Branding irons with laser-machined stencils can be usually bought in the form of a large stamping rod for the intended purpose of being heated up by sticking the rod and the stamp into a fire. However, more than likely, more modern options to heat up a stencil exist such as a blowtorch or even just placing the stencil into an oven, such that the lengthy rod could be shortened in order to be able to fit into more compact kits.

We have used the same stencil before for the purpose of branding the HAM radio bag with our Wizardry and Steamworks logo and now we would like to reduce the rod to a more manageable size whilst still retaining the ability to stamp items by heating up the stencil.

The plan is to sever the rod in half and then use some taps and dies (particularly, the dies) in order to create threads on the part of the segments where the cut was applied.

The metal rod is first marked, roughly around the size of the wooden handle. You can observe the taps and dies on the right and the Wizardry and Steamworks stencil in the middle within the previous image. Using a flex saw, or a Dremel, the rod is cut easily in half without too much delay.

Taps and dies are used to thread holes, respectively rods. The die is placed within a cup with two shafts on either side for leverage as depicted in the previous image. By rotating the die and cup with very little pressure, the small teeth within the die starts to bite into the material and starts tapping it by building threads on the exterior.

One must remember that the process should be based on slicing, not bashing such that if too much pressure is required, then the process should be stopped because something is gone awry. The process is analogous to cutting vegetables, where the feeling is more towards slicing rather than applying pressure.

For the illustrated case on this page, there is indeed something wrong, and that is the choice of materials: the rod is made out of steel and the dies are also made out of steel. Ideally, the dies should be made out of any material with a stronger rigidity than steel, perhaps titanium or the cutting process will end up being a painstaking experience. Indeed, it takes a while, but the results come out pretty good.

Overall, the results are very good and the rod is now shortened in half. Furthermore, the branding iron can be disassembled, with the rod, the handle and the stencil being separate such that all the pieces can now be easy to carry and will occupy less space.