Highly Textured Finish | Problem Solving | Forum

buy textured stainless steel from Rigidized.

http://www.rigidized.com/

Texturing mild steel plate, and expecting it to be flat when you are done, is crazy.

I have a neighbor who has a set of rolls that will do 12' of 1 1/4" plate, and even that wont get a 40" sheet of 1/8" flat again.

Theoretically, you could have it shot blasted- done that, and it warps the hell out of the plate.
Or you could actually hot texture the entire 40" square, by heating a few square inches at a time with a rosebud, and either manually or with a power hammer, beating on it using a die.
But dont expect that to be anywhere near flat.

You could grind it in fancy patterns by hand with a grinder, I suppose- but if you dont do the same thing to both sides of a sheet, it will warp.

(starting to see a trend here?)

The best way to texture sheet or plate is to roll it, in ginormous rolls with machined texturing rolls. Or buy it already textured.
Diamond plate?

Bart Turner mentioned at the Conference that he has flattened largish sections of thin plate in his glass annealing oven. He places weights on the bumped up areas, does a heat cycle, and the work comes out flat, or nearly so. You might talk to him to see if your project might take advantage of his technique and equipment.

the problem with rust finishes is that once you get em started, they tend to have a mind of their own.
some people use alkaline washes to neutralize the rust, which supposedly works- but I am dubious that the piece wont just keep on rusting indefinitely.
if you use thick enough plate, I guess the lifespan of the steel will be longer than the lifespan of the owner, and that could work.
But no clear coat I have ever seen stops rust for very long.

Deep etching is going to require a resist- they used to use this stuff called "asphaltum", which was just like it sounds- and then a tank of acid to do some serious etching in a reasonable time frame- the really great outdoor rust etched finishes sometimes take 40 years or more, if you just go "au natural".

There are resists for circuit board etching. They should work.

Also, there is plasma etching- I have done this sometimes- you just turn down the amps, and the torch only cuts part way thru- but I use it with my x-y machine, which can follow predrawn designs, and that also controls depth of cut, so the etch is consistent.

Or mechanical etching- with a grinder, a chisel, or even a milling machine.

But if you want to remove significant amounts of metal, its work, no matter what tool you use.