Custom Thermometer Dial: Plasma Cut, Fiber Etched 304SS

How does CNCROi.com make a custom thermometer dial for degrees Kelvin and Rankine? You are about to find out!

Having multiple machining and production platforms has massive advantages for our clients, it means we can literally cut anything and etch it with just as much flexibility for that ultimate custom widget that’s done accurately, fast and precisely as the client requests at their specs.

For this custom thermometer dial, the goal was durability outside and nothing affordable beats stainless steel, in this case, it’s 12 ga (roughly 1/8″) 304 stainless steel that we are cutting out of small piece I had at the CNCROi.com shop, you can see the item above is a BBQ grill that I featured a while back, well, this one didn’t make the cut for various reasons that were resolved when we did the actual production of them.

Whether it’s thick stainless steel, thin stainless steel, mild hot or cold steel or whatever you need fabricated, we can do it!

CNCROi.com‘s CNC plasma cutter cuts through stainless steel like a molten knife through melted butter, it’s just an awesome sight and before acquiring this piece of machinery, I was doing this manually so I can especially appreciate the power and speed this allows us to produce metal jobs at the shop with.

At the end of the day, this custom thermometer dial is basically a metal circle etched with some stuff, what does complicate things slightly is that it also requires two holes, one for the indicator dial to fit through which the customer has, and the other to hang said thermometer onto something.

When it comes to producing unique gifts and hands-outs for customers customers, CNCROi.com excels in any volume and spec you require.

The easiest solution I came up with was to plasma cut this stainless steel, use the laser to mark where the holes will be and then drill them out manually, the plasma can easily cut holes, but at this small a scale, drills produce a cleaner finish, especially with our DVR drill that makes beautiful holes all day through anything.

You can see the fiber laser etched hole indicators in the image below right on the custom thermometer dial, with the diameter of the hole required and the center hole for the drill bit to begin working from.

So then the holes are dummy proof, it’s just sticking it under the drill and making the holes without requiring any calculation or measurements on this custom thermometer dial.

Of course, drilling holes through stainless steel always produces wonderful shrapnel that gets into absolutely everything, but you can see how wonderful this hole is, zero kerf and perfectly round.

Of course, drilling holes also produces extruding shrapnel and burrs on the underside of the custom thermometer dial, so those need to be angle ground off and while I’m at it, I might as well sand both the front and the back of this custom thermometer dial to remove any additional impurities and burrs that may or may not be present.

After producing a wonderful surface on the custom thermometer dial, it’s time to stick it yet again in our laser and begin the fiber laser etching process, with the same accuracy and positioning that I made the initial holes with.

As CNCROi.com increases it’s capabilities and production methods, we are able to take on larger and more complex projects but this also means we can more easily do the simpler stuff as well.

Fiber laser etching, unlike inks, dyes or paints, is completely permanent and will not fade, crack or peel overtime, additionally, it isn’t affected by wind, rain, snow or anything else the elements may throw at it.

Fiber laser etching this custom thermometer dial is a very slow process through, and yes, the steel gets very hot to the touch so spreading out the heat and pushing air both on and around the steel helps greatly to prevent warping.

Running a custom job shop is fun, everyday there is something different that needs to be made, using different methods, materials and processes.

CNCROi.com has been fiber etching since inception, in fact, one of our first jobs involved making custom stainless steel fiber etched cards for a customer of ours.

When it comes to fiber laser etching, nothing beats the sharpness and quality of the etch, compared to other methods of branding metal, this one is by far the best aesthetically and durability wise.

CNCROi.com has two different fiber etching / annealing platforms, one using the gantry system as you see in these photos and the video on this blog post and the other galvo based that is more focused on small etchings and deep ones at that.

Although technically I could have done this job using our galvo system for the same results, it’s easier to do it with the gantry system due to the size.

Regardless of the method used for fiber etching at CNCROi.com, the results are always sharp and permanent, the marking produced is a dark to light brown right out of the machine due to the metal being oxidized as it lifts off from heating from the surface of the stainless steel (in this case) but it goes back to jet black once we seal it in after cleanup.

Being able to mix and match capabilities and material helps CNCROi.com really do truly unique jobs that you’d never imagine… and just think, most of the jobs we do aren’t even published anywhere on our website or social media!

When it comes to producing the best results, vector black and white images are ideal as there are no jagged edges, this produces a sharp and defined edge on all the lettering and graphics involved.

The finished results already look great, but this needs to be cleaned-up further, this will increase the sharpness as no metal dust and debris will be on and around the etching that was just performed on this custom thermometer dial.

Looking close-up, though my camera has trouble focusing properly, you can see how all the lines are straight, the numbers defined and even the small details like the snowflake is sharp, this will only get better after cleaning.

CNCROi.com works on a large variety of custom metal jobs, across many sizes and thicknesses for our customers across North America, Caribbean and Europe.

Stainless steel is notorious to take good photos and video of as it reflects the environment around it and especially when fiber laser etching or plasma cutting, there are so many much brighter things going on that the camera tends to focus on that the custom thermometer dial itself, so these photos are a little fuzzy.

I took a few photos at different angles just to show you how the light and environment changes on the surface depending on the angle of viewing but the etching itself is always clearly legible and visible on this custom thermometer dial.

Looking at the finished sealed custom thermometer dial close-up, you can see how awesome this very unique temperature indicator really is.

Need something custom? Contact CNCROi.com right now!