. Red brass, yellow brass, bronze, oil impregnated bronze, steel, cast iron, aluminum, stainless. Then wood, teflon, nylon, and plexiglass, just for funsies (plexiglass shavings make the best artificial snow...). You think your damned old brass came is something special? Has magical hardness properties that no other brass has? Nope. Send me 6" of the stuff and I'll show you 6 ways to cut it.
If the few swipes it would take to cut the stuff with a hacksaw is too much for you, I'm sure there is something that will fit in a Dremel and give decent results. The trick is finding the right rotating speed for the cutter being used. You can burn up almost any cutter in any material if you turn it too fast.
There is no 'Maybe' to it. Walk into any machine shop and ask to use their grinders on brass. If they don't refuse you outright, they will insist that you re-face the wheel when you are done, to remove the material that clogged up the wheel.
And as far as the scratches on the glass, grinding wheels and disks are expendable devices...they work by disintegrating...it's the nature of the beast. When they do their job, they leave grit everywhere. Very hard grit. Much harder than brass and much more likely to scratch glass.
No, but it doesn't take Carnac the Magnificent to know that a diamond (one of the hardest materials known to man) is not going to be 'destroyed' by brass (one of the softest metals known to man). Post the pics. Would love to see em. If it is that bad off, all I can figure is you got the thing so damn hot that whatever adhesive they used gave up and all the diamonds fell off. Besides, there's this 'free country' thing...I can doubt anything I want. So there.
So, Mr Expert. You can sit around all day and burn up grinding wheels from hell till breakfast for all I care. Just trying to share a little useful information from one craft to another. Maybe somebody who's willing to listen, discuss, and experiment can find an easy way to cut this stuff, and take all those nasty old brass came jobs away so you won't have to stress out about them any more.
And if there is somebody who would be willing to send me a foot or two of the stuff, I'd be glad to play around with cutting it and see what I can come up with.
-- Bill Browne Computer for work
I agree with most of what you say here. However, hand cutting with a hack saw would tend to be tedious on a large project. Could you identify a circular blade with the same properties and a thin kerf that would do the job? I only wish that there was a small saw with a slower speed. The abrasive saws all turn too fast in my opinion to use the toothed blades. I would think only a few hundred RPM on a 6-8" saw would do the trick. What say you?
G^2
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