Sorry, it had a picture of your rock from a couple of months back whe I posted the reply.Aw come on, that rock is puny. Around here they're 75 miles wider and 300 miles longer.
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Welcome to Westwood Metalworks, What is he building in there?
- Thread starter Dan Dubeau
- Start date
Dan Dubeau
Ultra Member
Define Irony.....
Not being able to complete a project due to work and winter weather so you give up a couple days to build something and rearrange the shop a bit to get that material stored and out of the way so that you can literally shelve that project until spring and work on other projects over the winter. Only to be immediately rewarded with a couple days off work with nice weather where you could have just completed the initial project in the first place.... Or most of it anyway.......lol
Sunday I got some more material in, and the other shelves and stuff all rearranged and put back together. A much more efficient use of space now. Monday morning I got a text just before going in that I was pulled off the job I was supposed to be on all week and to stand by for some breakdown stuff.....Nothing Monday, Nothing Tuesday, but got a call yesterday before lunch for a snapped screw conveyor. Nice 7 hour job. Have today and tomorrow off now too because they back filled my other job already. Oh well, I got caught up on a bunch of other household projects and little things I've been putting off for a while, while staring at my phone all day waiting for it to ring.
That was pretty much the only project we have going on right now, so it's time off until after Christmas for a 3 day shutdown unless something breaks in the meantime. Another month or so of steady work and I'll be back to where I was before making the career change this past spring and I can enjoy these unexpected vacations a bit more. The sometimes large amounts of time off between projects were one of the reasons I made the switch I just need to build back a financial buffer to make them a bit more comfortable. Getting there....
Was told to expect a call this morning too, but it hasn't rang yet, so I'm heading out to the shop after my coffee to finish putting the Tormach all back together and I should be back to baseline with everything all cleaned up, organized and ready to start some machining projects. Been a long time since I've cranked handles and programmed anything. Hope I still remember how.
Not being able to complete a project due to work and winter weather so you give up a couple days to build something and rearrange the shop a bit to get that material stored and out of the way so that you can literally shelve that project until spring and work on other projects over the winter. Only to be immediately rewarded with a couple days off work with nice weather where you could have just completed the initial project in the first place.... Or most of it anyway.......lol
Sunday I got some more material in, and the other shelves and stuff all rearranged and put back together. A much more efficient use of space now. Monday morning I got a text just before going in that I was pulled off the job I was supposed to be on all week and to stand by for some breakdown stuff.....Nothing Monday, Nothing Tuesday, but got a call yesterday before lunch for a snapped screw conveyor. Nice 7 hour job. Have today and tomorrow off now too because they back filled my other job already. Oh well, I got caught up on a bunch of other household projects and little things I've been putting off for a while, while staring at my phone all day waiting for it to ring.
That was pretty much the only project we have going on right now, so it's time off until after Christmas for a 3 day shutdown unless something breaks in the meantime. Another month or so of steady work and I'll be back to where I was before making the career change this past spring and I can enjoy these unexpected vacations a bit more. The sometimes large amounts of time off between projects were one of the reasons I made the switch I just need to build back a financial buffer to make them a bit more comfortable. Getting there....
Was told to expect a call this morning too, but it hasn't rang yet, so I'm heading out to the shop after my coffee to finish putting the Tormach all back together and I should be back to baseline with everything all cleaned up, organized and ready to start some machining projects. Been a long time since I've cranked handles and programmed anything. Hope I still remember how.
Dan Dubeau
Ultra Member
Westerner just rubbing the mountains in our faces.....Sorry, it had a picture of your rock from a couple of months back whe I posted the reply.
I hope to make it out there next year to finally see those big rocks. With any luck, I might not make it back.......That's what the wife is scared of anyway......
Uhh, they just block the view, highly over ratedWesterner just rubbing the mountains in our faces.....
I hope to make it out there next year to finally see those big rocks. With any luck, I might not make it back.......That's what the wife is scared of anyway......
Dan Dubeau
Ultra Member
I could stare at that for the rest of my life and never get tired of it .
.
140mower
Don
Me too...... And I took that from the front yard....I could stare at that for the rest of my life and never get tired of it
Dan Dubeau
Ultra Member
Ya I figured....rub it in some more....lol
Now ya got me on MLS looking......
I can't complain. We've got a pretty amazing spot here, but.....Mountains......
Now ya got me on MLS looking......
I can't complain. We've got a pretty amazing spot here, but.....Mountains......
Dan Dubeau
Ultra Member
https://www.realtor.ca/real-estate/27505757/194-deste-road-lillooet-lillooet?view=imagelist
Found it. Now to convince the Wife.....I already bought this house without her permission or seeing it, I don't think I could get away with another one......
Found it. Now to convince the Wife.....I already bought this house without her permission or seeing it, I don't think I could get away with another one......
Dan Dubeau
Ultra Member
I like this one better. https://www.realtor.ca/real-estate/27475638/dl-3619-seton-lake-lillooet-lillooet
140mower
Don
I know the owners and have done some Bobcat work there .. Dennis and his wife are meticulous home owners, that would be a good one, has a decent sized shop too, although it is a quansit type....https://www.realtor.ca/real-estate/27505757/194-deste-road-lillooet-lillooet?view=imagelist
Found it. Now to convince the Wife.....I already bought this house without her permission or seeing it, I don't think I could get away with another one......
Dan Dubeau
Ultra Member
It shows they took pride in it. Sad to say, it would look much worse under my care lol. But it's a nice house and property. Not sure I could handle moving back into a town though.....Those other houses are awfully close....
historicalarms
Ultra Member
The only problem I see in that property is that it may have " A River Runs Thru it" possibility
140mower
Don
It's a good 200-300 feet above the Fraser River so it would take a serious event to take it out, and at that point we would have way more serious issues.
My house would be gone about 250' earlier as we are maybe 50-60 feet above the Fraser River and around 30 above one of its tributaries. My biggest concern is the dam and canal just up stream as both are man made, and we all know how much they can be trusted if there's a chance to profit...
historicalarms
Ultra Member
It is amazing how much water can build up in a short time with the right conditions. I dont know the height difference between normal water level & the highway bridge at Lethbridge , its a long ways down at regular times but I crossed that bridge with a loaded semi one day during a flood and the water was within 3 ft of the bridge deck...that whole valley was full to the brim. The hiways workers were putting closure barricades up as I went by.
That'll never happen.....oh,, wait,, remember the Chilcotin River.
Water front property anywhere these days can be an issue but at 300 feet up, in theory you'd be okay.
Dan Dubeau
Ultra Member
Went out to the shop to take some pics for the shop pics thread, got sidetracked and started tidying up a bit..... One thing led to another, and I puttered around for a few hours cleaning up and putting stuff away. Just a bunch of simple stuff I've wanted to do for a long time, but it never seems worth it. I'm sure we all have those little projects that pile up........
First up was my bandsaw stand. It has always bothered me that the opening was on the back side of how it sits in it's place. I never stored anything under there, and it was just wasted space. I took a quick 10 minutes to flip it around, and it's now some pretty valuable storage for some jigs and an off cut bucket.
Next up was my cordless tool area. Getting a bit crowded and overpopulated....One thing that's bothered me is that I didn't have all my chargers on a solitary power strip, and for the lesser used tools I had to plug them in. So I found an unused powerbar in the basement and mounted up under the shelf like I used to have when I first built this shelf. Now all my chargers sit up top, and they're all plugged in ready to go. I moved a couple tools around a bit to use the space a bit better too.
Before....
After
Peekaboo at the powerbar.
Maybe I'll get to those shop pics later.....
First up was my bandsaw stand. It has always bothered me that the opening was on the back side of how it sits in it's place. I never stored anything under there, and it was just wasted space. I took a quick 10 minutes to flip it around, and it's now some pretty valuable storage for some jigs and an off cut bucket.
Next up was my cordless tool area. Getting a bit crowded and overpopulated....One thing that's bothered me is that I didn't have all my chargers on a solitary power strip, and for the lesser used tools I had to plug them in. So I found an unused powerbar in the basement and mounted up under the shelf like I used to have when I first built this shelf. Now all my chargers sit up top, and they're all plugged in ready to go. I moved a couple tools around a bit to use the space a bit better too.
Before....
After
Peekaboo at the powerbar.
Maybe I'll get to those shop pics later.....
Dan Dubeau
Ultra Member
A while back (2013) I went to an auction and scored a hydraulic power pack. They had about 50 of them, and I went through all and wrote down the lot #'s of the ones that were 3 phase 230 volt (most were 575, or single phase) hoping to score a few. Anyway, long story short, this was about the 5th or 6th one in and the first one on my list. I think I got it for around $20 or $30 (if I remember right?). Right after this one, the auctioneer had enough, and decided to speed things up and auction off the entire bunch as one lot, so I lucked out and the scrappers got the rest. As they did with all the steel, and almost all other lots of material I was interested in.
I bought it to make a belt grinder, or to repower my Excello mill. Whichever came first......Since I'm not one to rush into finishing projects, and my Mill was repowered via other means a while back (thanks Rauce) I figured I was safe to use it for a belt grinder now.....A few years ago I put the reservoir on casters cause it was a PITA to keep moving it around the shop. It was tucked in behind the Tormach, so a bit of sliding block puzzle game later I had it out. Now to find a 2hp single phase motor for a shop hydraulic supply.....Maybe in another 10 years......
Today I wanted to work on another (new) project, but this was taking up space on the welding bench so I decided to rewire it for 230v and take it for a test spin before I finish designing an entire machine around it. As hoped, it runs just fine, from 30hz, up to 90hz, silky smooth and quiet as a mouse. I did have to massage out a dent in the housing that was rubbing on the fan, but that was no problem. I also ended up just buying a wheel set from vevor to save some time on the build. I will have to make an 8" drive wheel (a yak shaving adventure worthy of another thread....) though to get the belt sfm up into an acceptable window from the low speed motor. A vfd can do the rest. I'm going to hold off on this for now until the wheels come in, as I want to finish the cad design 100% first before building. It's nice knowing the motor works fine after all these years though. Boy they flew by, seems like yesterday.......
The grinder is a Jeremy Shmidt inspired design I started years ago too. I've always liked his idea of being able to tilt the belt but being able to leave the table where it is. I started changing some other stuff I didn't like such as the tensioner, the pivot point, and the general pieced togetherness of it, but he adressed some of those issues in his gen 2. I have a couple other unique Ideas, and I also wanted to incorperate dust collection directly into the design as a feature, instead of it always being an afterthought on grinder plans. It's going to live primarily in the shop (no idea where yet) so I want to be able to contain the dust better than just a 5gallon bucket full of water, but I'll be able to wheel it outside when needed. I had the perfect place for it carved out in my last iteration of the shop layout, but then I went and bought a surface grinder this spring, so.....I don't know where it's going to live now.......The base might have to get smaller than I'd like just to fit somewhere. Future Dan's problem......I hear he loves moving shit around.....
I bought it to make a belt grinder, or to repower my Excello mill. Whichever came first......Since I'm not one to rush into finishing projects, and my Mill was repowered via other means a while back (thanks Rauce) I figured I was safe to use it for a belt grinder now.....A few years ago I put the reservoir on casters cause it was a PITA to keep moving it around the shop. It was tucked in behind the Tormach, so a bit of sliding block puzzle game later I had it out. Now to find a 2hp single phase motor for a shop hydraulic supply.....Maybe in another 10 years......
Today I wanted to work on another (new) project, but this was taking up space on the welding bench so I decided to rewire it for 230v and take it for a test spin before I finish designing an entire machine around it. As hoped, it runs just fine, from 30hz, up to 90hz, silky smooth and quiet as a mouse. I did have to massage out a dent in the housing that was rubbing on the fan, but that was no problem. I also ended up just buying a wheel set from vevor to save some time on the build. I will have to make an 8" drive wheel (a yak shaving adventure worthy of another thread....) though to get the belt sfm up into an acceptable window from the low speed motor. A vfd can do the rest. I'm going to hold off on this for now until the wheels come in, as I want to finish the cad design 100% first before building. It's nice knowing the motor works fine after all these years though. Boy they flew by, seems like yesterday.......
The grinder is a Jeremy Shmidt inspired design I started years ago too. I've always liked his idea of being able to tilt the belt but being able to leave the table where it is. I started changing some other stuff I didn't like such as the tensioner, the pivot point, and the general pieced togetherness of it, but he adressed some of those issues in his gen 2. I have a couple other unique Ideas, and I also wanted to incorperate dust collection directly into the design as a feature, instead of it always being an afterthought on grinder plans. It's going to live primarily in the shop (no idea where yet) so I want to be able to contain the dust better than just a 5gallon bucket full of water, but I'll be able to wheel it outside when needed. I had the perfect place for it carved out in my last iteration of the shop layout, but then I went and bought a surface grinder this spring, so.....I don't know where it's going to live now.......The base might have to get smaller than I'd like just to fit somewhere. Future Dan's problem......I hear he loves moving shit around.....