My Metal Tech Cage is shipping today (1 Viewer)

[ouroutdoorfamily]

As far as the notcher goes. I was hopeing to start on my rack mount design and having a notcher for that would be great. I have the money to spend, but I can't get to carried away.

As mentione earlier, I bought a small welder and just picked up a Plasma cutter at lunch, I guess the only things left are the notcher and tubing bender.

But for this cage, yes, i already thought about doing the grab rails while the posts were not vertical. I may be added a few other "ideas" onto the cage as well. Once the main pieces are tacked I'm sure the ideas will be flowing

 

[Poser]

I am very disappointed to here this cage needs to be notched by the consumer. For the money they charge it should come pre notched and fit together.

Because every Land Cruiser is the SAME.

 

[ouroutdoorfamily]

Are the main tubing OD's that ya'll are using for cages, sliders or bumpers 1-3/4" and 2"?
I was thinking of getting the JD2 Manual Bender with those dies as well as just a 1" die for smaller things such as braces, handles or racks.

 

[ouroutdoorfamily]

Roll cage has not gotten in yet, but today was my first day welding and I thought I'd share my first project. We had a piece of AR500 plate 5/16" cut for a target and I built a 3 piece stand for easy transport either to stand up or hang from a bar.

The pic show the design and my first welds. They are not the prettiest welds but they did hold up to the sledge hammer test...
I was unable to test the plasma cutter as our 220 plug did not match the plug on the cutter, so I'll have to buy a new wall plate

 

[ouroutdoorfamily]

Well, still waiting for the roll cage to come is, and we took off the hard top 2 weeks ago and I'm running with the bikini top currently..... unfortantly it is pouring down rain in Houston and I'm at work.... hope it stops before I have to drive home or its going to be a wet drive home, lol

So for stuff like this, do ya'll just pull the floor plugs and let the water drain out or wipe it all out?

 

[myquestoyota]

The vacuum caused by the excessive speed will draw all the water out. Just drive faster than the rain.
(Pull the plugs, wiping it out will only waste time if it's going to rain tomorrow)
Are you worried about ricochet with that heavy steel plate? Is it angled towards the ground or away from the shooter?

 

[ol'skul]

Front and then back when you sweep the weld. take your time your not welding a beer can. Make sure your wire speed is not to fast. LOOK LIKE YOUR ON TRACK! Good Luck

 

[bikersmurf]

I carry a 6" window squeegee for the inside of the windshield.

 

[camcruiser13]

those wleds arent super terrible, but take your time, you cant rush the weld, as said before go back over the weld while its still a puddle and then foward to your new weld, or i like to make overlapping C's you want the steel your welding to turn blue and you know your getting good heat on it

just practice youll get the hang of it. but i would practice more before i hit the cage

 

[ouroutdoorfamily]

Here are some welds that I did tonight before dinner, they are getting a little better. Most of what you are seeing is a double pass, the initial pass was in the chamfer of the tubing I grinded off, one of them I did a triple pass on just to practice and a couple beads flat on the surface.

I can totally start to feel when I'm going to fast. Although last night I was trying to practice on some 1" square tubing and I kept burning thru the wall. I am using .030 wire and had the machine set to 1 power and 30 speed per the instructions, but no matter how fast I went it would burn right thru.... stiff scratching my head on that one. But for the thicker stuff I seem to be doing better with that.

I took the 2 lb. hammer to this piece of plate and tubing and the welds held, but the tubing started to bend over and deform.

As for the target plate, yes it is designed with a 10 deg down angle, so the spatter goes down, but for pistol shooting up close I can take out those u blots and it has a 25 deg down angle.... the targets at our range have less angle so this is very safe

The axel and springs came in today for the trailer

 

[hellbent40]

looks like your welds are coming along... your using flux core and pushing your welds?? you can point almost 90 degrees into it and wash left to right with the puddle..

or if you want you should try welding with gas and a solid wire... tri mix gas and
S-6 wire is easy to learn on and your welds will come out nice ... flux core is not easy to learn on....
just my .02 cents...

 

[ouroutdoorfamily]

actually I'm not pushing, I have been pulling the gun toward me, should I be pushing it away from me?
We haven't gone the gas route yet, as that is more $$$$, perhaps in another few paydays.

 

[cjgoode]

This is some good welding advice and tips. One thing you should do is run some of those practice welds where you can see the other side, or probably cut one open after. As for strength good penetration is more important then the look, but then if you can lay down a good looking weld you probably got good penetration. They are looking good.

 

[Trollhole]

Clean the area, clean the area, clean the area. Contamination will make for a crappy weld. Even on the second pass clean before you hit it.

 

[ouroutdoorfamily]

well I watched a bunch of online tutorials today and one of my first lessons was to try and weld up a small gap. So I took the chop saw and made some cuts and then welded them up. I also broke out the plasma cutter tonight and tried a couple cuts

My first cut... A for Ava (my daughter)

These 2 are a test of cutting a notch for bracing

 

[camcruiser13]

theres the blue

 

[ouroutdoorfamily]

Here's some tubing tack tests, my roll cage should be here tomorrow... (I hope)
I tried to run a bead first but the speed wasn't constant and I blew through at the end... doing the spot tacks look much cleaner

 

[ouroutdoorfamily]

Well the cage came in today, but my friend has not delivered it yet, I shipped it to his business, however the Tranny plate did come in.

 

[copasspupil]

I like your target setup. Nice!

 

[ouroutdoorfamily]

Yeah, we took it out last weekend, it works great, although I need to add some weight to the flip up plate... seems even the torso shots were causing the plate to jump. I have a scrap piece of pipe that I will weld on this weekend. We shot .223, .308, 30-06, and .240 at it, stood up to everything; however I have some 62.gr pentrator steel core .223 rounds, those took some "chips" out of the armor, but nothing to worry about.

If you have a local steel place, ask for a piece of AR500, they should carry it