Quick intro

[RatRockx]

Hi guys (and some girls maybe?) I'm Joris Rockx (38), live and work in Rotterdam, Holland. I'm a self employed designer / artist / fabricator. I mainly work for artists but other fields are interior, fairs, sets, etc.

Greatest passion is to work in steel but other materials go through my hands as well (wood, glass, plastics, electra, etc.)

I like most to build and ride bicyles.

So far I did a couple of metalshaping projects (bowl, 3 bicycle fenders, bicycle sized tractor seat) by hand: leather bag I sew up from an old coat and vice-clamped small english wheel I made with a convex bearing.

I was in the process of building a Pullmax / Trumpf like machine (had most of the parts done and was about to build the frame and bring it all together) when I found a super bargain on a Dutch vending website. So since last autumn I am the proud owner of a Trumpf TAS 42A. It came with lots of nibbles and doming, beading and flanging tools. And a circle-center-clamp and incomplete longitudal guide and incomplete offset tool.

It also came with some brochures, parts drawing and list, and repair and order forms (oldest date I found in these was 1969). I will post copies and photos later on.

I'm looking to make more tools for it like thumbnail and louvre dies and smaller radius doming tools. In december I finally bought a lathe (1964 Colchester Bantam MK2 1600) that should help but I still miss a mill.

At this point I am mainly trying to find out what steel to use for these Trumpf tools, if they need to be hardened and if so, how to do this.