Buck's random home-made things.

[daniel_buck]

alot of V8 flatheads had heat sinks/ribs on them, eh?


yea, I purchased the engine this morning (used engine) will pick it up hopefully next week.

[inVERt'D]

Not from the factory. I'll admit I've seen a lot more stockish flatties than ones with custom aluminum heads.

Congrats on the engine. Does this mean the exhaust is on-hold?

[daniel_buck]

I'll probably figure out the rear 1/2 of the exhaust, but wait for the final install of the exhaust until the engine is in. Still got some parts to collect. I need a bellhousing from an F-head, fuel filter, the correct flywheel & stuff that comes with the kit to mount up to the transmission, and a few other little things.

[RAT]

finished the support bracket

Dude! She's looking SWEET!

[daniel_buck]

I drive it every day

[daniel_buck]

Picked up the diesel engine today. And to make sure I could keep this in the "home-made" post, I made a little rolling platform for the engine, so I can move it around the garage, since I don't have that much room.

I'll need to put on a different oil pan, exhaust manifold (that will go with the turbo), and oil filter mount. As well as the flywheel, motor mounts, and transmission adapter from Overland Diesel. And a bellhousing from an M38A1 willys

And yes, the Homer bucket makes a great seat. I have 3 of them, haha! And every time they get used for something other than a seat, I need to pick up another one to sit on again. #4 will probably come soon.

[daniel_buck]

I finally got around to starting my welding cart.

It's 3/16" angle iron, probably over kill. When I originally purchased the metal for this, I wasn't sure how thick it would have needed to be, so I just went thicker than I thought. I think 1/8" angle iron would have been plenty strong enough, but I already had the 3/16", so that's what I'm using. I'm planning on mounting a bench grinder and vice on top.

I started out with my usual solid wire and gas setup, but after the first few welds I decided to use this as an opportunity to get more familiar with flux cored welding. So I switched the polarity on the welder and put in .035 flux cored wire. At maximum output and a slow wire speed (2 out of 10). First few welds were very ugly, then I put a bit more wire speed (almost 3 of 10) and slowed down my travel and started pulling the weld instead of pushing (I usually push when mig welding) and the welds seems to be alot better looking, and the penetration seems good, the welds sink in pretty good.

[6spdYJ]

Pulling gives a narrower, deeper bead while pushing will produce a flatter, broader bead with less penetration. It looks good!

[daniel_buck]

got the frame finished. I'm planning on a shelf above the welder (but still leaving room to remove the welder with relative ease), a bunch of hooks to hang things, and a top. I'm thinking about putting my abrasive cutoff chop saw on top as well, I think it would fit nicely up there with the bench grinder. I think the top would be to small to be of any real use as a welding table.

It rolls around real nice, doesn't feel like I'm moving around much weight at all

[aw12345]

Grinders on top of your welder might not be the best idea, do you want all the cutting wheel and metal dust in your welder?

[daniel_buck]

Think that might be a problem Art?

The welder would be below all that, with a solid top on the cart, and a shelf above the welder. It probably wouldn't get any more dust than if I were grinding right next to it? I don't know, I didn't really think about that. Maybe I could throw a towel over the welder, and put some light foam over the fan intake on the welder. Having the grinder and chop saw on top of there would really be handy. Any time I need to bring either of them out, I have to bring out saw horses and what not. Wheeling the cart out there with everything on there would be super!

I think I'm going to make the shelf removable, instead of solid mounted.

[daniel_buck]

I'm looking around online at people's home made welding carts, and I don't see any with a grinder or chop saw on top. So, maybe that's not a good idea after all? I do see some other good ideas though. Maybe I'll bolt on a power strip.

Went to the metal shop and found the perfect size scrap/drop cut to be the top platform. Only 1/8" thick, but that will be fine I think.

[inVERt'D]

I'd have to agree with Art, and now you. Conductive dust in a welder is bad jojo.

As for the integrated welding table, welding on a welding cart while the welder is in/ on it also seems like asking for trouble. If the body of the welder happens to short to the cart as you're welding I don't think that would be particularly good. A physical short might not even be necessary. It's not hard to imagine an arc between the welder and the table-cart.

I used 1/8" on the bottom of my cart. It ties together the base of a frame made mostly out of 3/4" sq tubing. It carries a 60lb Lincoln 175HD MIG, a 30 lb plasma/TIG/ stick machine, a 55 ccfm bottle, and a 120 ccfm bottle. It goes uphill, downhill, over ruts and little rocks, and I've even used it hoisted as high as my engine hoist would go. The thing is solid, and the base is a big part of why. The plasma/TIG/ stick is light, so I just used expanded metal screen for the top rack.

[daniel_buck]

Well shoot, maybe I'll just mount a tool box on top then, haha! Just trying to make this thing as useful as I can, being space limited and all. any ideas?

[daniel_buck]

So, a neighbor of mine's F250 snapped the front track bar mount as he was jacking it up to change the brakes (it has previously been in a front end accident hit from the side, so we think that might have put some stress on the mount). In any case, after we cleaned up the mount I welded it up. Shoot, I found some very interesting welding positions trying to get this all welded up, haha! Had to start and stop alot though, with everything in the way of getting the gun in there. And also had to weave back and forth a lot because we couldn't get the mount to line up perfectly, there was about a 1/8" gap most of the way because it wasn't a clean break, parts of it bent and tore as it broke, and didn't seem to ever line back up again. But the gap might have actually helped here, as it let the weld sink in pretty flat I think.

The break was probably 6-8 inches long, went up and around the entire mount. Fortunately, I had access to the back of the mount as well, so I was able to hit both sides. Hope it holds! I had the flux wire spooled up, so that's what I used. Probably best though, since we weren't able to clean the mount real good, I think the flux wire handles dirty metal better than solid wire with gas? It was hard enough to get even a brush in there, and no way to get a grinder in there at all.

Not a pretty weld, but it sank in pretty deep, almost went all the way though, so I think by hitting it on both sides it should be pretty solid?? we'll find out soon haha!

It was fun for me! Got a chance to use the welding cart, wheeled it down the street into the alley way. It wheels just fine! I just hope the weld holds