Anything welding

Damn! That huge for 1 shoe!

 

For those of us w/o a cnc plasma table… I have to say sendcutsend has been super fast and cheaper than I remember for steel. Been getting parts bent, too, and they’ve been great. $2-3 a bend.

Related, I’ve been trying to learn fusion’s sheet metal module to make flat patterns of my bent ideas. That has not been fun. I have found the tools to be weird. As if designed by a software person who was shown some bent parts but has no idea how they get designed. Which has not been my experience with the rest of Fusion. I’m also finding the history to be much more “fragile” if a sheet metal part is in there. References go screwy… things invert. It’s buggy. Oof!

last time I did a lot of sheet metal design was 20 years ago on solid works and creo (ptc) and I don’t remember it being this hard!

 

The sheet metal tool in F360 is still giving me fits, too.

I'm not giving up. It does work okay for basic design, but it, or I get lost if I want to get into too much detail.

 

uhhhh no mill... yet... its on the list, as is upgrading the lathe.

 

I have used SendCutSend since about the time they started, they do great work, and they are fast too

 

Dang

Yeah everytime I see a lathe come up out here it's an easy $5k or more

More than a CNC table

 

Does the job though!

 

I think it gets lost. I feel like I am pretty darn good at solid modeling and making my timeline bombproof. Change a feature early in the timeline and no red or yellow. But once I started introducing sheetmetal features... Chaos! For instance... I changed the height of a flange in an assembly a few steps back in the time line. Just the height! I didn't change the .... topology (?) of the part at all just a length. Fast forward to the end of the timeline and a later flange was inverted - "references could not be found" yeah because they were on the other side of the planet! WTF? Anyway, with any luck they'll keep improving it. Lol. When ever I get pissed at it tho, I remember I'm paying like $350 a year for it compared to the $25k seat with $1400/year maintenance I used to pay for my seat of PTC! Yuck! I will work around some bugs!

Plus the simulation stuff is really frickin' cool - I can't believe it comes with the package. Played with it a little more for this cargo platform I'm making... so cool! new design 5x stiffer!

 

trailer work. i got frustrated with the overall platform design (my stockpile of metal is all too short for any of the central beam sections), so wanted to get part of it together. so i welded up the main part a-frame and hitch coupler. main problem is that my 20A garage circuit can't handle my welder, i couldn't make a full pass without popping the breaker. i had a lot more starts/stops than i would've preferred in an unobstructed workpiece like this, also really hard to develop my normal rhythm. i'd start getting into my rhythm and then the breaker would pop... i guess my next side project to this project is really going to be figuring out getting a 60A 240v feed to the garage, as well as making an order for a 'real' welder. i knew this project would push the limits of the little eastwood mig80, and running 0.35 wire definitely isn't helping, just didn't expect to be having issues with the breaker side of things.

i also tapered an 8" portion of the 5" c-channel a-arms down to 2-3/4" at the leading edge. i might still tie that further forward into the tongue portion, but currently avoiding it as i don't want to create a 'snow shelf' in the structure that will just collect road debris and rot out. i did it mostly for the aesthetics of making the a-frame look less 'chunky' where it all comes together. it was also just a fun little project to practice pie-cuts and play with bending one rail down and then welding the gap. later on, i'll sand down most of the welds, and the beams will look more complete.

the top that's not pictured got double-passed, the sides that'll carry most of the weight all got quadruple passed, because i felt like it.







oh, and side-note, the rattle can bed liner SUCKS. the etching primer i hit the tongue with originally somewhat held up except for direct welding heat, but the bed liner crap came off in ribbons under a wire wheel.

 

Ouch

Definitely get that outlet and wiring upgraded!

Double pole 50 amp breaker for the win, and I push everything without issue. All run via 6 gauge straight from the panel.

 

Is your washing machine a 40amp breaker? If so that works great for our little 120v machines.

 

nope, my dryer is gas. has a 20A 120v circuit to it.

the only thing in the house on a 2-pole breaker is the a/c. and with the heat, i'm not trading that for welding work!

 

Hopefully this picture is better with the bumper off. The holes circles in red are on the outside of the frame and are the holes that we blew into the frame to make the current bumper work. The ones in green are the original mounting locations. The second picture is the inside of the frame rail. I’m wanting to put a bumper on that has an integrated class III hitch and I’m worried the frame might be comprised from what I previously did.

 

It's C channel as I recall correctly so why not box it in by putting plate on the inside?

As for those holes...looks like someone took a chisel to a rock

I'd hit everything with an angle grinder (with a wire wheel) and reveal the good and bad. Plate what you need to reinforce.

 

Putting plate on the inside was my initial thought but I was unsure of how thick of a plate I would need and what would be over kill….still learning.

yeah, they’re terrible oh the joys of redoing things your younger self didn’t think through haha!

 

i would match the frame rail thickness, as that's going to be the maximum carrying load anyways.

 

Have you looked into frame plate replacement parts?

This is the 1st one that popped up, but there are many more vendors.

https://trail-gear.com/tacoma-rear-frame-reinforcement-plates.html

 

Spent a little time in the office today



Problem? I forgot to switch my nozzle (again) so the scales came out jagged





It'll live in the garage and I'll just cut another one out



Was supposed to be for my cousin who we're gonna see when we go up north this weekend; he's got a pond with koi fish

 

And before you say something @koditten

That was only a 9.5% IPA

The harder stuff is for after 12pm