Steam Tractor 3/4" (Rudy K)

[Dave Otto]

Hey Kim

I think to have any luck with placing the bends accurately and repeatably, you would need to fab up an adjustable back gage like on an industrial press brake; after all that is what the little guy emulates. Part of my day job involves running such a machine.
I looked at unit larger than the one you are using one time (probably a Horrible Freight Tool) and the punch and die were so awful I wondered to myself how anyone could ever make a decent bend on that thing. The nose radius on the punch was huge and the finish in the die looked like it had been chewed out with a hammer and chisel.

Good work on the tank, sheet metal can be a real challenge. Had you thought about folding it so the small tabs would be on the inside? I think that would have been my approach.

Thanks for posting your progress.
Dave

[Kim]

Thanks Dave,
I appreciate your input on the sheet metal machines.  Kinda matches my own.  Its possible that this one is higher quality than the HF (it's a  "Kaka" brand sheet metal machine), but even with higher quality, I don't see how to use the Die/Punch brake with any level of accuracy.  Maybe a back stop would help, but I don't think any of them have that.

Had you thought about folding it so the small tabs would be on the inside? I think that would have been my approach.

Interesting idea.  I was following Rudy's pictures is all.  Somehow it also felt like I had a better view of things to make sure the tabs were in good contact with the sides this way, but I'm not sure why I felt that way.

In the end, it doesn't really matter because its underneath the bottom of the cab and you won't be able to see it.  But its an interesting thought!

Thanks,
Kim

PS  I realized I spelled brake wrong in my previous post.  Fixed it now.  Sorry for my spelling faux pas, but I'm quite adept at them

[b.lindsey]

I had almost asked about the brake/shear/ roller myself. Interesting to hear the opinions. I guess like a lot of things, the more versatile you try and make it, some of the capabilities get compromised.

Bill

[Dave Otto]

They got it partiality right Bill, with the segmented punches, but as Kim found out you really need to have segmented dies too. I guess like a lot of the far east tools you could consider it a good starting point and build on it from there.

Dave

[Kim]

A segmented Die would be really nice, but even in a standard Pan Brake the bending apron is one solid piece.  Looking now I found ONE pan brake that had a segmented apron to match the bending fingers (and they want over $3K for it too! but it looks pretty cool http://www.trick-tools.com/Mittler-Bros-4-foot-Ultimate-Box-Pan-Brake-with-Radius-Fingers-16-gauge-2800-48-16-r-8951).  But most don't.  At least, I'd never seen one before.

So for me, its mostly the fact I can't seem to get the bend on my line.  I like being able to line it up on a normal brake before you clamp it down and bend it.

Kim

[Kim]

Continuing the continuation of continuing on with the fuel tank:

Next, I needed to add the mounting brackets.  The plans say you bend a bracket and soft solder it to the tank, then you soft solder a nut to the underside of the bracket so you can bolt it in place under the tractor.

While this sounds good, I was worried about getting the nut to align with the hole. When I solder things, they tend to slide around and end up in the general vicinity of where I wanted them, but not exactly.

So, I came up with this solution; solder a small piece of steel to the back side of the bracket, and then I can drill and tap it after I get things assembled.

And I decided to silver solder my nut replacements so I didn’t have to worry about them coming off while soldering the bracket into place.

Here I am, preparing for silver soldering the nut wanna-be in place:


Here are both pieces soldered.  This strip will be cut in half to make two brackets.


But before I cut it in half, I used the mill to square up the steel pieces so it looked better.  See?  They slid around on me just as I predicted.


Here’s it is after the milling:


And here are the brackets – cut in half and bent to shape.


Next, I soldered them into place (soft solder).


And here’s the tank, with brackets.

I did a test fit of the tank, marked where the holes should be drilled and tapped and went to work.

I spotted and drilled the first hole, and tried to tap it.   But my tap would only go about 5-6 turns in before it got very hard to move.  I could feel it moving a bit, but I didn’t want to break it off.  I decided that 5-6 threads was plenty – as much as any nut would have, right?  So I drilled a clearance hole from the other side to meet the threads, so I wouldn’t have to thread the rest of the way through.

So I did this (sorry, no pics here, I was too focused and forgot). And then went to run the tap through.  5-6 turns and it stopped. I drilled a slightly larger clearance hole, thinking my holes might be misaligned.  Still it wouldn’t go. I was feeling like it was about to go through, when ... SNAP …
Oops… I snapped my #2-56 tap! 


This was my signal to take a break (no pun intended – I wasn’t feeling overly punny at the moment!  ).

[Kim]

OK, after a little time to calm down, and a little positive self-talk, I decided to tackle it head on.

First, how’d that happen?  I figured I must have hardened the steel when soldering the brackets or something.  Why else would it have been so hard to tap?

So, how to repair the damage?  Of course, there wasn’t enough tap exposed to be able to twist it out.  So, I removed the chunk of steel with the tap in it, by attaching a pair of vice grips to the steel to act as a big weight, and heating the stupid thing up to release the silver solder.  Which worked quite well:


But, now, do I solder another chunk of steel there and go through that pain again?  I decided that since I had the hole marked in the right spot, I could just hold a nut in place with a short bolt and solder it down. Which is what I did.  And it worked fairly well:

Not the best soldering job, but it’s very firmly attached.

Now to do the other side.  I went to get a 2-56 cutting tap, since I’d broken my 2-56 roll tap.  But what do I find?  My 2-56 roll form tap!  Turns out, I’d been trying to use a 4-40 tap in a hole sized for a 2-56!  No wonder it got hard so fast!  And no wonder the 2-56 clearance hole didn’t help much!   I’m surprised I got 5 turns in with a 4-40!

The stupid things you do (well, at least I do!).

So, with the REAL 2-56 tap, the threading on the other side went quite smoothly. No difficulties at all!

Amazing how it works when you use the correct tool!

And here’s a shot of the completed tank, with mounting brackets.


And here it is mounted under the cab.  You can see the copper fill-tube sticking up in the middle there, and the two hex head bolts holding the tank in place.


Finally, I soldered the burner cups into place:


Here’s the victory shot – the completed tank & burner assembly:


Now, mounted in place under the cab, taken from the under side:


And finally, to add the wick.  I had gotten this long role of 1” lamp wick.  I cut several 1 1/2" long sections, then rolled them together and placed them in the burner cup.


Wick now in both burner cups:


I still need to test my burners, but I think they look like they ought to work!

Thanks for following my trials and tribulations! 
Kim

[b.lindsey]

Great update and more nice progress Kim. Bummer about losing the 4-40 tap....I've done that or something similar. Humbling, but it happens. The tank turned out really well though.

Bill

[Kim]

Thanks Bill,
And what's even more embarrassing, is that in the picture with the broken tap (last picture in post #905), you can SEE where it says "4-40".  And I STILL Hadn't noticed it!  I was looking at it the whole time...   
And I believe I have learned this one before.  I think I'm going to have to keep my 4-40 tap farther away from my 2-56.  Somehow, I get the wrong one too easily!
Kim

[crueby]

Been there, done that!         

[Flyboy Jim]

Thanks for the update Kim. This tank definitely qualifies as a "project within a project"! Well done!

Jim

[Kim]

Thanks Jim!
Kim

[90LX_Notch]

Nice work on the tank Kim.  It is one of those parts the a lay person could never comprehend how much time and effort went into.

-Bob

[Kim]

Thanks Bob!
Yes, I'd never have guessed how much time would go into it either, till I made one.  Of course, when you do everything two or three times, it always takes longer 

But that's the process of learning. And despite how it may sound, I'm really enjoying it! 

Kim

[Kim]

Today I tried out the burners.

I purchased a large plastic syringe (30ml) through Amazon, that had a 1.5” long needle.  I used this to fill the tank with ~90ml of denatured alcohol.  Turns out, 90ml was just a little much – I got just a smidge of overflow.  But it was pretty close!

I played with the wick a little to make sure it was wicking fuel up and then lit the burners.  It burned quite well!  As the wick stabilized, I got a good tall flame from it = maybe a little too tall. If I shorten the wick a little, I should bet a smaller flame, I think.


But I started noticing that the back burner’s flame was getting smaller, pretty fast.  It was burning very low – it didn’t seem to be getting as much alcohol as the front burner, which made no sense to me.


I blew out the flames and waited for things to cool. 

On investigation, the wick on the back burner was quite dry, which made me wondered if that rear fuel line was blocked somehow.  But after removing the wick, the burner cup immediately filled with fuel. So the line wasn’t blocked.

Then I started to wondering if I’d crammed the wick in there too tight – tight enough that it impeded the wicking action. So, I repacked the burner cups with one less piece of the 1” wide wick I used.

After replacing the wick, the top of the wick became wet with fuel very quickly, which I took to be a good sign.

This time, I got the same good flames, but they stayed more consistent over 5+ minutes,  not decreasing over time.


The back burner flame still seems to be a little shorter than the front one, but the wick had burned down more, so twas shorter.  I should probably trim the wicks more evenly when I do it again.

But it seems pretty clear that I can get a good flame from the burner!  Hopefully it will be hot enough to make some steam!

Kim