can you make your own chips?

[Sundevils21]

maybe making really good chips would be tough but what about the stickers? I've found some okay blank chips here... blank chips
Would it be possible to make a customized chip with those colors?

[technogeeky]

[ QUOTE ]
I would drop two grand (2K) on equipment/renting if it would allow me to make binions style chips. i.e. 12+ edgespots, 10-11 grams, dayglo colors, 1" inlay. Nobody makes em like that, and I have no idea how much a press costs.

[/ QUOTE ]

Binions chips (WSOP) are made by an injection molding process. The mold itself probably costs $100,000. The machine to make them probably costs over 1 million.

Compression molding is less expensive, a 1 unit compression mold machine might cost $5,000 but the mold to make a chip could cost anything unless you can make this stuff yourself.

Again, I am looking into it. It's a slow process, but I'm discussing this with chip companies (if they'll help me) and engineers.

[MrGo]

If it was easy to make chips, all these chip manufacturers would be out of business.

Sorry to say, but you're not going to make a quality chip unless you want to spend 6, perhaps 7 figures.

[wacki]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I would drop two grand (2K) on equipment/renting if it would allow me to make binions style chips. i.e. 12+ edgespots, 10-11 grams, dayglo colors, 1" inlay. Nobody makes em like that, and I have no idea how much a press costs.

[/ QUOTE ]

Binions chips (WSOP) are made by an injection molding process. The mold itself probably costs $100,000. The machine to make them probably costs over 1 million.

Compression molding is less expensive, a 1 unit compression mold machine might cost $5,000 but the mold to make a chip could cost anything unless you can make this stuff yourself.

Again, I am looking into it. It's a slow process, but I'm discussing this with chip companies (if they'll help me) and engineers.

[/ QUOTE ]

$100,000 for a mold, $1 million for the injection machine?

Where did you get these stats from?

First of all, there is no way a mold for a chip costs $100K. Ever heard of C&C milling?

Second, don't make up stats when you don't know. If you don't know, say you don't, don't make stuff up.

[MrGo]

Do you expect this to be a cheap process? If so, you're sorely mistaken.

I don't think "$2,000" is going to get you a single chip.

[WEASEL45]

do you mean CNC milling

[jdl22]

</font><blockquote><font class="small">En respuesta a:</font><hr />
You can make small cermaic discs, but do not plan on getting any detail or longevity out of them.

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This might be ok depending on what you mean by detail. Don't enthusiasts make plates and bowls with fairly intricate design patterns? I was thinking it might be possible to make something roughly similar to a ceramic bowl, though perhaps a little softer.

It seems there are a couple themes going on here - one is making chips at home that are similar in quality feel and look to chips you would see on TV or in a casino. The other is whether it is possible to make something halfway decent (say better than the 11.5 5stardeal ebay chips) that doesn't necesarily look like those chips you see on tv but could be customizable. I would think this would be possible with reasonably nice equipment. Surely you can make a dinner plate with something like edgespots, but maybe not, so I would think a smaller version (say a poker chip) would be possible. Also, not to sound too much like a former president, what do you mean by longevity? I will mainly be playing a weekly game and playing my friend heads up quite frequently, it's not like I'm opening a room or anything of that nature.

As for being able to copy binions chips and others I would think that this is very difficult or else counterfeit chips would be too easy to make for the casinos.

[dandy_don]

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ceramic chips

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Wouldn't these be fragile? My first thought about ceramic is that this stuff breaks real easy. That ought to make for an interesting "splashing the pot".

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clay chips

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I don't know about the injection molding of clay chips, but from what I have read, one method of making clay chips requires a great deal of heat and pressure. I can't imagine that type of equipment would come cheap.

You ought to check into some type of polymer material (plastics and new age materials). All I know of this stuff is that there is a School of Polymer Science at the University of Southern Mississippi where I attended for a short while during the '80s.

[Wayne]

I made my own playing cards. Scissors, cardboard, and 4 colored markers (for a 4-colored deck). They are a bitch to shuffle though...

[wacki]

[ QUOTE ]
do you mean CNC milling

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes you are right. Thanks for correcting me. :-)