I find it amusing that my heaviest tool has the fewest moving parts. I believe it even beats my little Kubota (sans excavator).
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What's Paul up to?
- Thread starter PaulL
- Start date
Finally got the acorn table moved up the driveway:
Big casters, a couple of 2x8", and some clamps to keep them from slipping. A car jack, a bit of swearing, and boom, it's now outside my garage door, waiting for some CRS to make up the rails for my grinding jig.
At this rate I'll have it done by Christmas!
Big casters, a couple of 2x8", and some clamps to keep them from slipping. A car jack, a bit of swearing, and boom, it's now outside my garage door, waiting for some CRS to make up the rails for my grinding jig.
At this rate I'll have it done by Christmas!
Work has been insanely busy which has reduced how much work I've been getting done in the shop, and certainly my logging here.
But I did get my first solar-powered smithing heat yesterday:
I had been going to weld up a custom cart, but this $128 job from Home Depot is going to work just fine.
Getting the induction heater working was a nightmare. Significant damage in shipping ($300 partial refund at least), including a torn internal cooling hose, and a broken wire. I've had it mostly apart, inspected, and back together. Support from the seller was decent, but with a 24 hour turn-around.
My chiller is a little under-powered: I have to constrict the flow slightly to provide enough pressure to start up, but then it works fine afterwards, though I haven't put in a full day of work on it yet - just a few test heats.
But I did get my first solar-powered smithing heat yesterday:
I had been going to weld up a custom cart, but this $128 job from Home Depot is going to work just fine.
Getting the induction heater working was a nightmare. Significant damage in shipping ($300 partial refund at least), including a torn internal cooling hose, and a broken wire. I've had it mostly apart, inspected, and back together. Support from the seller was decent, but with a 24 hour turn-around.
My chiller is a little under-powered: I have to constrict the flow slightly to provide enough pressure to start up, but then it works fine afterwards, though I haven't put in a full day of work on it yet - just a few test heats.
Wow! Potential goldmine.
Not Myford day. No lathe in there.
I have never seen so many loose sockets, so that might be a clue to the holiday. They seem to be offered to some god "SnapOn".
Dan Dubeau
Ultra Member
You've got a few hundred bucks in nice tools there. Nice find!
Previous owners of my place were like that, except there wasn't that much good stuff. There are 9 outbuildings/sheds and a cottage here, not counting the animal shelters/coops and almost all of them were full of "stuff". Mostly building materials, hardware, and various farm junk. Some of it really handy to have, other stuff not so much. The cottage is still pretty much untouched in the 13 years we've been here. I'll get to it someday..... I'm cleaning one shed out this afternoon to turn into my blacksmith shop. I'm either going to get it done, or get sidetracked looking at and going through all the stuff in there lol. I dropped a few trees around it earlier today, now I'm heading back out to finish after a quick break to clean it out, and maybe run my chimney if I get that far. That might be a tomorrow job.
Previous owners of my place were like that, except there wasn't that much good stuff. There are 9 outbuildings/sheds and a cottage here, not counting the animal shelters/coops and almost all of them were full of "stuff". Mostly building materials, hardware, and various farm junk. Some of it really handy to have, other stuff not so much. The cottage is still pretty much untouched in the 13 years we've been here. I'll get to it someday..... I'm cleaning one shed out this afternoon to turn into my blacksmith shop. I'm either going to get it done, or get sidetracked looking at and going through all the stuff in there lol. I dropped a few trees around it earlier today, now I'm heading back out to finish after a quick break to clean it out, and maybe run my chimney if I get that far. That might be a tomorrow job.
On Wednesday my buddy Matt showed up with some steel - 31" length of 4 1/2" "Ultimo" steel. Some holdover from the '50s, probably related to 4340.
So I did what any right thinking man would do and sliced an inch off to figure out if I could squish into a more usable shape in my forge. It only took my little saw 55 minutes to get through it. I probably need a blade with fewer teeth.
Anyhow, the answer is "yes" and "no". My industrial beating machines are just too small to do it efficiently. After 40 minutes of not enough power I stopped here:
It's certainly a better shape, and thicker, though still cupped in the middle. That tells me I'd need a bigger hammer to get the upset through another inch and a half of material.
So next time I'll cut a thicker slug, then slice off the cheeks to make some 2" stock to work from.
So I did what any right thinking man would do and sliced an inch off to figure out if I could squish into a more usable shape in my forge. It only took my little saw 55 minutes to get through it. I probably need a blade with fewer teeth.
Anyhow, the answer is "yes" and "no". My industrial beating machines are just too small to do it efficiently. After 40 minutes of not enough power I stopped here:
It's certainly a better shape, and thicker, though still cupped in the middle. That tells me I'd need a bigger hammer to get the upset through another inch and a half of material.
So next time I'll cut a thicker slug, then slice off the cheeks to make some 2" stock to work from.
Somehow I've not kept up documenting my shop work. I've been holed up the last few weeks building this beast - a half-wheel raclette melter for an upcoming party I'm hosting.
Got to mess around with the raising/lowering mechanism - the crank and shafts giving me 8mm distance per turn, as well as element design. This one hits just about 1kw which should do just fine. It's held by some cut kiln brick pieces and the whole element structure stabilized by the tinfoil reflector.
After an hour of running the electrical box and lift mechanism aren't warming up, so I'm good to go.
I just don't want to cut into the wheel of cheese I already bought for the party, so I think the first test will involve a smaller chunk stuck onto those spikes.
Got to mess around with the raising/lowering mechanism - the crank and shafts giving me 8mm distance per turn, as well as element design. This one hits just about 1kw which should do just fine. It's held by some cut kiln brick pieces and the whole element structure stabilized by the tinfoil reflector.
After an hour of running the electrical box and lift mechanism aren't warming up, so I'm good to go.
I just don't want to cut into the wheel of cheese I already bought for the party, so I think the first test will involve a smaller chunk stuck onto those spikes.
Must admit. I had to google raclette melter. Then I asked my wife if she knew what a raclette melter was and the reply was "Sure! for melting cheese for type of fondue". So there you go. She gets to say to me yet again, "You know nothing John ..."
The best part of the half wheel version is the very interactive service!
Me too! Not a clue what it was!
Thanks @PaulL for the intro to rachelle. Santa is bringing one of these to the family (just ordered, cyber week sale and free delivery)
Attachments
So the cheese melter exceeded all expectations this weekend! 35ish folks came through to eat our way through that wheel, and I dare say there was not much left over! A few potatoes joined the butter clams I forgot to put out with the oysters to make a nice lunch chowder.
