Peter Dow
17th June 2005, 06:11 AM
Corrugated (or fluted) steel strips: Where to buy? How to make?
Can you help?
http://img206.echo.cx/img206/3207/corrugatedsteelstrips1hq.jpg
Thanks to ImageShack for Free Image Hosting (http://www.imageshack.us)
The above photograph shows two examples of something similar to (but not exactly) what I am looking to source or make - on the left is a strip of tin-plated mild steel cut from the corrugated part of a tin can, and on the right a stainless steel pastry cutter constructed in part with a piece of corrugated steel strip.
Now, if you start from a sheet of pre-corrugated steel and cut that into strips to suit, wouldn’t the cutting procedure squash the corrugations, particularly if the corrugations were jagged
(/\/\/\/\/\/\/\-shaped) as opposed to gently undulating
(~~~~~~~~-shaped)? In which case, is it better to cut flat sheet into strips and then corrugate the strips using some kind of machine or tool, made or adapted for the purpose?
Also I am wondering who would have a machine to corrugate thin strips of the order of a couple of centimetres wide? Could a jeweller’s rolling mill be adapted with special rollers to do it?
If I could get it made to order, I’d maybe be looking at buying, first of all, 2cm wide strips, made from 0.5 mm thick stainless steel strips and having
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\-shaped corrugations maybe 2, 3 or 4 mm apart ridge-to-adjacent-ridge.
But might it not be easier and cheaper if I can buy something like that ready-made from a supplier? But from whom?
Or if I can afford to buy the tools to make it myself, I’ll do that. However, the industrial corrugating machines I’ve seen advertised on the web are designed for corrugating wide sheets and are way too big and expensive for me to buy.
Anyway, I guess this is a fairly obscure fabrication, so I’m stuck as to who I should even ask about it. I tried the local B&Q hardware super-store but the stamped or perforated sheet-metal they sold was everything but a simple corrugation.
(Corrugated paper is easy to source, corrugated steel, not so easy it seems.)
The local tool merchants, didn’t have a clue how to begin to make it. Simply bashing out the corrugations with a hand-chisel and mallet isn’t ideal. I’m looking for a faster and more repeatable method than that. I am thinking that rolling strips through two suitably exposed intermeshing gear wheels might be possible?
One way or another, can you make a helpful suggestion?
Peter Dow,
Aberdeen, Scotland
Can you help?
http://img206.echo.cx/img206/3207/corrugatedsteelstrips1hq.jpg
Thanks to ImageShack for Free Image Hosting (http://www.imageshack.us)
The above photograph shows two examples of something similar to (but not exactly) what I am looking to source or make - on the left is a strip of tin-plated mild steel cut from the corrugated part of a tin can, and on the right a stainless steel pastry cutter constructed in part with a piece of corrugated steel strip.
Now, if you start from a sheet of pre-corrugated steel and cut that into strips to suit, wouldn’t the cutting procedure squash the corrugations, particularly if the corrugations were jagged
(/\/\/\/\/\/\/\-shaped) as opposed to gently undulating
(~~~~~~~~-shaped)? In which case, is it better to cut flat sheet into strips and then corrugate the strips using some kind of machine or tool, made or adapted for the purpose?
Also I am wondering who would have a machine to corrugate thin strips of the order of a couple of centimetres wide? Could a jeweller’s rolling mill be adapted with special rollers to do it?
If I could get it made to order, I’d maybe be looking at buying, first of all, 2cm wide strips, made from 0.5 mm thick stainless steel strips and having
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\-shaped corrugations maybe 2, 3 or 4 mm apart ridge-to-adjacent-ridge.
But might it not be easier and cheaper if I can buy something like that ready-made from a supplier? But from whom?
Or if I can afford to buy the tools to make it myself, I’ll do that. However, the industrial corrugating machines I’ve seen advertised on the web are designed for corrugating wide sheets and are way too big and expensive for me to buy.
Anyway, I guess this is a fairly obscure fabrication, so I’m stuck as to who I should even ask about it. I tried the local B&Q hardware super-store but the stamped or perforated sheet-metal they sold was everything but a simple corrugation.
(Corrugated paper is easy to source, corrugated steel, not so easy it seems.)
The local tool merchants, didn’t have a clue how to begin to make it. Simply bashing out the corrugations with a hand-chisel and mallet isn’t ideal. I’m looking for a faster and more repeatable method than that. I am thinking that rolling strips through two suitably exposed intermeshing gear wheels might be possible?
One way or another, can you make a helpful suggestion?
Peter Dow,
Aberdeen, Scotland