Rookie wanna-be weldor starting to make some cool things!

I was wondering how you guys were making out. AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!! I see! Very creative use of scrap. Your anvil stand looks factory made. Very nice, indeed!

The look on your son's face is priceless! Very nice!!!!!!!!

You need to post up some piccys of what you two are making. I'm excited to see your craftsmanship!

BTW, I have more steel whenever you need some more. There's only about 12,000 lbs or so tucked under the building now.

I also just scored several thousand feet of 1/2" liquidtite conduit. For those who don't know, it's a water tight, outdoor, direct burial or exposed, flexible electrical conduit. Great for feeding a heat pump, spa, water fountain, pole light, etc, etc... Free to ADVers... I only took about 1% of what's available. It will all be trashed at work soon, so I took about as much as my little 10' x 10' building could handle. Just hate seeing stuff like that go to the dump. It's used, but I have it stored in neat rolls ranging from 20 to 50 feet in length. PM for details...

Holy Christ! I just read this entire thread from the beginning. I've enjoyed (a little enviously) watching you build your shop and tools. The last fab job I undertook was going to be a screenprinting press, but i ended up scrapping the entire project after losing access to the welder I was using, after revising the design a few times. I would not admit how sad a day that was, I was just loading crap in the truck trying to gain metal money.

But quickly, I will show the projects I had success with. A rear rack and pannier braces for mermite pannier cans I made before traveling coast to coast.








Inspired by Kubiak's flat bar design.



It had a simple straight crossbar installed at this point. This pannier hoop was also later scrapped. And the mermite cans too. Oh well. Big, dumb boxes served me well while I had them. Had some sway and flex since they were not attached to a lower forward point like the XR650L has on the frame. All this stuff started happening around page 55 of my XL600 rebuild thread: http://www.advrider.com/forums/showthread.php?t=242358
And the cross-country trip takes place in ADV format on: http://www.advrider.com/forums/showthread.php?t=375864

I'm about to do it again on this '87 XT600. I'm back from Portland in N.C. again, ready to take the west coast land voyage in 6 months. I have a love affair with mid-80's big thumpers, I guess. This one's special though. And unlike the XL which had no racks and was hard to find any rack for at all, I got a top rack with it, and there are pannier racks available in Italy made for it. I will probably buy those, but if given the opportunity, I would love to make the roadtrip up to work in your shop for a few consecutive days just to have the creative input on the rack that I make for the bike. I want to make my own soft bags this time around, mainly because I am heavily into bag making and some leather working at this point. My favorite idea is to get the italian pannier racks


and then cut them up to install these BRmoto loops into them;

http://brmoto.com/racks/diy-side-rack-parts.html
and fab a crossbar and go from there with the textile works. Even if I have to make my own cable nets to protect them from theft.

Hope my creativity is stimulating the same brains that enjoyed this thread as much as I have.
Cheers to all who have contributed.
Joel

Excellent work, Joel!!! Those are some fine looking racks that you made.

I like 80's era duallys myself and so do thousands of others here.

I dream of making coast to coast trips like you are doing. Maybe I'll get a chance to in the near future.


By all means, come on up. I'm generous with my playtoys.


...and I have some more goodies in the mail! I just upgraded my JD2 bender to full electric over hydro and have a 2" shoe on the way so I can attempt to fab a deerslayin' bumper for my Tundra. I also ordered up a bunch of 3/16" and 5/16" al. plate because I'm going to try to make it light and strong. Pics when the big brown truck starts showing up.

Another quick little weekend project to throw into the mix...


My daughter wanted a super deeee-luxe Piggy Paradise guinea pig cage. Sure! Gotta keep the womenfolk in the house happy.

Plus, I've been itching to use the shear on an actual project. After taking some measurements, a few quick stomps, and I was ready to weld! Suh-weet! No edges to dress with a grinder. Coolio.





My weld uniformity is getting better by the project. I'm fortunate to have a co-worker who's a Certified Weldor. He also used to be an instructor. One day last week, he had me run a couple beads while he watched. He told me I was introducing filler wire way too early, I was moving a bit too fast, I didn't have enough heat to get the toes of the weld wide enough onto each side of the weld, and finally, that I was bouncing when I advanced the torch - almost like a leap frog. Whew!!! With all the new thoughts in my mind, I tried to correct all my mistakes at once. Thanks for the help, Jim! I'm getting better already with the advice and help you gave me!

Base complete. Now it's time for the super-deeeee-luxe high rise portion. My daughter drew it all out how she wanted it, so now I just need to make the customer happy.



And here's the Bambi smack...



Not terrible for 60mph, I guess. It's pretty well confined to the bumper. If I find any other damage underneath, SF will cut me a supplemental damage check.

I can't wait to get crackin' next week when all the goodies show up. I think now's a good time to break down and buy a JD2 tubing notcher as well... Monday.

Those welds look much better!

added fuel capacity to my xr650l from 2.8 gallons to 7.2 gallons by welding bigger wings on the stock tank.

heres a finished pic.

cant seem to get the pic to enlarge on the last pic but heres a pic of another tank i made before the last one, it was 6.2 gallons.

found a pic of the 7.2 gallon tank.

Thanks, EG!

I've been having fun working on the Piggy Penthouse today. I love the smell of argon in the morning.

Without a doubt, you are a master craftsman, Kubiak!

Honda needs to give you a job in their R&D department. Your bikes wouldn't sit in the showroom for long!


Do you have to make a crossover tube to get all the fuel out of the wings?

thanks kirkster70! yea i weld in fittings for the wings so i can get every last drop of fuel. on the 7.2 gallon i even installed a fuel pump so the carb would not starve for fuel when getting low.

I'll help you out with whatever projects you have going on too. I miss being in metal shops, and yours is really coming along. If you can host or let me pitch a tent, I'll gladly be able to come for 3 days so a project can get finished. I'm in Carrboro, N.C., I'll have to see where you're located to figure out riding time, etc. PM me some time about it.

Looking forward to the truck bumper. We've got a lot to discuss about leather work too. 'Bout to make a seat cover for my XT when I get the industrial walking foot sewing machine in a week or so.

Kirk,

where do you get your DOM tubing?

When you're welding frames and racks on your bikes, do you do anything with the electrical systems first? I wanted to make a rack for my DR, but was worried about damaging the electrical system.

I'm sure we can work something out. It will probably have to wait until my bumper is complete. I have a limited time window to get that knocked out. I will let you know...

I've been using speedymetals, industrial metal sales . com, and a few others I've stumbled upon. I've been buying small qtys, so shipping has been a non-issue.

Local yards charge shearing fees, so it's a wash when buying small amounts. The shearing fees = the shipping fees.

If I ever make it to the big leagues, then I'll buy large amounts local. Until then, I'll just do the online thing.


I clamp the ground right next to where I'm tacking for the shortest return path to ground. I've never disconnected the battery on a bike I'm fabbing on, and I've never had any issues. As a precaution, I probably should, though.

Then again, everything I've fabbed to has been carbureted with no ECU. In the future, I will take the extra step to disconnect the battery and ground. 5 minutes work could save lots of time and money and frustration.

The Piggy Penthouse project is coming right along.



All aluminum TIG so far. I'm having fun welding angles I've never attempted before, and using the stomp shear like a mad man. I like hearing the ring from the scrap al. hitting the floor. RIIIIIIINNNNNG!!!!!



I make little hiding spots for Piggy. This is mostly scrap from making panniers. It's .080" 5052. The tube is from a handle from who-knows-what that has been in the building for 16 years. Chop chop! Not a handle anymore! It's pretty thin, and has been a bit of a challenge to weld to the .080".

I'm still learning all the features of the Dynasty. I was reading where the Hz can be increased for a pinpoint inside corner arc. 120 is usually good for most welds. I turned it up to 200 Hz, and it sounded like an angry bee hive! Heheheh. I used that setting on the tube welds and could tell a big difference. No arc wander whatsoever. Then I used 60hz for blending an outside corner on a fusion weld with no filler. Pretty friggin' amazing. Clothes don't make the man. Tools do. Heheheh....

I have yet to use the pulser control, but could have used that in front of the box-looking area to keep that little landing from warping so badly. Maybe I'll give it a shot when I enclose the ramps. Projects like this are great for learning things, so I'm having fun figuring it all out. Getting more hood time is what it's all about. Plus, no one is likely to get injured from flubbing any of this cage, so I can experiment more than I would on something else.

I'm trying to knock this out a couple hours at a time when in from work. That way I can get right on the bumper on my next break if all goes well...after I run all the argon out.

You can see where I got a couple pieces a bit hot. Warpy warpy. Every little bit helps, so this is a fun little project to get me all "learned up".

Work on the Taj-ma-piggy continues...



I start trimming out the ramps...



Thing's starting to look like a kitchen appliance.



I've been working about 2 hours a day on this after getting up from night shift. 8-10 hours worth of solid TIG practice. Every little bit helps! Plus, it's been fun to work on.



One of my better welds. I'm not going to show my ugly ones! Heheheh! This is an "autogenous" weld. Basically, no filler was used. One edge was hanging over the other enough to fuse the two together with no filler. Pretty neat-o in my book. Speaking of books...



I highly recommend this one. This is from my community college stick class in '06, but it covers all facets of all welding. The best part is the practice exercises in the back of the book. It also covers destructive testing, and touches on metallurgy. Great book. I look at it often for big words like autogenous.

This book combined with all the excellent help I've gotten on this site has really helped me to understand what I'm trying to do.



5/16" 6061-T6 aluminum shows up for my attempt at a winch bumper. This will be the framing. Behind it is two sheets of 3/16" 5052 for the exterior cosmetics. These 3) 2'x4' sheets weigh 78lbs. I'm hoping I ordered enough. I'm helping a friend fab a rack to put a top box on a Burgie400 today, but hope to get on the bumper right after that. I'm chomping at the bit to get started!

Until next time...

As the proud owner of an uber-heavy, steel Ranch Hand bumper/winch carrier, I'm looking forward to this aluminum bulid.

BTW- the pig palace is coming along nicely...

Thanks, DD!

Is the backside of your bumper fully boxed?

Are you running a 12,000lb winch? What's your deepest point on the winch front to back?

Thanks!