Clive

Beware of using too hard a material for your pins, advice I took from Ramon Wilson who has described his method (search for "Pinning&quot on this site. To achieve a non-pinned look the pins and base material need to be similar. Ramon strongly counselled against piano wire.

When faced with my first pinning job on a Stuart 10V crankshaft a couple of days ago I used a paper clip for my pin material and the results are exactly what I wanted. Admittedly the shaft was not stainless but the clip I used was made of wire 1mm dia and the pins are invisible after a touch with a file and some wet and dry. As a book keeper I have a large selection of paper clips in varying sizes and hardnesses (not that I have ever bought a single one, people just send me stuff with a multitude of the damned things on and at last I seem to have found a use for some of them). Since I only ever run my engines on air, hopefully the paperclip and Loctite will be strong enough, if not – back to the drawing board!

Hope this adds a little to the debate

Jim

When I pin I like something soft enough so the ends of the pins can be peined over into shallow countersinks and then when they are filed flush become almost invisible.

If you need to go below 1/16" rod then look for some veneer pins rather than panel pins.

Failing finding anything a suitable small dia just turn down a bit of bar to say 1.0mm, its not that long a length required and if it turns out slightly tapered that could be useful.

J