MIME made flashlights?

[kosPap]

Greetings all! It seems this is the proper place to ask...

Sometime ago a member stated that several chinese made flashlights are made from powdered aluminum.

Is that the same as the MIME proecess?

And how can one distinguish them?
Personally having observed how Surefires & Maglites look (body surface is covered in tiny ribs), I tend to look at smooth or grainy surfaces in chinese flashlights as suspicious.

for example look at this pic: http://img401.imageshack.us/img401/5598/combo1ek5.jpg

The latter is what seems to be cast/powder made/MIME. In contrast the first two have those ribs I mentioned. THe middle one especially, has so pointed edges that I have mikro-teared my fingers skin some times.

So how close to truth am I?

Many thanks, Kostas

 

[gadget_lover]

Aluminum can be cast, machined, extruded and welded. A sintered process (heating powdered aluminum) would be akin to molding. Once it is cast, machined or extruded it can go through secondary machining.

A part made from powdered metal that is heated is usually indistinguishable from any other molded part.

It's surface can be raw, polished, blasted, tumbled, painted or anodized.


The bottom one has a surface that can be the result of bead blasting or casting, as well as certain paint techniques.

I can not tell with any degree of confidence from the pictures just what combination of techniques were used.


Daniel

 

[KowShak]

Personally having observed how Surefires & Maglites look (body surface is covered in tiny ribs), I tend to look at smooth or grainy surfaces in chinese flashlights as suspicious.

By "tiny ribs" do you mean the pattern that is left by turning a metal part on a lathe? That patterning can be removed by grit / bead blasting or lost in the anodising process so their absence doesn't automatically mean that a metal part was cast rather than turned on a lathe.

You don't always get those peaks and valleys turning parts on a lathe, for example if you do a number of extremely slow passes you can get a pretty good surface finish, you can use "wiper" inserts or form tools to improve finish too, you can even grind parts after turning.

The reasons that I doubt many torches are cast rather than turned on a lathe is that they are round and easy to machine, need threading (so they need to go in a lathe anyway) and they show no signs of the artifacts that I'd expect to see on a cast / forged product i.e. moulding marks or grinding.