Recommended place to buy HSS blanks

Busy Bee sells to the USA and have a $100 free shipping threshold. So whenever you want to top up an order to get free shipping, add HSS blanks which means they come out at very low net cost.

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Go ahead and buy a few new ones, but if you are lucky enough to have a machinery auction company in your area or the occasional estate sale which includes some machining tools, you will eventually be able to amass more high quality HSS bits than you could ever use, most of them at least partially ground for you, for very little money. Many of mine will probably still be unused (they don't wear out that fast) when my own estate sale comes around some day, supplying some lucky person in the next round of hobby machinists with some good usable bits.
 
TexasPyro said:
Being new to machining (lathe) I took the easy path to immediate "success" and bought some carbide insert tooling when I bought my lathe. As time wears on, so does my confidence. I'm wanting to mess around with grinding my own tooling out of HSS. Where would yall recommend to purchase them? I've got some in my McMaster cart but wonder if a $30 blank from there is really better than a $12 Accusize blank from Amazon, at least for a noob? I dont mind spending the money on quality, but am curious if the $30 route is really all that much better for messing around with different tool shapes. I dont intend on cutting anything very hard for now, mainly mild steel, aluminum, delrin, etc..
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What size is your lathe? It appears you're looking for 1/2" blanks so I assume you're working with at least a 14 x 40.

In general, I would agree with buying on ebay and until you learn to grind a decent tool, stay with Chinese tool bits. Later, when you can grind accurately, then invest in good blanks. I suggest you not buy old bits that are already ground. It is rare that you get one ground by someone who knew what they were doing.
 
I definitely agree with the "buy China" suggestions. I donated a bunch of HSS tool blanks to our local makerspace. My go to tool is the one with the big "CHINA" written on the side. I just used it to trim a bridgeport lead screw, which is medium carbon. It struggles a little and may get a little burned, but a quick touch with a grinder restores it to full function. That tool will last for ages, even if it is sharpened for every session.
 
No need to go to full 1/2'' blanks. This is a 3/16th blank ground for threading to a shoulder. It lives in that tool holder adjusted to dead center and both ends are kept sharp.
 

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Wow, thanks for all of the responses everyone. I have a ton of different spots to look into now. I went ahead and ordered a few 3/8" Chinesium blanks to play with for now. My lathe is a 13x36, based on what I've seen posted here, I should be fine with 3/8" blanks? I guess my next question is, what are your go to wheels for grinding tools? My grinder has 8" wheels.
 
McMaster Carr caters to an interesting crowd. I expect to pay a 25% premium on what I buy from them, however they have a business model that many industrial suppliers cannot keep up with. Most items ship same day as the order and arrive within 2 day pretty much anywhere in the USA. When I need a quick part for work, I can have it available for pickup at their distribution center within 2 hours or delivered to my company by their courier service within 4.

They keep the brands they stock to themselves unless you make a special request. This allows them to only stock 1 brand for each item and get around people's brand preference. To be fair, they always stock very high quality stuff. There is also minimal to no minimum buy on their products which is a big deal for us home hobbyists.

Finally, their website is a paradigm of design that no other large supplier (MSC, Grainger, etc.) can even come close to. I can find what I need in seconds and even find new products I never knew existed just because they are logically organized.

After all that, I always come back time and time again and don't have an issue with their markup.
 
I think you'll do fine with those. You can branch out with more options once you gain some experience. Right now, a correct grind is the most important, and Mikey's great thread will help a lot.
 
I've slowly accumulated about 20 lbs of Latrobe, Mo-Max, Cleveland, and other USA HSS and Co blanks by simply watching for lots on eBay. My only rule is not to pay more than $3 per name-brand blank. My drawer is full, probably for the rest of my lifetime.
 
If you have not formed a HSS tool yet? You will quickly learn that the hand grinding can/will be tedious on larger bits and or bits that are a better grade than just HSS. Soooo, if you start off with, say, a 1/2” bit you will notice a lot of hand grinding time. When maybe a 3/8” or even better a 1/4” bit will do the same job and take less time to grind. My three cents…Dave
 
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