A pick copying machine

[ForFun]

the edges could be smoothed with a hard burnisher that presses the metal flat as it (snip).[/quote]

The picks I've seen so far would have been stamped out on a punch press. About a nickle a punch depending on where in the world it's done, not counting material cost. A lot of manufactured items like this will have at least a 5 to 1 markup. If something costs a dollar to manufacture it can well cost the end user 5 dollars or more. The product sometimes goes through several hands like distributors.
To remove the burrs, sharp edges, the parts would have been put in a tumbler with ceramic stones of various shapes, usually with some water and soap. I had a small tumbler that held only about a cubic foot. If you are inventive you can make one out of a gallon tin can with something to keep it rotating.

[hiaxis]

Mills are slow compared to other alternatives for simple 2D cutting. CNC plasma can cut thin stuff like that at 150+ inches/minute but the plasma arc has an accuracy of around .030 so scratch that. A high def. plasma is closer but I have yet to see the difference between the two in person.

A CNC laser has the accuracy but they're a very spendy machine. A CNC waterjet would make quick work of it and they're way more common. All it would take would be to draw your pick design up to scale in any flavor of CAD program and since most of us certainly don't have the need to own our own machine, take your drawing to your local waterjet place and have him/her blast them out.

I live in a fairly small town of around 30-40k people and we have a company that does waterjet cutting. Compared to the cost of the material, having them cut out costs next to nothing. Assuming I brought my own material, I could probably get 20 picks cut out for a buck a piece. With accuracies on the order of .001", that's ain't bad.

Just thought I'd throw it out there....

[wadded2]

yeah my dad manages a metal fabricating company they own plasma cutters (hi def and regular) and a cnc i'l get back as to how the picks look when cut out

[-Aaron-]

I would think that most, if not all picks are stamped, plasma, water jet, CNC, are all to slow and costly. Depending on the stamping machine they could have a 1 foot by 1 foot of sheet metal and get 30 picks out of it in seconds. With a water jet you would get 1 at a time and would probably end up breaking the picks, same for the plasma and CNC, there just to slow.

[LockNewbie21]

Die stamping is good.

Photochemical ethcing is my choice.

With die stamping you can creat mico fissures in the metal which weekens it.

however, as said the pocess creates so many and cheep that replacing would be cheap and effective.

Still its a good idea, perhaps he or someone may create it. Its a nice weekend project.