Projects

[willedoo]

On 26/09/2024 at 7:05 PM, nomadpete said:

That's interesting. I have left oily sawdust on my old chainsaw for years without seeing any corrosion when I eventually cleaned it up with degreaser. I cut gum and wattle. What timber did you cut?

I have seen aluminium disappear when left in contact with damp concrete but never when exposed to oily wood.

I wonder if the side case has a considerable magnesium content and if so, whether that would have a bearing on the corrosion. The crankcase is magnesium.

[willedoo]

If you have a lot of ongoing slab or board cutting to do, the extra work in building a band saw is worth it. It's quieter, gives a better surface finish and less waste. Some of these Russian outfits are a bit rough around the edges.

 

 

[willedoo]

Most youtube videos are in Europe or North America cutting soft pine. With Australian hardwood, I'd say it would be a lot slower cutting and a lot more band sharpening required.

[onetrack]

Ha ha! Don't you just love the fan on the electric motor hanging out in space, with no shroud? - and they keep checking the motor to see if it's getting hot!

 

Makes you wonder why they even left the fan on the shaft!

 

When we had the Blokey Shed going, one of the Victorians on there (he was from out Gippsland way, I STR), had done a lot of slicing and dicing of timber and he reckoned he could never ever, get a good accurate cut with a bandsaw blade. He reckoned, no matter what you did to try and keep it true, it always wanted to woofle around and give you a wavy cut.

He swore that steel disc sawblades were the only way to cut timber straight and true. But you need a darn big blade to cut any kind of decent width.

 

I gotta laugh at the Americans referring to their "hardwood". They wouldn't know what a hardwood was! It never ceases to amaze me how fast their timber grows, though.

[old man emu]

9 hours ago, onetrack said:

It never ceases to amaze me how fast their timber grows, though.

I think a basic reason for fast growth is simply water. You don't realise how wet parts of the USA are compared to Australia. I suppose the closest equivalent would be western Tasmania, which cops so much rain. But with fast growth in a moist environment the vessels within each year's growth ring there is a lot of empty space when the wood is harvested and dried. That means that after it has been made into something, it will still take in water, or dry out with the seasons with the varying heat and humidity. That then leaves the woodworker with the need to allow for shrinking and swelling in the finished product. If not allowed for, timber in the product with split.

 

[willedoo]

13 hours ago, onetrack said:

He swore that steel disc sawblades were the only way to cut timber straight and true. But you need a darn big blade to cut any kind of decent width.

A problem with some sawmills is that the faster they cut timber, the more money they make. Pushing it through too quick results in blade flex and consequent variation in timber dimensions. To do a good job they need to do it slower and more accurately but they end up with less production.

 

That happened to me with my verandah floorboards. Our local sawmiller would always do a good job as he was a perfectionist, but on that occasion he was flat out with work and got another mill to supply the boards for him. It was 5x1" spotted gum, green off saw, and there was quite a noticeable difference in thickness from one side of the board to the other side. If boards were laid low side to high side the height difference would have been enough to catch your boot on while walking across the deck. It took a bit of extra work sorting the boards so they were laid high side to high side and low side to low side alternating. It was a bit wavy but at least there was no protrusions to catch on. Once laid it was only noticeable for a while; you get used to things and they become invisible in time.

 

Being green off saw timber I butted the boards up to each other and used a temporary cramp to just firm them up to each other. I don't remember the shrinkage rate I calculated on but I think I was expecting about an 8mm gap which turned out about right once it dried. I like the bigger gap. It doesn't look too excessive on a 5" board and a lot less dust and debris gets caught in between. All it needs it a blow out of the gaps with a leaf blower now and then. On the plus side, all the spotted gum floorboards were top quality timber, no sappy stuff.

[old man emu]

Talking about decking timber, I was told that it was wrong to lay the boards with the grooved side up, which a lot of people do in the belief that is prevents slips. However, the reason I was told to put the grooves down was that they were there to allow airflow to keep the wood dry where it was in contact with the joists. With a bit of regular light maintenance, a deck should not get slippery. That's caused by allowing dust to accumulate, which encourages microorganisms to flourish.

[willedoo]

Getting a bit off topic here but I dragged the remains of an old Howard Kelpie out of the bush today. I skulldragged the old Howard engine from the ground up a plank onto the ute back and couldn't get over how heavy it is for a small engine. I realise I'm getting older and weaker but the weight of this motor really surprised me.

 

[onetrack]

They didn't make anything lightweight in the old days, and cast iron was always preferred to cast aluminium! - mostly because it was much cheaper!

[spacesailor]

old iron

Never rusted like this new , oil fired malleable iron.

But then again like stainless,  in the wrong place,  like

Titanic,  " rusticles " are eating it away very fast.

spacesailor

 

[willedoo]

Where I'm living these days is a very rust prone area and my block is exposed to the prevailing salt air coming off the sea. Any steel rusts badly unless it's stored in an enclosed shed, but I've noticed all the old stuff like old farm machinery doesn't rust much. I've often wondered whether that old cast steel has a high carbon content or something else in it's makeup that resists rust. More modern cast steel will rust much quicker.

[spacesailor]

True .

Old steel was smelted with "  crushed coal " .

( blast-furnace ).

Giving a very high carbon content. 

New steel uses oil that contains ' sulphur ' .

spacesailor

[onetrack]

In my experience, high carbon steels rust more quickly than low carbon steels. Low alloy, high tensile steels in the likes of high grade fasteners, such as Grade 8 or metric Grade 10.9 bolts always rust rapidly. The modern high tensile steels in car body panels rust faster than the old car bodies, which used mild steels.

But different irons and steels all possess substantially different properties, so nothing is guaranteed. The older steels may have more impurities such as small slag inclusions, which discourage rust, and sometimes there's a high copper content in older steels, and this inhibits corrosion.

 

Steels produced to a standard have a very strict quantity range of copper, phosphorous, sulphur and carbon levels in the steel, and this wasn't the case in older steels that didn't have to meet specific steel standards, they just had to do the job they were produced for.

 

Also, scrap content makes up a surprising amount of furnace feed - even in the old days. Scrap content can be 25%-30% of furnace feed and sometimes even more.

It was known early on, that adding scrap of a known quality improved the steel/iron end result, as the scrap has already been refined at least once. But the quality control over the scrap being fed in, is the biggest factor in the quality of the end product.

[facthunter]

Impurities make steel rust more. Things like sulphur. Steel is not easy to cast. Wrought iron is made in a puddling furnace and doesn't rust much. I doubt you can get it these days. It also welds easily under the hammer. Old anchors and their chains were made from it.. IF you look on early shipwrecks you'll see it looks laminated.  Nev

[willedoo]

I've had another thought bubble on the subject of building a log jinker similar to that in the opening post of this thread (screenshot below). I'm inclined to build the rear section as it would be a good way to deal with that end of a log and with minor design adaptations could be handy for some other jobs as well.

 

As far as the front section goes, my thoughts currently are that while it's a nifty toy, building it is a lot of work and expense for something that's fairly restricted to a specific use. So here's the prototype plan C. I need to buy a cheap unregistered 6x4 single axle trailer for carting stuff around my block. You can pick them up for around $300. It could also be used to support and tow the front log section. With the electric winch pulling from the front of the trailer, the log could be winched up a temporary roller ramp that runs from the rear of the trailer to the ground. I've got plenty of rollers on hand to build a cheap ramp. I can see it as a much easier and more versatile option.

 

[willedoo]

The rollers I have are probably around 500mm long and 60mm diameter. They'd probably do the job. I've also got a few sets of big rollers (photo of one below) but they're heavy and a bit of an overkill. I'll find some other use for them. I picked them up years ago from the local dump in the good old days when the dumps weren't manned and people could take home whatever they liked. I think they were from a gravel crushing plant originally.

 

[willedoo]

The other option is to make up a longer roller ramp and winch the logs straight on to the back of the old farm ute in the above photo. It cuts out one articulation but the tray is a lot higher than the deck of a trailer and the height presents a few challenges.

[willedoo]

The other day I had a test run winching a small log up to the ute with the winch cable running over that big roller. The obvious happened - without a roller ramp or a lifting boom the log winches up too close to the ute back and catches.

[old man emu]

38 minutes ago, willedoo said:

So here's the prototype plan C.

The first requirement of Plan C, D, E etc is to apply the KISS principle. Getting fancy only makes for a more difficult construction, and introduces more potential failure points.

[onetrack]

Build a gantry that fits in the back of the trailer and mount the winch on that. You could just bolt the gantry in place and remove it when you weren't snigging logs.

[willedoo]

I've seen a few variations of this type that sets up at the back using the tow hitch as one of the support points. It would be portable, versatile and fairly easy to build.

 

[willedoo]

[willedoo]

I've seen some photos where they've had a small crane boom mounted on the rear of a ute. With a bit of skillful reversing of the trailer, they jacknifed it beside the load, picked up the load, then drove forward with the load suspended until the trailer straightened and was under the load.  Then just plonk it on the trailer and drive off.

[facthunter]

You BeaUTE is gonna look pretty 2nd hand if you do that to it.  Nev

[onetrack]

An old bloke who had a local car wrecking business here in the 1960's, had a gantry on the tray of his ute for picking up car engines. It comprised a couple of inverted U frames (along the lines of the tradie rack bars below - but heavier material), and he'd slung a length of light RSJ girder ("I-beam") down the tray centreline, attached to the frames, and the RSJ hung over the end of the tray by about half a metre.

He had a girder trolley attached to the RSJ and a chain block attached to the trolley. He'd back up to a wrecked car, unbolt the engine, hook the chain block onto it, and lift the engine out, then roll it into the tray, via the girder trolley. He had that rig for years and years, until he died, I think.