I'm going to be cutting a few molds for encapsulating some small circuit boards out of 7076 aluminum (encapsulation vendor's recommendation for material). But seeing about the cost of aluminum, I would like to do some 'fitment tests' before I actually cut aluminum.
I'd like to find a material that I can cut with the machine and end up with a pretty similar finished product as far as dimensions go to what I'm going to end up with with the aluminum. But spend a lot less. Since I have a feeling it matters, I expect the final product to be milled out of 1"x6" (or possibly as small as 1"x4") bar stock.
I was thinking of playing with MDF, but it sounds like that's got challenges of it's own (although it still is an option I guess).
So, Ideas of something I can buy and use for testing which costs less per cubic inch than 7076 aluminum, and which is easy to work on the mill?
I realize I might have to buy a few mills for this... I'm definitely open to that. One mangled block of aluminum can easily pay for a couple of mills.
-forrest