Build Officially Started!

[londonsean69]

Originally Posted by Tatey

My garage suddenly seems much smaller with an 8'x4' build table in the middle of it

Tell me about it, I've been having a really decent clearout, and moved everything I could out of the way, onto shelves etc. but when I lay down a sheet of ply in the middle it doesn't half take up some space.

I will be starting my chassis build fairly soon, off work for a couple of days next week so will be getting my order in for the steel and ally

Originally Posted by Tatey

Although 2 steps forward, 1 step back. My recently purchased MIG welder (Clarke 151EN) has got a faulty gas valve, so the torch leaks a small amount of gas, even when the trigger isnt depressed. I've ordered a new one at the grand cost of £18.85 delivered, so all is not lost .

Recently purchased new or second hand??

If it was new, I would have been expecting the vendor to provide a replacement part FOC

Originally Posted by Tatey

If you sign up to the MIG welding forum and PM a guy called weldequip. He'll be able to sort you out. He's a clarke supplier and a really nice guy (called Steve), really seems to know his stuff.

Steve is a cracking bloke. It's who I bought my MIG (portamig) from, and he is very good at what he does (tempt me into some nice little extras)

Good luck with the build

Sean

[Tatey]

It was a second hand MIG, so problems were expected . Yeah Steve does seem to be a cracking bloke, although I've been a bit disappointed with my second purchase from him, as I ordered it on Sat and he's not sure if it was sent out today or not.

[HandyAndy]

nice one tatey, pleased to hear your build is now making progress, hope you get the gas valve soon as i,m sure your eager to get cracking on welding the chassis together

all the best & lets see some piccies when your main chassis is taking shape, with you sat in the drivers seat area

andy

[Tatey]

Well as my boredom is growing while waiting for my gas valve to arrive, i've started designing a revolver style potato cannon in 3D cad (im classing it as a uni project ).

Me and a friend made a potato cannon last year and they work amazingly well , firing potatos atleast 100m . But the reload time for it is quite long, so i thought, why not design one which can hold 8 potato slugs and you pull one leaver, it puts some more fuel into the combustion chamber, move the next potato slug into position and reseals the joints between the potato holder, barrel and combustion chamber. Then you just need to pull the trigger and away you go again. Once i've finished designing it in 3d cad ill make sure to post pics of it

[Tatey]

Just for an update: My gas valve arrived last week so i started practising welding and i got the hang of it quite quickly. So i then set to work tacking up the bottom chassis rails, once i'd done that i decided to flip it over to make sure it was symmetrical....it wasnt. The 2 pieces with the massive angle on them were not the same, meaning it sat slightly over to the left hand side, i got all of that sorted and it is symmetrical now.

I've tack welded the front frame together now, after reading through chris's tutorial on it a few times i managed to get it all right first time

I've also started tack welding the uprights onto the bottom rails, its all starting to come together now

[HandyAndy]

nice one

lets have a few piccies then

hope you are enjoying your build.

all the best

andy

[Tatey]

I've now finished tack welding the uprights and front frame onto the bottom chassis rails. As requested Andy, here are a few pictures (mind the mess ):

[flyerncle]

Looks good well done,What about the spud canon?

[Tatey]

I've done a bit more work on it, havent got that far though, as i'm now back at uni so got a lot less time on my hands.

[flyerncle]

Sounds very interesting !!!!!!!