fabrication and 97/99 plow truck on a hot-dip galvanized frame

Just finished building a staircase for my shop office build. Never designed or built a staircase of any kind before... real head scratcher. Lots of fun to assemble it without a helper, too.

 

Lazy Sunday today, building some staircase landing legs for the magic kingdom. Almost out of argon, definitely out of talent.

 

Looks Bad assss to me. don't forget your hand rails for "Safety" purposes. You have some serious fab skills. I should have gone to welding school way back when I was a young man.

 

Yup, they're next. I need to build a bender so I can make ornamental scrollwork before I can build the railings.

You can start welding later in life, and there's no better time than now. We're living in the golden age of free information - youtube is the modern Library of Alexandria. I don't have any family members who are into any of the stuff I'm into: fabrication, machining, vehicles, guns, aviation, you name it. Self-taught or at least self-motivated to seek the appropriate instruction in every discipline. I think most peoples' biggest barrier to success is their unwillingness to set aside their pride and be bad at something. I've poured thousands of dollars and incalculable sums of time into projects and ideas that never panned out or ended up in the scrap trailer, but those occurrences start to become further and further apart as you gain experience. It's humbling every time, and it hurts less the hundredth time it happens than the first. Beats the ego out of a guy. "The expert has failed more times than the amateur has tried" and all those other aphorisms.

Carpe diem.

 

Not knowing anything about your flying experience, I’ll offer a word of advice anyway. Don’t try to fly around or above weather. Someday the weather will beat you. You can always just turn around. If you get into the soup, things can go bad real fast. The training and muscle memory needed to maintain and correct course with no visibility, it’s a lot. I know confident people who ended up pulverized in a pile on the ground, and with passengers who thought they would be OK.

 

Yup. From day one, we're taught to respect and understand the weather. I'm pursuing my instrument rating for exactly the reasons you mention - VFR into IMC is a bad, bad time.

 

Just found this thread, Love the fab work, flying, and the taco.

Curious, how thick is the galvanization on the truck? Any idea of the rate the galvanization is consumed in your area and use?

 

I don't know how thick it is, not really sure if you could measure it with a paint mil gauge. I'm interested to see how the ICC bumpers age - they're exposed to salt spray 3-4 days per week all winter, whereas the Tacoma really only gets exposed to salt when it leaves the farm for fuel or a rogue side plowing job. The Tacoma is generously undercoated with Fluid Film, too. I don't foresee frame rust ever being a concern again.

 

Pretty weird looking '97 Tacoma.

 

Top staircase gusset ended up looking like the main sail on an eighteenth century Chinese junk. Gotta build a scroll bender and get going on railings next.

Maybe I'll repair that right front fender on the Tacoma and get this thread back on track someday.

 

Railings are almost done, just waiting for the steel supplier to get another ~200ft of flat so I can finish the decorative scrollwork. I blasted a bunch of 5/8" holes in a plate of 1" steel I had in the shop and used some plasma cut laminated dies from an eBay seller to make a simple manual scroll bender. Works pretty well.

 

Wow that’s pretty

 

Really impressed with the amount of work you're putting into that space, it looks great.

 

Thanks. Aesthetic beauty is important, especially if you're going to spend a ton of time in a place. "Put soul into your tools and they'll put soul back into your work."

 

Wow! I really like the galvanized frame. First I've heard of that being done.

 

Amazing s here. Thanks for sharing and keep it coming.

 

Got my railings done. Not perfect, but I'm pleased with the results.

I ran out of steel for a few days last week and took a break from the shop to run through the Sheppard Air study program for the FAA IRA (Instrument Rating Airplane) written exam. I have been dabbling with a self-study approach to the curriculum for a few months but needed to buckle down and make a move.

I'm all signed off for the high performance and complex logbook endorsements, so I flew the retractable-gear Cessna 182 out to the FAA testing center at KROS (Rush City, MN) on Friday. It was a ~90 minute motorcycle ride when I went over there for my Private exam; this time it took like 22 minutes despite having a 20 knot headwind.

I'm not on a career track in aviation, so I need to establish some deadlines for myself if I want to stay motivated to keep advancing through the ratings. With the IRA written exam out of the way, I have 24 months to meet all the training experience criteria and pass the practical checkride.

Passed the exam with a 98% score, I missed one stupid question and it's going to haunt me.