Will the gate sag?

[ianinsa]

Alan if you aren't using a press to toggle your joggle with a stepped die(no not the hammer kind) then you have skipped a page and lost the plot.

Yves, I guess you are using a press of some sort? 

[Frozenforge]

I dont know if it would be aesthetically pleasing or not for this design but you could have 2 smaller 3/16" rivets diagonally at each joint. That would eliminate the pivoting action.

[yves]

I have not run away, I'm thinking. And with all the info, questions and recommendations there is a need for some thinking. Like He said : "I'll be back!" ... shortly ...

[yves]

I will try to be  clear.

We are the client : we want to make cider for us and the family and we need the gates. To me these gates are to be a show piece. 

About the rivets

Since I want to forge the holes in the bars, forging square rivets does not put me off. I would not have thought of using them but after reading what you all have said, I feel confortable with this solution. And it might add visual appeal. I'll see what happens. I'll forge some.  I much prefer one square rivet to 2 rivets per intersection as was also suggested. Two rivets is a lot of company on that rather small real estate.

I will give myself some leeway for assembly with the holes forged a little larger than the rivets.

About the setting

The building is 75 years old give or take. We just opened the wall. I will probably make the molding in steel. Just an idea.

The gates will  be behind the shutters in the following pic, in the middle of the frame (I will add inside doors for the winter).

The inside of the frame is 6 feet wide and 7 feet high. The frame is made of 2 x 8 screwed on the sides to the jambs. To the bottom of these shutters, I will add large decorative drop breaks as I have admired in France because they were beautifull and because they were at their job of protecting the door for more than a hundred years. I'm safe, I will not have to change them.

These shutters will open on the following hinges or something like them if I can ever find out how I forged that one at the end of a day for the fun of it. This is 3/16" x 2" flat material. The eye is forge welded.

The hinges will be affixed to the shutters with clinhed forged nails (I forge two every morning)  and with the collars of the following pic which will also be clinched. There will be 3 hinges on each side. 

Two things are to be worried about as all the posts have made clear : the weight of the gate and the joggling of the bars.

About the weight.

I was looking at the doors to my woodshop.

They are (one half of the doors) 4 feet wide and 7 feet 9 inches high. I calculated that they weigh in with glass and bottom pannel, at 66 pounds. They are 12 or 13 years old and they never sagged at all. The latch always works smoothly. It almost sounds like that famous Volvo door. ... I know, I ought to change the lag screws for black ones ..

.

I also calculated that a gate somewhat like in the following drawing (not to scale) would weigh in at

1. 120 pounds if it were forged with 1/2" x 2-1/2" for the uprights and the top and  bottom cross bars and 1/2" x 3-1/2" for the central part.
2. The same gate would weigh 95 pounds if it were forged with a 3/8" frame
3. and 69 pounds with a 1/4" frame.

I  am looking at 2 options here :

• I know about wooden doors, made a lot of them and would easily keep the style of the woodshop doors only replacing the glass and the pannel with the grille. That door would weigh between 85 and 90 pounds which is quite close to a steel gate with a 3/8" frame. However, screwed to the frame with piano hinges like the woodshop doors, nothing would sag and the frame could easily take it;
• the second option is to go with the 1/2" steel frame (to prevent warping and add visual interest as was pointed out).

In the drawing above, there are two tenons, one on the bottom of the righthand upright and one at the top.

The bottom tenon would be forged round on the end and would rest on a ball bearing in a bushing with the end welded shut and installed in the sill of the frame (epoxied) and resting on the cement below. The vertical weight (can I call it that?) would be taken directly under the gate.

For the "side weight", especialy when the gates are open, the top tenon goes through a bushing in the wooden frame and into a 1/2" x 5 plate bolted to the door jambs and to the wooden frame (but not to the beams as in the drawing, (I checked : the beams are much too high). When the gates are opened by kids hanging on , the frame which is screwed to the jambs would not budge ... I think ... (and I will probably anchor the wooden frame in the cement on each side, which cement was and is very hard), 

Maybe I would add a pintle in the middle and an eye forged from the central cross bar. I'll see. It would also add visually while also carrying some weight.

Finaly, the idea of adding a decorative angle at the bottom to reinforce the frame is still with me.

About the joggling of the bars.

Ianinsa, the "some sort of press" I use is the following :

You will have recognised Ernst Schwarzkopf's "Form for making offsets" (page 73, fig. 68). That is what I used for the example I have forged that appears in the first post of this thread.

There is the Schwarzkopf form and on the right, a piece of steel of proprer thickness and width at the necessary distance to obtain 4 inches between centers. As is apparent, I forge one offset, flip the bar over, set he last offset on the piece of steel and hammer the hot part in the form.

I  will get my welder to make me another form. It will have all the parts welded together. The top of the form will extend to the right and the piece of steel to measure the distance will be welded on. If you look at the left holdfast, it was put on a piece of steel. This piece will be welded on the new form and another one extending from the right hand piece of the form to and on the side steel. This will ensure that the bars are layed along the same axis and that the offset is perpendicular to the bar.

That is how I plan to forge the grille. I think of offsetting both horizontal and vertical bars. As I said, since I need these, I might as well use them as a showcase. I started making drawings of the placement of the bars (heavier at the bottom and on the hinge side). I'll come back with them. If my system does not work, ... well ... I'll listen to Alan and offset only one bar. But it has to work. It will be somewhat precise but it is obvious that it will not have that dangerous  precision that would make the grid sag.

 

Edited April 27, 2015 by yves