My take on a bed rack - now with 270 deg awning mount

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Relic6.3

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Do you have a finished product yet? Been watching this... like watching Michael's build for the back of his rig. Suspense is killing me.
 

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breathed a little life into this over the last week or so.

Lacking some of the tools need to finish this on my own has been the biggest issue stopping this from moving forward.

So I have been rounding out the shop tools with a new addition or two.

First up, a Finger brake so I can remake the mounting brackets for the tube bars. I picked up the heavy duty 20 ton SWAG offroad kit.

20200615_185315.jpg20200615_185622.jpg20200616_184936.jpg


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By the time I Reached this stage, it had gotten pretty hot in the garage, and I was soaked. Plus, it gave the metal time to cool off before I make another pass to clean up the ugly welds. ( It has been 20 years since I stick welded)

The other project involved adding the ability to powder coat small parts. I picked upm the Harbor Freight Powder coat gun and took an old toaster oven and gutted the controls, added rock wool insulation and built a custom PID control box for it.

20200606_080135.jpg

while the current oven is to small to do the bed rack, it does let me practice on smaller parts such as my Zip Tie mounting tabs I designed for my roof rack, or any series 10 aluminum extrusion for that matter

20200605_203906.jpg


Next step is to pick up a tube bender. I recently found out my dad has the 110v Hydraulic power unit The bender can make use off. So after a long wait things are moving forward slightly faster than a glacier .

I also need to hit up the local steel supplier and see about some buying some scrap by the pound to practice my welding. I have gotten really rusty..
 

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testing out a 3D printed dimple die... 2" hole in 16 gauge mild steel

I have a few idea for the bed rack where this may come handy.20200624_123739 (1).jpg20200624_123749 (1).jpg
 
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looks like this is going to die the slow death, or at least long term life support until I can get a tube bender bought. I was hoping it would have been finished weeks ago, but life has gotten in the way.
Quick update...

This is going to have some life breathed into it...

Just placed an order for a new JD2 model 32 tube bender along with a TIG welder.

been working on getting the shop outfitted with some big ticket items.
 
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Pyrotech

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Been practicing with the tig welder. Bit frustrating learning a new skill. Especially when you are stuck doing the self teaching route.

At least I have some past experience with stick and some gas welding. So it is not 100% .foreign in concept.

Couple shots from today's practice seasion on 1/4" mild steel


20201114_151837.jpg

20201114_153049.jpg

I also ground down the first days practice plate,

20201114_102334.jpg

A bit of porosity at the start and appeared to.clear up at the end....

Gonna try and pick up the steel to build the bender stand this upcoming week. And finish assembly of the bender itself and the air over hydraulic, and hopefully get some tube in before anybupcomming shutdown somincan practice bending and welding tube
 

M Rose

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I’m glad to see you are still going to be building this.
I don’t know much about TIG, but it looks like you are moving the toungsten too fast. The stack of
Coins should be a rainbow color.
 

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I’m glad to see you are still going to be building this.
I don’t know much about TIG, but it looks like you are moving the toungsten too fast. The stack of
Coins should be a rainbow color.
It didn't look like very much penetration to me. I'm not familiar with tig but with arch welder you can see it penetrating as you weld. I bought a flux welder to play with one of these days. I like the idea of being able to weld sheet metal..
In the past I have only used acetylene torch and bailing wire or flux copper wire for sheet metal. Flux seems simple and will weld 1/4" steel nicely. I like because no gas is needed and any 110v outlet will do. You could probably use a car battery with inverter for power.
 

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It didn't look like very much penetration to me. I'm not familiar with tig but with arch welder you can see it penetrating as you weld. I bought a flux welder to play with one of these days. I like the idea of being able to weld sheet metal..
In the past I have only used acetylene torch and bailing wire or flux copper wire for sheet metal. Flux seems simple and will weld 1/4" steel nicely. I like because no gas is needed and any 110v outlet will do. You could probably use a car battery with inverter for power.
Yes no penetration.... the color told me that alone... also the puddle tells that he’s not welding with his wrist and the power settings are low...
A89D742B-13D8-4FB7-A7C1-430854DD03EB.jpeg
 

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Well... this project suffered a bit of a setback, due to stupidity..

it seems taht when I bought the bender and Die, I bought the Die for the wrong bender . how I have no clue but I did.. so now I have to jump through hoops to get the old returned wait for the refund, and then hope the wife doesn't spend it, which she will... so I will end up having to save up for the replacement die.

All because of me being stupid.

So frustrated at the moment...
 
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Pyrotech

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I understand the frustration.... I’ve done the same thing multiple times.
20201201_184625.jpg
well... at least the stand for the bender is coming along nicely. need to do some clean up on the mounting plate, I needed to cut some clearance for the the air over hydraulic mounting bracket to bolt up . and prep the stand for paint.
 
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Got the bed brackets bent up today.... Discovered a few minor adjustments that will likely get done at final assembly.




View attachment 122343

View attachment 122344
View attachment 122342

I may need to extend the bolt slots a bit.

View attachment 122341


Top of the bracket is a hair longer than I would like, once the bed bars are welded on I may trim this a bit to keep it flush with the bed side.
redesigned this bracket, using the knowledge learned by the above mistake, and learning better ways of modeling a sheet metal part in CAD. I think I am gonna 3D print a slice of the bracket for a test fit.

Also in the very very early stages of designing my own CNC plasma table, that should be a fun project
 
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Test printed a slice of the brackets to double check the slot location and over all fit..

20201212_125842.jpg

need to shift the slot down ~1/4".. that should get the mounting bolt in the center, and allow for equal room on each side to adjust as needed.

20201212_125831.jpg
 

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Test print #2... only a portion of the bracket printed again

20201213_152606.jpg

Turned out much better with the slot moved down

20201213_152652.jpg


Once I had confirmed the new design, I sent the files off to the laser cutter.
 
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Prototyping with a 3D printer is a very good idea... how’s the CNC table coming along?
 

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Prototyping with a 3D printer is a very good idea... how’s the CNC table coming along?
Still working on a design for that.. planning a on a table with a 4'x4' cut area thinking 2x2 tube for the base table 3060 extrusion for the gantry 25mm linear rail s with 20mm ball screws possible downdraft over a water table

And that is about the extent of a very flexible design in my head.

I need to spend some more time researching. And making notes etc not to mention shopping for parts.

The table size is pretty set in my mind so I might start putting that together in a few weeks. Q
 
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Pyrotech

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The flats for the bed brackets arrived., remember the first set i ran into an issue where the part was bent wrong. This was mainly due to how I designed the original part and a lack of understanding of the sheet metal design tools in inventor2020....

As you can see this time they turned out to be much more useable over the prior version. They sit on the top of the bed nicely with no overhang and the s3/8" slot is centered on the mounting rail. I added the slot to give a bit of room if I ever needed to raise the bed rack. To compensate for sealing material or a metal bed rail cap in the future

20201225_091425.jpg

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Now to bed up the next 5 brackets...

Btw... I am been very happy with the SWAG offroad finger brake that picked up. Turns out it and the press have been an extremely useful addition to the garage. Amd has gotten far more use than I orginally anticipated

20200619_140731.jpg
 
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