Welding Table

I've needed a welding table for quite a while.  I happened upon this one at a local shop - destined for the scrap yard.  It's not exactly what I would have built had I made one from scratch, but the price was right 😁.  Follow along as I turn it into a mobile workstation by adding storage, a vise, casters, and level feet.

Sitting in the shop after I brought her home

Plug 'em up!

That's a top-quality item

Since the table had these "holes" plasma cut through the top, I assume it had a vise mounted here previously.  The first order of business was to fill these things in.  I clamped an aluminum backing plate to the underside of the table and filled the holes using my MIG welder.  A backing plate gives the weld puddle something to lay against so that it stays in place.  Aluminum and brass are nice materials to use when working with steel since the two won't fuse together.

Aluminum backing plate

I couldn't reach the centermost hole with a clamp, but luckily I was able to hold my aluminum plate in place with some welding magnets.

Welding magnets to the rescue

After welding

After the holes were filled with weld (making sure that they were filled above flush with no undercuts), I had to grind them down to flush with the tabletop.  I roughed them out with a 40-grit grinding wheel in the angle grinder and then finished up with an 80-grit flap disc.  While I had the flap disc on the grinder, I ran around the table and knocked down every booger and sharp spot that I found.

After smoothing

Vise Vise Baby

Now that I had the top smoothed out, I decided to mount my newly restored Reed vise to it.  If you haven't seen it, I documented the restoration of this vise here.  You may notice two details in the next picture.  There are a bunch of abandoned hole locations marked on the top.  Because of the supports under the top, It took me a few attempts to find a spot that was close to the corner and still allowed all four bolts to be used.  Also, the holes aren't square to the edge of the table.  I learned when mocking up the vise that when its swivel base is locked, its jaws aren't square to it's mounting holes.  I decided that I'd rather have a square vise than square bolt holes.

I drilled the holes for clearance with 1/2" bolts, and I ended up using carriage bolts to mount the vise.  I really like the clean look they create, and thankfully they didn't try to spin on me while I was tightening them up.

Time for a barely-related side story...  I recently learned that I, much like you, have been using keyless drill chucks incorrectly for millennia.  I didn't believe it either, but I've seen the error in my ways and I'm here to show you the light.  Next time you're using your drill, tighten the chuck as you normally would.  Once it's tight, spin the barrel in the opposite direction until it clicks.  If you feel / hear it click, you have a locking chuck and you just increased it's holding power!  If it just loosens, pick up your freshly broken drill bit and feel free to curse my name.

New holes for the vise

In her new home

Caster?  I hardly know her!

Now that I had a decent work surface, I could continue my project by making a set of brackets to hold some swivel casters that I had on the shelf.  I also had about 9 1/4" of this 3" x 1/4" wall square tubing lying around.

Caster materials

I cut the tubing in half to get two roughly 4 5/8" long pieces, and then set them up in the bandsaw so that each piece would be split lengthwise.  The pieces were set at an angle so that they would taper from 2" tall down to 1" tall (approximately).

Cutting the tube in half

I'm the king of sketchy set-ups!

With the pieces all split in half, I cleaned up all the edges with the flap disc and rounded the corners over while I was at it.  I put the pieces in the vise, drilled and then tapped them to accept M8 x 1.25 screws (Yeah, I'm not happy about metric either, but it's what I could get my hands on easily).  With the holes threaded, I could bolt on the casters.

All drilled

Tapping

All four caster mounts

It was now time to mount the caster brackets to the table.  Using shims between the legs and the floor, I raised the legs about 1/2" above the floor.  I noticed that the table was a little twisted, so I settled on getting the center of the table level and cut down on its teetering.

Next, I used the flap wheel to knock the paint off the legs roughly where the new casters were going to be mounted.  Then, it was a simple matter of holding the bracket in place and welding it in place.  I rested the casters on the floor while putting the brackets in place so they would keep the top level when on the wheels.

I repeated the same process three more times and I wound up with a wheely easy-to-move table.

All four casters in place

As you may have noticed, I mounted the casters on the inside of the legs - my shins will thank me later.

Four feet from the finish line

Now that the table was on its casters, it was time to add leveling feet.  I sliced off some 3/8" x 2 1/2" bar that I've been using up over the years.  These blanks were then cleaned up on the mill so that they would all be the same width, and have some taper on the ends to match the inside of the channel that makes the table's legs.

Cleaning up the foot mounts in the mill

While they were still together, I clamped them to the table of my baby drill press, drilled a pilot hole, and then a 21/64" hole for the upcoming 3/8" - 16 tap.  Bonus points if anyone notices where I screwed up with the foot mounts.  Thank goodness it's easy to fill gaps with a MIG welder!

Drilling the foot mounts while all clamped together

Tapping the foot mounts

I salvaged these feet from our old washer on its way to the scrap yard a while back

Ready to be welded in place

With everything assembled, I cranked the feet to the same height and welded them in place inside the channel.  It was a similar process to the caster mounts.  I placed them at such a height that they can pick the casters off of the ground by about 1/16", and just about tuck completely out of the way when I'm rolling the table around.

The heat from welding loosened up the thread locker that was holding the nuts in place.  I was a little bent out of shape about it, until I realized that I could then take the nuts off, and place them on the top of the threaded portion of the feet.  A little tack weld holds them in place now, and I can use a socket on a ratchet (or impact gun) to raise and lower the feet - way easier than an open-end wrench!

All done...ish

Shelve it where the sun don't shine

Now that I had all the planned metalwork for the table out of the way, I shifted my focus to storage and usability.  I cut a scrap piece of 3/4" plywood to form a shelf inside the angle iron members at the bottom.  This shelf now houses an intermediate chest that has sat unused for years.  It now houses my grinding wheels, grinder wrenches, a large engineers hammer, layout and marking tools, MIG pliers, etc. - everything that I would normally use at this table.  LEAN, baby!  This shelf is also proving to be a nice catch-all for miscellaneous stuff that hasn't found a permanent home in the shop yet.

All done

If the primer, bare metal, and welding smoke ever starts to bother me, I'll consider cleaning up and painting the new additions.  Until then, I plan on using this bad boy for work!

This was a rewarding project, even if it took longer than I had expected to wrap up.  It allowed me to start using my old vise again, and now I have a decent place to do metalwork or spread out parts for other projects.  Anyone want to take a guess at what this upcoming project is?

An upcoming project...

Sorry for all the puns, I guess I'm channeling my inner Bob Belcher tonight.

Thanks for reading!

Firewood Processor Controller

I worked on this project about a year ago.  I realized recently that I had just enough pictures and a fuzzy enough memory to pull off a blog entry.  Enjoy...

A friend of mine has a firewood processor that was having some electrical issues last year.  The manufacturer didn't use an enclosure that was rated to be outside in the rain, so the inside was always damp and he was replacing components regularly because of corrosion and rust.

Original controller

Oh, the humanity!

It took some convincing, but he brought the machine over to my shop, and I got to work.  The plan was to keep the design of the controls the same, but to use higher quality components.  I started by making a parts list for the new controller, which included new pushbuttons and cable glands that would maintain the NEMA 4 rating of our new enclosure.

In case you don't know, NEMA is the National Electrical Manufacturers Association.  They created a standard that dictates how resistant electrical enclosures and other components are to the ingress of dust, water, and other things you won't want mixing with the pixies in there.  NEMA 4 basically means that when assembled correctly, it will be waterproof (within reason).

With our parts on order, it was time to figure out how the existing controller worked.  I spent some time rooting around in there, writing down connections between components and poking arounf with a multimeter.  It took a few tries, but I was able to sketch up a schematic that appeared to match the existing controller.

After the new parts were delivered, I had to transpose the schematic because the terminals were configured differently on the relay sockets. This involved comparing the old and new sockets with a multimeter and making a table that related the terminals on the two versions.  Then I had to redraw my schematic.

Final schematic, drawn with handiCAD

With my new schematic in hand, it was time to start building the new panel.  I started by mocking up the new relays and terminal blocks on a section of DIN rail, and laying it on the subpanel of the enclosure. I kept it towards the bottom of the panel because I would need room in the panel for the cables (all eight of them) to enter the enclosure, and also because the height of the relays would interfere with the pushbuttons.

Once I was happy with the locations of everything, I drilled and tapped two holes in the panel to mount the DIN rail.  I then screwed the rail onto the panel and snapped on the components.  I then drilled three 7/8" diameter holes in the front of the enclosure for the pushbuttons.  I kept the layout of the front identical to the old enclosure so that I wouldn't screw up my friend's muscle memory when he was running this thing later.

With the components in place, it was time to use my schematic to connect the components on the panel together with some 14 gauge THHN wire.

New controller before the notch was added.

In a prime example of my supreme planning prowess, I now had to disassemble what I had constructed so that I could add clearance in the subpanel for the eight cables to pass through.  I took the components off of the rail, and drilled two holes to serve as the inside corners of the area I was going to remove.  Then, I went to the bandsaw to cut from the edge to the holes, and then from hole to hole - making a nice notch with rounded inside corners.

After a little filing to smooth out the edges, it was almost time to reassemble - after I drilled holes in the back of the enclosure for the new cable glands.  I laid them out to be as close as possible so that the cables coming through them would fit neatly inside my newly cut notch.  With the holes drilled, I could install the cable glands, and reinstall the subpanel and all my components.

With the new controller assembled, it was time to remove the old one from the machine.  To maintain order, I labeled the cables as I removed them, and then unbolted the old box from the machine.  To maintain it's NEMA rating, the new enclosure needed to be mounted from the back into four threaded inserts that the manufacturer installed.  This meant making a pair of uprights with 1" angle iron, drilling matching holes, and welding them to the frame of the processor.

Octopuss.  The old enclosure can be seen in the background.

When mounting the new enclosure, I decided to lay it back at an angle.  I did this for two reasons: First, it felt more comfortable to me, so it seemed like a better choice from an ergonomic standpoint.  Secondly, after removing some of the ends of the cables due to corrosion, some of them didn't have quite enough slack to land in the box when it was perfectly upright.  Dang!

I had some cans of knock-off John Deere green spray paint that was a surprisingly close match to the paint on the machine, so I shot the new brackets with a few coats to keep the rust to a minimum.  After the paint had dried and I mounted the new controller, I used the schematic and my labels to land the cables in their new home.

Inside the new controller, after the install

It was all done.  Nothing left to do but test it.  Would it work?  Would it explode?  My friend came over to help me find out.  He fired the machine up, put it through its paces, and... it operated just as it should - what a relief!

Having lived with the previous, janky enclosure for a quite a while before, he was suspicious that this new box would hold up to the elements.  To put his mind at ease, we sprayed it with the garden hose for a few minutes (he seemed a little shocked at my testing methods).  We did find one very slow leak at one of the cable glands, thanks to a burr on the edge of the hole, but that was a breeze to fix.  Once it was reinstalled and tightened up, the whole enclosure proved to be tighter than a clam with lockjaw.

Its been a year, and as far as I know, it's still operating perfectly.

New controller in place

Thanks for reading!

Reed 204R Vise Restoration

"Restoring" this vise seemed like a nice little project to document on the blog.  It's a Reed model 204R, and having now disassembled it, I've learned that it is a marvelous piece of engineering.

After sitting for a few years

My dad had this vise in his shop for as long as I can remember.  I never thought to ask him where and when he got it since it was just always there.  In a last-ditch attempt to learn more about its origins, I asked my mom if she remembered when it came home.  She seems to think it belonged to my great grandfather, who gave it to my father at some point.  That'd be pretty neat if true.

I've been unable to find any markings on the vise that may indicate the year that it was manufactured, but the patent number on the casting indicates that it was poured after 1938.  P.S. I love the artwork in old patents like this.

Disassembly

All disassembled

Disassembly was surprisingly smooth.  Thankfully it turned out that all of the work that the vise needed was superficial and cosmetic.  There were, however, just enough dings and dents on the slide to require the use of a small jack to force out of the body (after removal of the lead screw - obviously).

Removing the lead screw from the slide was educational.  This vise uses a two-piece threaded ring to hold the what (appeared to be) a one-piece leadscrew / handle assembly in the slide.  A pin spanner would have made quick work of removing it, but I had to settle for a punch and hammer - and some caution.  After I got it removed and cleaned up, I was tickled to see that this ring was cast and machined as one piece. After machining it was split by fracturing it at a predefined location thanks to two thin sections cast into it.  Pretty clever use of the brittleness of the iron used.

After separating the vise from its swivel base, I noticed yet another slick design feature.  The swivel-lock stud is serrated, and it locks into a serrated pattern in the base.  The design requires far less force on the swivel lock handle, and makes it nearly impossible for the vise to swivel inadvertently - saving knuckles!  I also noticed that the stud on the swivel lock is a double lead thread, which is one of the few that I've seen outside of a book.

Swivel Lock, after a little clean-up

Stripping and Repainting

After disassembly, it was time to start stripping the decades-worth of rust and paint from its surfaces.  A wire cup in an angle grinder made quick work of this task, although it did start to slow down towards the end of the project...

Ooof

I'd like to think I got my money's worth out of that cup.  After I plucked the wires from my shirt, I ordered a replacement and was back up and running a few days later.

Once the paint and loose rust was removed with the grinder, all of the surfaces that were going to be repainted were shot with primer.  Then two fairly heavy coats of a deep blue that I had sitting on the shelf.  All rattle-can stuff - I'm curious to see how it holds up to the abuse that a vise typically sees.  If I'm feeling spunky one day, I may highlight the letters on the casting with some white paint and a fine brush.

After the paint was dry, but before it had a chance to really harden up, it was time to clean up the surfaces that were not supposed to have paint.  Some hand sanding with 100-grit in the nooks and crannies, and some time with the orbital sander on the large flat areas brought some shine back to those surfaces and knocked down the burrs and high spots.  They're certainly not polished - in fact, they still have the scars of decades worth of work, but all the pieces slide together as they should now.

The two handles were chucked up in the lathe and rotated to make sanding easier.  This worked very well and made quick work of cleaning them up.  I started with the wire cup, and then moved on to 100-grit paper, then 240-grit, and finally some high-abrasive polishing compound.  Again, not a mirror finish, but much better than what I started with - and it still gets to tell its story.

Just finishing up the handle on the lathe

All of the unpainted surfaces were all coated with Minwax Paste Finishing Wax to add some lubricity and slow down the formation of new rust.  Because of the threat of condensation, I've gotten into the habit of waxing just about all of the bare iron and steel in my shop.  It's great on woodworking tools like the table saw and bandsaw, and it seems to work well on polished handwheels, too.

Reassembly

After the paint had some time to cure, it was time to put it all back together.  This was pretty easy, just the reverse of how she came apart.

A little dab will do ya

To keep things moving smoothly, I added some grease to the running surfaces between the body and swivel base.  I also precoated the thrust-bearing surfaces and leadscrew with oil.  The vise has two holes for oiling, so I decided to forgo the grease and give it with what it wants.  If anyone knows more about what kind of lubrication these things like, please let me know in the comments.

The leadscrew went in smoothly, and the threaded retention ring was a breeze to install - although just like during disassembly, I needed to tap the ring around with a punch and a hammer, since I don't have a pin spanner.  Even so, adjusting out most of the backlash was no problem.  Once I was happy with it, I snugged up the set screw that prevents the retention ring from spinning, and that was it.

This was a fun little project and a great excuse to spend some time in the shop.  It's going to be a treat to start using this vise again.  Now I just need a solid bench to mount her on.

All done

Thanks for reading!