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Welcome to www.Loco-Plates.co.uk
Loco-Plates.co.uk offer a personal and bespoke service, we specialise in engraved nameplates but also produce loco parts for 16mm and G Scale locos and rolling stock. Nameplates are CNC Engraved or Milled.
What's the difference between an etched plate and a CNC machined plate?
Traditionally many of the smaller scale model railways utilise small photo etched plates, the plate is treated with an etch resist, and then chemically etched in Ferric Chloride in order to produce the design. Our plates are physically machined on a CNC (Computer Numerically Controlled) mill. This mill can produce plates with a much deeper relief, also producing a slight bevel to the raised lettering which is typical as the real life plates are sand cast and have a small draught angle on the raised lettering in order to remove the casting pattern from the sand.
16mm scale nameplates are machined from 0.7mm Brass. Nameplates in the larger scales, 7/8" or 3/8" scales can be machined from 1.2mm Brass or 1.6mm Brass as required.
In the larger scales such as 7/8":ft and 3/8":ft a thicker gauge of Brass can be used which makes much more of a feature of the plates as they can be produced in a scale thickness. In 7/8":ft, a 1.6mm plate would equate to a 12mm or 1/2" thick brass plate on the actual prototype. Also mounting holes can be provided, and 14BA round head machine screws used to bolt the plates to your locomotive, for a pleasing scale effect.
As well as producing plates to a standard design, we can also replicate an existing plate, or create a plate to your own requirements from a drawing or photograph.
How are these plates made?
Step 1
CAD Drawing of Plate |
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Firstly a vector drawing is required, on a computer a photograph is composed of thousands of dots or pixels, a vector drawing rather than being composed of pixels is a precise drawing. This drawing is used so the CNC mill can trace out the design as it machines it from brass sheet. |
A photograph or Bitmap image cannot be used directly. If you can provide a photograph, we will convert this into a vector image or CAD drawing.
We try to accommodate our customers needs and will happily create a plate to your own design or specifications. |
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Step 2
Tool paths added |
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Lets colour it in!
Once the drawing is ready it's time to colour it in! The CNC machine uses various colours for different tools and for the various cutting depths required to produce the finished nameplate. |
In the example above, the blue areas will be engraved to a depth of 0.4mm, the red dots indicate the hole centers for 1mm mounting holes which will be drilled, the orange line around the edge will be cut with a small slot drill. There's also a green outline around the edge (hidden underneath the orange layer) in this layer the brass will be machined through onto a sacrificial bed made from Nyloil (Oil impregnated Nylon) mounted to the table of the machine, a couple of "leave tags" are left on the part to keep them attached to the sheet.
This is particularly important if very small parts are machined, as they can otherwise hide themselves in a pile of Brass swarf!
The brass sheet is fixed to the table of the machine with heavy duty double sided tape to hold it flat, machined Aluminium hold down clamps and jigs. Once the plate is fixed down it's time to start making some swarf! |
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Step 3
The Finished Plate |
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Once the sheet has been engraved, holes drilled and the parts cut out, a small amount of hand finishing is required to remove any leave tags or small burrs from the edges. |
The plates are then degreased, and treated with a chemical surface cleaner which removes any tarnish prior to painting, if the plates are to be painted 'Satin Black' they are now chemically blackened prior to being sprayed with Enamel.
Once the paint has hardened the plates are then polished to remove the paint finish from the raised lettering.
That's it just have to pack the finished items and get them in the mail! |
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Step 4
One last thing - lets see how they look fitted to the locomotive! |
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