Here are some pics of the frame I got Steve to weld up for me. Thank you Gary for the plans.... You will have to click on these images to see them full size I believe.
As you can see, it is essentially a great big "C" shape, up on caster wheels. The upper truck is sitting on top in the first picture...it is just sitting there, waiting for me to get a nice big old eight inch flat steel wheel. The bottom truck is not even there, but it will look much like the top truck, but will hold different shaped wheels depending on how I want the metal to look. it is a hand tool, and the way it works is this.....if I were to trap a wrinkled piece of metal between two rollers, it would flatten that metal out. If the bottom roller were to be rounded, like a bowling ball, the sheet of steel would find itself becoming hollowed out, like the inside of a motorcycle tank.
You can also see how excruciatingly cluttered my shop is! Well, the English Wheel frame is the big blue C shaped object in the centre! Just because, I mounted a saw set on it....best thing I ever found for holding steel sheet while you are filing the corners. It may not stay there though.
I'll post more pictures on this site as I finish building this tool, and as I learn to use it.
7 comments:
Just what is it you have against fingers? Wasn't the roofing hammer good enough? (Whell hurt Stan. Bad wheel! Bad!)
Um, "wheel hurt Stan".
I have no freakin idea what you're talking about. But it looks really cool!
Yeah, its more than just a "guy" thing Jen, this is THE tool for the "uber macho motorcycle building guy". Jesse James has it in his motorcycle shop. Paul Tuttle has it in his Orange County Choppers shop. And now "I GOT MINE!". And it is half again bigger than theirs!
Though I would LOVE to make motorcycles with it, and someday, I just might, however the purpose of this big old piece of iron is to make bumpy sheet metal objects nice and smooth.
Now it is easy enough to take a piece of sheet steel, and pound on it to make it look like an armoured breastplate, however, because you wale on it with a big old hammer, the result is full of dents, bumps and lumps. This tool will iron out those bumps, making my armoured breasplate nice and smooth, ready to use in jousting, dinner theatre, or any of a hundred kinds of pagent.
Stan's comment refers to the English Wheel used by Jesse James, the motorcycle builder in California. He calls it a "thumb flattener". Thats because Jesse has A.D.D., and can't concentrate on what he is doing, so he runs his thumb under the wheel from time to time, blackening his thumbnail, and blueing the air in his vicinity. (but he makes nice bikes!)
i have seen a nice old cast one years ago,a beautiful thing if you can find one.what are you using for the rollers?
I'll see if I can find some rollers on EBay I guess. I was going to use homemade ones, but I have been talked out of it. We'll see how much the "professional" ones cost....if it is too much, then I'll just have to make my own.
Lookin good Stag!
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