Thread: 55 Wagon Progress

Tweet

Originally Posted by rspears

Gotta say I was a bit surprised, not to read"....so we went over and found a piece of flat stock and made up a die set for the PullMax....."

I'm with you Roger.
Some of the ingenious things I've seen made /done on this thread (and others on this site,) leave me shaking my head in wonder.

I've said it before: it makes me feel inadequate.

Now to fold the outer perimeter of our air cleaner base. I thought of using a tipping wheel, but that appeared to be rather close for comfort. So a curved piece of bar stock in the scrap pile (resource inventory) was selected and a drum sander used to fine tune the radius to match our part.














Then a hammer form was made to stretch and shape the "horn" of the base. Quite a bit of stretch needed but you don't know until you try...








Video of hammer action:


https://youtu.be/am3PNWl467o


Alas, cracking occurred, so the horn was trimmed just down from the radius and a piece of 18ga was hemmed, rolled, and welded, to form a band. The band was tacked up for a test fit, we'll get it fully welded tomorrow and get all the parts bolted up with some rivnuts and press nuts..

















Yesterday we got our replacement tube from TP Tools for the Skat Blast 1536 cabinet. Can't remember the last time it worked like this, so I'd guess we've had a "leak" for a while now.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-VWNn523SDc


And since we replaced the nozzle unnecessarily, we now have a good used media blast cabinet gun for sale. Has the High Volume power head (20-25 cfm required) and tungsten carbide nozzle, if anyone needs one. I think $50 plus shipping would be fair. No trigger, intended for use with foot pedal. For a hopper/suction machine, it does work nicely..

I know some of the things I've seen you do in this thread were over the top... but that one above is out of this world!

More travel for the day job, had to install a 24' video wall. Back in the shop finally, progress on the air cleaner continues.. We had some stainless mesh left over from our speaker grill fabrication that we plan on using to address air flow inside our pocket for the ignition coil.





An 1-1/2" Rotacut is used to provide the hole in the pocket, two pilot holes spaced 1/2" apart will expand the hole for us.. The venturi effect inside the breather should promote air flow across the coil.














Next, to hold the mesh in place some retaining rings will be needed. We'll use some MDF trimmed to size to fabricate these...








Or the action version....


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y9xRENMU9l8





The newly formed part has a tight hold on the hammer form, so much that we can clamp it in the vise, drill the two pilot holes to match the pocket, and drill out two 1-1/2" Rotacut holes without the part budging..


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wVM_iv-XZdw


The dynabride belt sander cleans up the points into flats, the side flanges are trimmed to size with a roloc sander, and then we can roll to fit the inside of the pocket.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OyHC0p9NKrE


test fit....


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7DxT-oGXcfk


Holes are added for some 3/32 rivets to clear the mesh





Aluminum pop rivets are used to get a better view of the final look before we blow it apart for priming..





https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z9-Hp-O925M


We will be using press nuts in the coil to ease the pain of assembly, and we also added some more shiny stuff on the front end..

You make everything you do look so effortless. Always cool to read and learn from your build threads

I agree.. this build certainly stretches the imagination as to the limits of what could be. Well done Robert.

What Steve and Mike said.
I'm going to go into withdrawal when you finish this project.

For your continued entertainment , the next project will be a 1954 Divco milk truck.. We do have a FEW dents to fix...





This truck had two small rust spots smaller than a pencil eraser to fix. A tornado went through the area and the shear force winds pushed the barn over that it was being stored inside..

That should make for an interesting project. I remember them from my youth when milk was delivered at your door in glass containers.

your metal work is fabulous !!!

Originally Posted by Navy7797

your metal work is fabulous !!!

What he said.

With your habits of thinking outside the square, the new project should be well worth following too.
I'm looking forward to it.

Robert, more outstanding work as usual. You definitely make it look easy.

Thanks for checking out our progress fellas!!


Some equipment repairs were in order over the New Year's break, our tried and true Lathem time clock in the shop had given up the ghost. In speaking to Lathem, this model has been obsolete for some time and the only parts available are the print ribbon and a replacement motor. Doesn't help me with this little part...








Quite used to this lack of availability in car parts, how hard can it be? A $1.99 package of music wire from Hobby Lobby and some round nose pliers, we are back in business....











Next on the list, I had received a pair of Fairmount wire edge pliers for Christmas, which had quite a twist to the handles where it was difficult for the catch to swing over the adjacent handle:





Since these aren't available for return at the local hardware store (obsolete), and also since they are drop forged, I decided to do some heating and twisting. The Meco torch was used to bring the handles to a light tan color.... and a twisting device employed with a bit of tension via ratchet strap as the handles cooled...

















....and here's a video showing their use on a test sample. These do a nice job of locking the wire tight to the flange as you stake and wrap the wire..





Finally, since the artist in the family had asked a few months ago, looking for a canvas to paint, I pointed her to the Lennox. Here is the layout on the one side in Sharpie in prep for painting..





As far as the wagon, we are still here, back to one of the more boring stages..... applying epoxy primer and making black dust on the floor...




















And in the planning stage for one of the trim details, the owner had ordered a ball milled dash insert for the wagon many months ago, which was far too 1990's billet. So naturally I breathed a sigh of relief when it did not fit the dash contour. (go figure) I was leaning toward an engine turned panel as it is more of a hotrod flavor. Unfortunately, it is more of a TRADITIONAL hot rod flavor, and we were in the gray area there as well. So in the meantime, a buddy has a shop in Wilmington DE, and does absolutely fabulous detail work (had a hand in the Double Bubble wagon's fabrication), and has been using this ribbed stainless sheet for dash inserts and other details.. (his picture and work)





This gives a nice classy and timeless look that is a better fit to the flavor of the car we have, so that is the direction we're headed... So to test a theory in adding a finished edge around the perimeter, we broke out the false wire edge Pullmax dies and installed them in the Lennox for a test run on some 19 gauge stainless. The "backstop" was setup to be just shy of a full wrap, which should give us a slight gap for the ribbed stainless to slide into. Our edge strips will be "outfitted" with some hidden press studs to hold it in place on the dash.








A little bit of polishing and that may just work.....

I like the dash trim, that will look nice. The artwork is very cool, she's talented.

Cosmo and I approved the Mice in the clockworks! Way COOL! The dash trims should be very classy / elegant.