rotary embossing

[Cedarman]

I have a company talking to us about making gobs of little premiums to give away at shows etc.  They are pieces of cedar 1/2" x 13/16" x 3".  Little fellers!  They want radiused all 12 edges.  Figure I can run through the moulder get the 4 long ones done, chop and sand the other 8 quickly. 

But, they want a logo embossed on each one.  We are talking 1,000,000 pieces.  I have heard about rotary embossing, but know nothing about them.

Anybody with ideas of how to do this?  Also, if you have a better idea of making the pieces, I could use the help too.
Thank You
Richard

[flip]

I would look at outsourcing that part after you are done with your end.  My .02

[beenthere]

Before cutting to length, but after the "4 long ones", emboss the long lengths. Then do the others.

Is the embossing just inking the roller...not a heated (wood burning) brand?

Might be a good excuse (if ya need one) to get a CNC router table adaptable to other potential projects. 

[trim4u2nv]

outsource

http://www.lindenwoodinc.com/custom.html

[metalspinner]

What about tumbling the part to radius all the edges.  That is about the size of a piece of wood from the family game "Jenga". All edges are radiused and the "Jenga" logo is pressed into the piece of wood. By embossed, do you mean a pressed image or an inked image?

[HOOF-ER]

Ditto on the tumbling. I would think a large drum would radius and polish many , many pieces.

[Cedarman]

I would definitely outsource if I could find someone to do the embossing.  If pieces could be embossed after being chopped and radiused then I could use a lot of low grade.  If it needs to be embossed on longer strips, I would need to use a higher grade of lumber.

I believe they want the logo impressed into the wood with a hot iron.

Thanks for the input.  Keep it coming.

[ksu_chainsaw]

In my last job we made about 500 coasters- 1/4"-1/2" thick, x 3 1/2" dia.  we just took LOTS of scraps and resawed them to make enough blanks.

We then set them into a jig on the table of the laser.  http://www.epiloglaser.com/
It is all computer controlled, you only have to create the design once, but the price is fairly high. It burns in the design into the wood, but there are companies that make filler material that can change the color that is burned into the wood. 

If they just want the wood to be imprinted with their design- not colored in, you could always make the seal, and then put it into a press- just need some cheap labor to pull on the handle  ;D

Charles

[Cedarman]

We will need to press with a hot iron ot burn an image.  There will be about 1/3 million of each of the 3 logos.  That is a lot of pressing, but I would love to talk to someone that has done a project like this because I do not want to reinvent the wheel.
We have lots of low grade boards that we can use.
We are looking at using up 30,000 board feet of low grade which we have.
All waste goes into mulch so I get 2.15 cents per pound for that.  Token recovery money.
With the value of the wood at 2 cents per piece, how much will it cost to make the final product?  Anybody have a guess?  I have not done this before. 
We did make a triangle that was S2S to 3/4" x 5 " base by 1 1/2" high in center for 7 cents each.

[low_48]

Just some random thoughts; if you decide to press, make sure you talk to the branding guys to make sure the brand will hold enough heat to keep the cycle time short. You might even need something heated with propane. I would look at using an air cylinder to do the pressing with a foot pedal to activate. You can vary the air pressure to set the stamping pressure, and get quick cycle time. You might modify an arbor press or drill press with the air cylinder moving the hand crank.

If you look at a laser engraver, you will be able to fill the bed and probably burn 100 at a time. You could build a couple of fixtures to load the blanks. While one is burning, you can be loading the other fixture. It would take less than a minute to load and keep the machine going. I would suspect that you could get the hundred burned in less than 20 minutes. Just a guess since I don't know the design. I do own a laser and have run production on ink pen blanks, I had 97 blanks on a v grooved fixture. The laser puts no forces on the parts, so just stack them on the fixture, no clamping needed. And after doing the job, you will probably be able to 70% of your money back by selling the used laser engraving machine. Don't even think about the cheap Chinese machines coming on the market. Stay with Universal or Epilog. I could burn a couple of samples for you if that would help. I've got some cedar, just send me an email with the artwork.

[Cedarman]

low 48, thanks for the advice.  I am sure the laser will do a nice job.  They have come back and gave me good news and news. (Not sure whether the news is good or bad).  They have said they will take care of the embossing.  That makes me happy.  I think I can make about 6000 blanks per hour with the equipment we have plus purchasing a Tiger Stop cut off system. 

The news is that they want them all at once.  I figure it would realistically take about 2 months to do the profect from start to finish.  I am sure there would be down time and some glitches getting started.  I made some samples out of a low grade board and was surprised at the good yield I got.

[TexasTimbers]

I will be real interested in watching this Cedarman. I have turned down two jobs of really small items with my boxelder. Nothing approaching 1,000,000 pieces mind you.

One guy wanted 10,000 coasters as mentioned above and was going to have his company logo put on with a laser as well. He didn't ask me to do that I assume he has a source for that. I just didn't want to get into making coasters with all I have going on.

I predict that you about to embark on a journey full of little tricks and methods that will come in handy on other projects down the road.

Heck just storing them until you can ship them all at once will take a little room. Are you going to put them in cardboard boxes then load them on pallets? Sheath and band them? How's all that work. ???

And remember one million is not that much when you think about it, because you only have to make 1000 of them. Then just do that again 999 more times. :D

[Cedarman]

My plan A is to sort on a conveyor which will take the little fellers up and drop into a big supersack.  Each sack should hold about 40,000. They have 4 straps on corners at the top to pick up with the forklift.  I have a dirt floor in a big shed and will set the bags on pallets.  I have a loading dock where I can run the bags into the truck.  26 bags will fit on the bed of the truck.  If necessary, I can double stack the bags in the truck.  Total weight is about 26,000 pounds.

I do not want to invest in cardboard boxes.  Also when they go to unload the sacks, there is a hole that can be opened in the bottom of the bags to let the pieces out.