A question of tooling?

[Triton]

Okay, forgive me if this is really a doofus question but here goes, but first a little explanation.

I use a lot of buckles in my hobby business, these buckles are mostly imported so as you can imagine they are a bit expensive. The ones I have been buying are cast bronze and very nice however.

Lately I've been wondering if I couldn't machine my own buckles. A bench top milling machine doesn't seem to be all that expensive, but I'm left wondering if I mill out a buckle blank, how would I go about rounding the edges that are left behind. Is there some tool for this? As I said it's a fairly rudimentary question.

The other thought I had is that I should get into wax carving and creating molds myself... but in that case I need a foundry that would do very limited runs since I don't really want to mess with liquid bronze myself. Thoughts on such a foundry?

Thanks for your time.

 

[Will Leavitt]

Here's a link to the guys that know everything about backyard foundries.

www.backyardmetalcastings.com

 

[J.S. Carter]

Your link doesnt work bub...
here try this

 

[Triton]

Thanks guys I really appreciate it! Anyone else know anything about that maching angle?

 

[fitzo]

I'm not sure exactly what you seek, but there's a milling cutter called a "corner rounding end mill", which comes in various sizes.

 

[Triton]

I'm not sure exactly what you seek, but there's a milling cutter called a "corner rounding end mill", which comes in various sizes.

Bingo! So this widget acts sort of like the roundover bit on a router it looks like. I think that would do it! Perfect. So now I've got options! Thanks guys!