Thread: Where to buy very thin sheet steel

G'Day there, can anyone suggest a place where I could buy a very thin, say tin can thickness or less, sheet of steel of about 900 mm x 1500 mm?

Have you rung K&K steel in Hastings? They have sheet metal.

Originally Posted by springwater

G'Day there, can anyone suggest a place where I could buy a very thin, say tin can thickness or less, sheet of steel of about 900 mm x 1500 mm?

Most big hardwares or places like Stratco will stock something that size or thereabouts but if you go to a steel merchant you will probably be able to pick up a 1800 x 900 sheet for less that the 1500 x 900 at a hardware. Last time I was at my local steel merchant I picked up 1.2 x 2.4 m sheets of "tin can thickness" on specials for $15.

Thank you, I haven't noticed sheet metal in hardware stores around this neck of the woods, maybe there's some there but I guess it may be Galvanised. K&K could be a good start thanks Clubman n

So I went into K&K which was busy on a satdy morning and asked for the thinest steel they had. The young bloke said "black steel", I said yeaah He flicked through a book, .6 mm thinest. Got anything thinner? Thinking, thinking, flick flick flick, gal iron .4 mm, still too thick I thought, said thanks and walked out thinking why I didn't just bring in the remains of an ice cream tin as an example of what I really wanted I must say that I was surprised by how much steel, in area, you can get for about $15, that does offer possibilities for other things to make.

Might have to try ringing around for less than 0.4mm.
maybe : Selection Steel
good luck.

Does it have to be steel?
Does it have to be one sheet?
Getting brass shim that thick will be easy though I havent seen it in that sheet size.
tinplate is what you are after but I dont know anyone that sells it.
I found Steel suppliers, Spring, Stainless, Steel - Dawborn Steels Trading Melbourne with google. I have no idea if they will be interested in talking to you about one sheet.

Good luck

Stuart

p.s. a sheet that big will be a pain to handle.

Originally Posted by Clubman7

Might have to try ringing around for less than 0.4mm.
maybe : Selection Steel
good luck.

Thanks Club, by the way what's your internet connection like at Balnarring, here at Somers mines cactus, to cut a long story short.

Originally Posted by Stustoys

Does it have to be steel?
Yep, I want it to rust some.
Does it have to be one sheet?
No I'm sure I could use more than a few but if you mean joining a some smaller sheet together then that's not behond the realms.
Getting brass shim that thick will be easy though I havent seen it in that sheet size.
Yeah, I usually go to George White for that sort of stuff, I hope it never closes down, most of the sales people being young and old are grumpy at first
tinplate is what you are after but I dont know anyone that sells it.
Yeah I reckon too, you haven't seen any old rustyish ice cream tins lying around have you cos that was the source of my last supply which I came across by slim chance and I don't think there'd be others around the corner.
I found Steel suppliers, Spring, Stainless, Steel - Dawborn Steels Trading Melbourne with google. I have no idea if they will be interested in talking to you about one sheet.
Thanks Stu

Good luck

Stuart

p.s. a sheet that big will be a pain to handle.

Believe Somers isn't great for Internet. Balnarring has Adsl2 so think it probably as a better connection.
normally runs ok for me.
Also think when he make icecream cans, they take the material from a roll of material slit to te correct width.
trying to find a large sheet will be harder.
Can you measure the thickness at all?

Hi Springwater,

Just another idea, try and locate a can maker, the ends are usually punched on coil fed presses, but the body line usually uses stillages of sheet stock, having worked in a can shop ( in a past life ) we used to discard top sheets off the stillages and they went into the scrap bin.

If you can get a foot in the door, you'd find enough tinplate to last a lifetime for pretty much next to nothing.

Regards
Ray

A quick ( and very rough search ) found this one Katjen Enterprise Pty Ltd - Dandenong South, Australia | Company Profile

Thanks for your suggestions Club and Ray. I haven't got an accurate way of measuring the thickness of the small offcuts that remain of the icecream tins I had but eyeballing it up against a steel ruler which has half mm increments tells me it's less than a quarter of a mm. I'll try, as you say Ray, some tin can manufacturers and see how I go there. I did have a squizz on ebay which had various old tin cans on offer but for most I wouldn't feel quite right cutting up into the pieces I need. The search goes on, thanks for your help

We used to use 0.3mm material at Kelvinators for the back of fridges. Horrible stuff because it was so thin that if there was the slightest burr it would slice right in...
I just had a thought - what about the sides of an empty (steel) 20 litre oil drum? You could probably pick one up for not very much and do some recycling. Mine have oil in them but being a once only container and only holding a 20kg or so I'd suggest they would not be all that thick.

Michael

Originally Posted by Michael G

We used to use 0.3mm material at Kelvinators for the back of fridges. Horrible stuff because it was so thin that if there was the slightest burr it would slice right in...
I just had a thought - what about the sides of an empty (steel) 20 litre oil drum? You could probably pick one up for not very much and do some recycling. Mine have oil in them but being a once only container and only holding a 20kg or so I'd suggest they would not be all that thick.

Michael

Yeah I reckon there'd be a heap lying around just rusting out that are considered junk. At the time of discovering the icecream tins I also picked up an old Kero tin which turned out to be too thick for what I was forming up at the time, had a nicely turned wooden handle though. 'spose you just have to be at the right place at the right time.