DSW

Here you go... you'll need to scroll down some to reach the steel or stainless steel ones. http://www.mscdirect.com/browse/Material-Handling-Storage/Containers/Drums-Pails-Tubs-Cans?navid=12105278+4288150889&searchterm=30+gallon+drum I'm betting if I search Graingers or McMaster Carr online I can locate ones also. You can also look under containers etc and probably find a local packaging company that sells them also. 30 gallon ones aren't the easiest to find used. Most times it's not as cost effective to ship things in smaller containers than 55 gallon drums or bigger than 5 gallon pails. The exceptions tend to be things where due to their hazardous status, regs limit the quantity that can be shipped, or because a consumer needs a predetermined amount of a product. If you need only 30 gallons or slightly less to mix an item, it might pay to simply order the pre measured quantity in smaller drums vs having to have a partially used one sit for a length of time. I know my buddy used to get heptane in 30 gallon drums where he worked. The reason being is that when they did a batch of product, that's the quantity the needed. If they used 55 gallon drums, they'd always have to stop and refill while making a batch and then sit and store the remainder until they ran that particular mix again. All the end product they made either shipped out in big 500 gallon totes, 55 gallon drums or 5 gallon pails.

I'm not sure I quite agree with that statement. Your time is worth something. I also know guys regularly under price materials from experience. Keep this in mind. If it takes you 100 hours to build and fabricate this, and you make $25 per hour, that's another $2500 you'd have to put towards this. That time adds up fast. If you are choosing to do this for "fun" then you are still paying yourself. I'm also betting consumables like gas, wire, grinding disks and so on probably aren't accounted for as well as they probably should be. Even if you have them on hand and use them, it will cost to replace them. Blow up your machine, cook a grinder, trash a blade for your saw that you didn't expect, and the cost escalates pretty quick. Don't bet on that. Steel almost always warps. managing to control or limit warpage is part that separates those that can weld, from those that can't. I can very easily warp 1/4" steel with my "little" 200 amp mig and not even have it maxed out. If you aren't getting it hot enough where warpage might be an issue, I'd be worried that you aren't getting decent penetration into the base material. A 180 to 200 amp mig would be the minimum I'd use for this job, and given a choice, I'd go even bigger to lay down material faster and cut production time. The 180 amp class mig would be borderline at best on a job like this and you'd really have to watch your duty cycle with the power cranked up to get decent welds. Small underpowered migs like the little 110v machines are notorious for making "pretty" welds on thicker material that really won't hold things together well. Don't bet on not welding the cross members fully either. Keep in mind that while they may not support that much weight while it's just laying there, you also have to think about how you are going to load these logs. Most logs worth milling are pretty decent in size, and you don't just toss them up by hand. Drop a log off the forks of a machine, and you can have a couple of things happen. 1st is may not hit level. That means all the weight may be on only one cross member right at 1st untill the rest of the log crashes down. 2nd you have to remember the shock value of a moving object. I can easily support my 20 lb sledge on a piece of glass, but drop it from any height and it will break. Steel is tougher than glass, but shock loads will still tear things apart. Not really. I'm not knocking you, but I'm betting the "free" work is sort of stuff mentioned at the beginning is what David and Charles are referring to. It's a fairly typical mindset for newer guys or ones who don't work with their hands for a living. I'm also betting that you may learn this the hard way like I'm betting those guys did at one point or another. I can do a lot of different things, but many times it's smarter to have someone else do the work than do it myself. I may not have the equipment to do the job, or I may not have the experience to make this either cost effective or done correctly. It makes sense for me to play to my strengths and let others play to theirs. If you are doing this because you have a newer better way to do it, then that may be a different story. If you are doing this because you want the enjoyment of working with your hands, that's also something a bit different. In that case you are paying yourself for the pleasure of doing the work. By doing so you take time away from other things, making a living, doing yard work you need to pay someone else to do, even just plunking your but in front of the TV and watching football and relaxing.

I welded for a lot of years in an apartment or rental house using a 50' 230v extension cord run off either the dryer or range outlet. I still have that 50' cord that I can use if need be to get the machine out to the middle of the drive way if needed. I've worked with quite a few sculpture students before the local college moved the arts program to the main campus. Each student learned a different process depending on what type of sculpture they wanted to do. Everyone at the tech school had to start with stick where I was at the time before moving on to other processes. The students interested in heavy industrial sculpture usually stayed with stick though some also learned mig. Stick is best suited to heavier materials, say 1/4" and up though someone with a good bit of skill can weld thinner stuff 1/8" is usually the thinnest I recommend newer stick welders try to weld. Stick will let you make tools and various general projects, but isn't suitable fir thin work on average. Mig tended to be the generic sculpture process. It allows you to weld thinner materials or thicker stuff depending on the wire used and machine settings. 1/16" to 1" is relatively easy with mig. Learning curve is short and decent machines aren't that expensive to buy. Thinner stuff can be done with lots of skill or specialized equipment like pulsed mig. The atr students interested in art glass and jewelry usually wanted to do Oxy fuel, as well as those interested in working in copper. Serious students wanted to learn tig. Tig would allow them to do very small precise welds and weld on metals like stainless, bronze, copper and alum as well as steel. This takes the most time to learn and skill to do however. Up side is most tig machines will also allow you to stick weld as well as do tig. If you can you might think about looking at a dedicated tig machine if you can find one used for a decent price. I see some of the monster industrial tigs going as low as $400-900 fairly regularly and occasionally I've seen rebadged ones like older Aircos ( made by Miller) as low as $250 on very rare occasions. Down side is the huge size, weight, and power consumption. Some of those monsters won't even do low amp tig on much less than a 50 amp circuit. If you get an AC/DC tig, you can do alum as well as other metals. If it's DC only, you will be limited to stainless, steel and most other standard alloys except alum. Adding the AC option usually ups the price significantly. Most guys can learn just fine on a DC only tig and transition to AC later if they feel the need after learning the basics on DC. If you buy a DC capable stick machine, you can do basic scratch start tig simply by adding the tig torch and reg. You won't have as much control without a dedicated tig pedal to adjust your amps as you weld, but rigs like this are used daily in the field to produce xray quality welds. It's not really practical to try and do alum with anything other than a dedicated tig however.

You should be fine with a gate that short. Only about 1/2 that weight will be applied to the top of the post where bending would be the greatest. The other hinge I suppose is relatively close to the ground, say 12 to 18" up. A deep 3' wide square block of crete is about more than 4000 lb's ( assuming 1 cubic yard of crete) The size depth and width don't give me any concerns for a 450 lb gate as long as the soil isn't really poor and soft. 6" wide x 1/4" thick square tube should hold up the gate and not bend significantly. If you are really concerned, toss some rebar in it and grout it solid to increase it's resistance to bending. My greatest concern would be the hinge attachment points. I've seen a lot of these where a couple things happen. #1 the masons get there 1st and block up the whole thing and you can't get easy direct access to the steel column. That leaves you having to anchor your gate into the masonry block and the steel post will end up doing nothing. That or gate pintles .are just single rods welded to the post and stick out close to 12" to get past the block and any cover material. At that point the hinge is the weak point. I've seen several decent ways to attach the hinges. In some cases they weld a T shaped plate or box shape to the post with the lower part attaching to the post at an angle for support. The top of the "T" is large enough for them to weld or better yet bolt the hinges to, but small enough to be easily concealed by the masonry. This gives a solid mounting point to transfer loads to the post. Keep in mind though if the post is centered on the block, you might be out 12 to 18" from the post. You also have to remember to keep in mind any cover materials like a stone veneer that might be applied depending on how they do the masonry. The second way requires someone have done a bit of thought originally before the posts went in. In this case the steel post is set at one edge of the masonry, usually flush with the outside face of block, so only the stone veneer covers the post. the rest of the block is "behind" the post usually in the shape of a C roughly. Done this way you only have a short distance to support the gate hinges, usually 2-4" for the veneer thickness. If they do split faced block, the mason has to notch every block to fit around the post and with solid block that's usually a real pain for the mason. Given a chance, he'll use full block to make his job easier. Last way I've seen done is that they leave the steel post showing and but the masonry up to it. In this case you have a finished edge showing and you metal connections need to be cleaner. In this case however the block work won't matter at all as long as it's set back far enough to be out of your way. If you can, try and set the hinges to the posts prior to the mason working and let him work to your stuff vs the other way around. Leave yourself some adjustment if possible. I know a bunch of gate guys like to use the hinges where they can crank in or out the hinges to adjust the gate for level even if the post isn't plumb. If using fixed welded hinges, you'll have to shim possibly to do so. Keep in mind masons don't always set their work straight and plumb. You may end up with a tilted surface you are working to or a very irregular one. Know in advance what they are going to do if possible so you can avoid trying to reengineer the wheel after someone else made their job easy at your expense... I've seen guys set things up for say a 10 foot opening as marked on prints only to find the mason did whatever he wanted and the opening is suddenly say 8'-10 or some goofy number so the mason could work with full block and save time. All of a sudden the pattern that looked great on the 10 foot gate won't work any more...

I'd have to agree. Those are better than even my 4th or 5th set of tongs and you'll probably have them for years to come. Good job.

"tombstone" has become sort of a generic term for a transformer based stick welder Most use it to refer to a Lincoln machine, but I've seen that term applied to Millers, Craftsmans, Monkey Wards and many others. The original Lincoln Idealarcs were in fact shaped very much like a round topped tombstone, hence the nickname. Lincolns cheaper stick machines also have the clipped corner tombstone look. As several have mentioned you can locate a nice used on on CL fairly cheap. Transformer based stick machines are very simple and almost bullet proof. The Ac only ones have almost nothing electronic to go wrong on them usually beyond the switch, and the AC/DC units usually only have simple diodes that on rare occasions fail. All these things are simple and easy to fix. You might also try Searchtempest.com to expand your CL search area if you are having issues locating something used. I use "welder" as my generic search term and then sort the list manually. As far as HF welders, I'd avoid them if at all possible. A suggested go with a decent name brand, Miller, Lincoln and Hobart are usually the big three, but you occasionally see other quality name brands like Essab, Ltec, Airco, Thermal Arc, and HTTP. Many companies like Sears and Montgomery Wards had one of the "name brand" companies build their units and simply stuck their sticker on them. Besides the links listed above, you might try looking at a welding site like Weldingweb. Your questions on AC vs AC/DC and rod selection usually gets asked almost weekly, if not more frequently. Again searching and reading will provide you with a lot of reading material to go thru.

LOL That sounds fairly typical. The shop isn't even done yet and it's already too small! Of course if you added another 1000 SF, that would probably still be the case.

You might also look at Majestic forge. http://www.majesticforge.com/

Maybe. I can only remember one compressor for a dry sprinkler system and that was in an old furniture store. At the time I wasn't into compressors and stuff. I only remember it because it was always in our way in the warehouse.

I'd honestly be really surprised if the walls are that thick. All the ones I cut apart for scrap when I worked at the dive shop ( sister company did commercial compressor work) were much thinner. I'd say 14-16 ga off the top of my head, but I wouldn't rule out 18 ga. These were all heavy duty 3 phase ones for continuous use in industrial settings for the most part. I'd bet the home center ones are even thinner to meet price point.

Very nice. At some point I'd like to try and forge an adze and try to work with it. I've always been a fan of heavy timber framing and construction.

A bit late, but I figured I'd toss this out anyways. I meant to post this a while back but with my poor internet connections and work I forgot. This Sat Sept 21 and Sun Sept 22 9am to 4pm, at Lake Rawlings Va, I'll be helping DiveRite out with a dive gear demo. Any certified scuba divers who want to come out and join us are welcome. ( it gets real boring for us if no one shows up... ) If you want to dive, you'll need your mask, fins, and exposure suit. Having your own cylinder would be helpful as our cylinders are for the sidemount demos. We'll have BC's, regs and other gear for people to try out. Even if you don't want to dive, but just come and size gear or talk about different gear configurations you are welcome. Demos ( other than the rebreather demos) are free, but you have to cover the park admission yourself. Here's a chance to try sidemount diving, back inflation BCD's, learn about stage rigging for deco or pony cylinders, talk about rebreathers and so on. The idea of the demo is to expose divers to things they might not have had a chance to try before. We don't have stuff to sell, but are there so you get exposed to stuff you may not be aware of. Everyone always has a great time. If you've never done doubles, or if you are like me and have back and leg issues,and are finding singles just too much, you owe it to yourself to come out and try sidemount. Those with kids that are into diving should also attend. Diverite has a great kids program that lets you upgrade the kids BCD when they get older to a larger size. It really pays vs having to buy new gear because they out grew it. http://www.diverite.com/calendar/v/011/9/2013/21/ Pete's also doing a similar demo on Saturday Sept 28th 10AM-4PM at Fantasy Lake Scuba Park, Wake Forest, NC. Friday night, 6pm Sept 27th, he's doing a presentation at Rum Runner Dive Shop Winterville, NC. Pete's photo presentations are always top notch and worth the time if you have never been to one. Tell Pete Doug sent you. I'm not sure yet if I'll make the one on Sat in NC yet. I have to check with my buddy who helps cover the fuel if he can get off work for that one as well and wants to go. Everyone else is still invited if they just want to come and talk dive stuff with Pete. He'll have all the same demo stuff there that he has at Rawlings this weekend. http://www.diverite.com/calendar/v/011/9/2013/28/ A few generic picts from past demos. 1st one is me on sidemount for those who may not be familiar with it. I'm showing that the cylinder location doesn't change your trim while diving. That's why I'm holding the cylinder out in front of me for the pict.

Someone on the other site posted up youtube security footage of a large industrial compressor tank going thru a block wall when it let go. If I remember correctly that one killed someone. I'll have to try and dig out the link when I get back from my trip to Va this weekend.

Keep in mind this was a relatively small compressor tank, probably 15 or 20 gallon at best from the look. 150 psi isn't all that high and should have been well within the safe working pressure of the tank. I regularly see guys treat air compressors with a very chevalier attitude. It's critical to remember a few things about compressors... Always drain them regularly to prevent water build up and rust that can weaken the tank. Never monkey around with the presure cut out trying to gain more out of your compressor. Remember to test your "safety" or OPV to be sure that it hasn't rusted or frozen shut due to moisture etc. Never weld on compressor tanks unless you are properly trained in pressure vessel welding and the tank is properly hydro tested afterwards. Also remember that it's generally a bad idea to test containers with air pressure. Even 50 psi is enough to cause serious injury if the container ruptures. Test at 2-5 psi at most and use soap to check for leaks. A better way is to hydro test them instead. Compressor tank explosions like this are not all that uncommon. Larger ones can and have led to deaths. Not all that far from me a welder was killed when a air tank he repaired on a concrete truck ruptured when he air tested it. Failure occurred not where he welded it, but elsewhere. Eventually it was determined that the original tank design was faulty, but that wasn't the only issue that lead to his death. That tank failed at only 80 or 90 PSI from what I recall, but the tank was larger. I'll also add older tires to the list to be careful of. Old dry rotted wheelbarrow tires can blow when filling, especially if you are in the habit of over inflating them so they are rock hard like some people I know. Most times rust and so on leads to simple pin hole leaks, but in some cases they can lead to catastrophic failure. Use common sense around these things guys.

I thought this story important enough to repost. I asked Mike the OP if he minded if I reposted this thread of his to another forum in the past to help spread the word about compressor safety and he gladly gave me his permission to do so so others wouldn't have to go thru what he did. This happened back January of 2011 and Mike has made a ful recovery with minimal if any lingering effects luckily. Mike is lucky to be alive after what happened when the compressor tank exploded on him. Again I'd like to thank Mike for his permission to repost this back at the time. Here's the original link to his thread for those that might like to read the comments by others at the time... http://weldingweb.com/showthread.php?48232-Stay-from-those-old-compressor ....

It's simple and easy and a lot less expensive than an auto drain. Reminds me I have to repost something on the dangers of compressors later on. Your comment about the air input is a good one as well. When I worked for a dive shop the noise coming from the air input was quite load. As soon as we moved and rerouted the air intake to outside, we decreased the noise considerably. Then you could really tell how much noise actually came from the input stack. Without the noise of the compressor to mask it there was a distinct "thwock, thwock" sound coming from the intake pipe outside..

Bit late now, but something others might want to think about if they do a shop in the future. Back the drywall up with plywood if you are thinking about putting up shelves, cabinets or other things that need to be attached to the walls securely. Even cheap OSB will work for most things like that. Cover the studs with the plywood, then rock over it if that's the look you are going for. Saves all those furring strips on the wall and you can throw a screw in anywhere you choose. The small storage room of my shop is lined with 3/4" plywood and my adjustable shelf standards will hold up just about anything you can stack on the shelves. ( we used to load them with bagged concrete products) That's a trick for doing bathroom and kitchen remodels as well. You might also want to make sure you can easily drain that compressor. I'd pipe it outside myself so you don't have to deal with the mess when you dump it daily. Mine uses a ball valve vs the cheap petcock that came on the bottom of my big tank. All I have to do is kick the valve open to dump it and then close it again to drain and the water dumps outside with no mess.

I wouldn't say that, not at least from the last two picts you posted. I was looking at that wonderful cast flywheel and was envious.

I didn't realize you were in the UK. It helps to note that in your profile so we know where you are from all the time. I'd assume they have them over there even if the fittings are different. I'd guess plumbers and so on use them like we use them here. You probably have to look at welding supply houses or trade shops that cater to "pro's" vs home centers. I came across this pict of my little "B" sized air acet rig that I took when I picked it up off Craigslist. I think I paid $100 for it complete from a plumber who was retiring and unloading a lot of his duplicate stuff. The tips can be changed similar to what you showed to change heat based on what size material you are working with. I picked up my 2nd rig almost new from someone who was moving overseas and had used it for art brazing and jewelry. That one was even cheaper. They had the cylinder listed on CL and thru in the torch and reg for free. I also have a air propane rig that is very similar that I picked up at a flea market cheap. Unfortunately I'd already sold off all the propane tips that I'd acquired in a lot I bought at an auction because they came with a reg and acetylene tips I wanted. I think I paid something stupid like $5 for the propane rig so I couldn't pass it up.

It's been way too many years since I learned OA to remember many exact details. I do know that Oxy propane does not work for welding. it works fine for brazing and soldering. You need Oxy acet to do welding. I have a feeling it has to do with how the gases break down in the flame. My guess is with propane you get only a partial breakdown and you get some water vapor forming within the propane flame, but that's just a guess. I know moisture does cause hydrogen embrittlement with arc welding. That's why 7018 and other low hydrogen rods need to be kept in an oven and most weld specs where this can be a concern often call for preheating the material at least past the point where the material "sweats". I'm not sure if you realize you can do basic scratch start tig with any DC stick welder just by adding a tig torch and the gas reg and cylinder. It works best with machines that are infinitely adjustable vs cheaper tapped transformer units. I know several guys who have picked up some of the inexpensive DC inverter stick machines and "converted" them over to basic tig rigs relatively inexpensively. This give you both a stick and tig capable machine at a relatively inexpensive price.

An air acetylene torch gets much hotter than typical propane torches. An air acetylene torch is what most plumbing and HVAC contractors use to solder and braze piping. Goss and Turbo torch are usually the big names in Air Acetylene, though they also make dedicated air propane torches as well. Oxy fuel would be the next step up. Oxy propane can be used for brazing and soldering and Oxy Acetylene can do brazing, soldering and welding. http://victortechnologies.com/turbotorch/products/prodList.html?brand=TTT&W2Code=TTT200200&W3Code=TTT301200&W4Code=TTT400400&W5Code=&W6Code= My small air acetylene torch will solder up to 2" copper pipe fittings and braze 3/8" to 1/2" fittings with no issues. I've done over 4" copper / brass pipe fittings with the big rose bud on my Oxy Acetylene rig.

Cast steel vs cast iron will make a huge difference. There are a number of ways to weld cast iron. However cast iron doesn't always weld well for a number of reasons. Biggest issue is that cast iron has a bad tendency to crack as your weld cools. One way is to heat the whole thing up, weld with correct filler, then slowly cool the whole piece. Another way is to weld very small sections with high nickel filler and wait until it's cooled before welding some more. The high nickel filler is more ductile and the low heat input helps reduce the chance of cracking. Peening the welds as they cool to help relieve stresses also can help. When I've done this I usually tig the welds and wait until I can touch the previous weld with my bare hands before doing the next. I'll also jump around to reduce heat even farther. I know some guys who have had luck doing something similar with stainless mig running very short beads to keep things cold. Brazing is another option for medium to low heat areas. Personally I'd leave it alone.

I'm not sure I agree with this idea 100%. I help teach welding and I frequently see new guys who are hampered because they want to start "cheap". The idea, like your statement, is that they aren't sure they will like it, so they try not to spend too much money at first. The problem is many times that hinders them from really learning. Is the reason they are having issues the result of poor equipment, or is it just that this isn't for them? Poor quality equipment frequently leads to frustration. Sure you can make do with almost nothing if you try, but are you really doing yourself a favor by doing so? I think with most hobbies there is a minimum investment that needs to be made. Exactly what that is though varies from person to person and that's what makes this very difficult to quantify. Sure anyone can set themselves up given say $2000 or more in gear, and some can very likely manage to find some real steals that can get them set up with similar gear for say less than $500 if they are lucky. Then there are some who just find enjoyment by seeing what they can make do with... I may not do blacksmithing for a living, but my tools make me money. For that reason I look at things a bit different than some do. I view tools as an investment. My time is worth something and in many cases having the correct tool means I can move closer to my goals faster and more efficiently. I take the same view towards training. Money spent on quality learning is almost never wasted. In some cases that means holding off until I can afford to spend what I need to to attain my goals. I also see a lot of people who want instant gratification today, and often want it cheap. Then there are those who think if they just keep throwing money at it they'll be able to buy their way to better skills. Unfortunately those who are patient and persevere are in the minority. Those who usually succeed are those who are willing to put in their "dues" and sacrifice what it takes to really learn. That usually means lots of boring repetitious work. True craftsmanship is often more about patience and attention to detail than it is about money in equipment and tooling. Ok I think I'm done rambling for now...

I have a customer who has horses. "Doing stalls" usually involves a wheelbarrow, a shovel and a lot of horse manure. :P

Avoid the import multi use machines that combine both a welder and a plasma cutter. There have been a lot of bad experiences with those machines going belly up after only a short length of use. They sound like a great choice, but most times the experience sours people fairly quick when the importer drags their feet with a replacement or refund. As far as Oxy Propane. Weld wise there are two issues, lack of heat ( max temp), and hydrogen embrittlement. The big up side of propane is that it's inexpensive, readily available and you don't have the withdrawl rate issues you have with Acetylene. Because you don't have the withdrawl rate issue and you can run propane above 15 psi, you can use huge rosebuds for heating. You can pump out huge quantities of BTU's to heat large areas very fast where with Acetylene you'd have to have a huge group of cylinders all manifolded together to stay under the 1/7th rule for withdrawl rate. It's also big with guys for cutting because it's cheap and plentiful. You'll often see scrappers using it for cutting for this reason.