Thin Beam Try Square

Model Railroader Layouts and layout building
1

Anybody know if a square with a “step” (my term) measurement of 1/32" is available on the market (that won’t break the bank!)? The step is the height difference between the two planes of the square at the joint where they meet, i.e. the plane of the beam and the plane of the blade. I work with 1/32" thick basswood sometimes. If the step is higher than that the excess height has to be accommodated by dropping the beam below the working surface…kind of awkward and some precision is lost with the try square. Micro Mark’s square has a minimum step of 1/16". As far as I know that’s the thinnest beam they offer.

2

If you just need a square corner make one your self. I do a lot of scratch building and also need the 1/32” shoulder. I used a couple of .04” thick strips of Styrene to make a square.

It works very good for marking 1/32” Basswood as well as Styrene.

EDIT:

If you need more strength you could use a couple of strips of .032” K&S Brass

Mel

My Model Railroad
http://melvineperry.blogspot.com/

Bakersfield, California

I’m beginning to realize that aging is not for wimps.

3

I sometimes use a flat square, mine happens to be X-acto but there are others:

https://www.hobbylinc.com/htm/zon/zon37-434.htm

Then place my stock and the square along a straight-edge fence and carefully align everything. I found some ground and polished tungsten carbide as a straight edge but you can find small precision straight edges from Starrett and others.

Good Luck, Ed

4

I have used roofing flashing to accomodate minor discrepancies in thicknesses and I have found corners are perfectly square. Standard flashing is 19/1000s or 0.019 inches. I just happened to have rolls of it around the house. I does not compress at all and that really helps.

5

Thanks to all for clever DIY ideas. Think I’ll solder a couple of pieces of K&S brass strip at 90 deg. Found some .025 in. thick at local hobby shop this P.M.

6

I just took advantage of a MicroMark free shipping offer and got the thin beam square. It would seem a fairly easy thing to laminate 1/16" plastic onto it (perhaps temporarily) and make it a 1/32" assuming I understand what you are trying to accomplish. It’s thin enough for my purposes although I have yet to fully test it out for what I need it for.

Dave Nelson

PS another thing in the order is a mirror on an extendable rod (sort of like the old fashioned automobile radio antenna) with built in LED lights. I am looking forward to finding all sorts of long lost stuff under the work bench!