Piano Hinge..

[zapster]

Well not exactly...

Hinge for a Bailer in a recycling plant...
Big piece 8"X 53" 1.25 thick flame cut..
Smaller piece 1"X"2 53" long flame cut..
Tubes 1.75 OD 1.25 thru hole...each piece 6" long...

Step 1...Put tubes on a 1.25 shaft and set up on bench.


Making sure you tack each tube to the PROPER SIDE of the bars after each tack make sure it still rotates back and fourth..




At this point REMOVE the shaft and give each tube 4 tacks both sides...
If you don't..it will seize in place...

Tacked both sides..


First pass..


Now continue until both bars are done....

I'll be back...
Something else just came up that needs to be done NOW...


...zap!

[billwood437]

Now that's a hinge!

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[HT2-4956]

Rebuilding a heavy hinge like that is a pretty common repair that needs to be done to the ejector assembly on an EOD bucket. That heavy washer you see in the picture is what gets plug welded on to the end of the shaft (both ends) for a "keeper".

[Blocker]

That is a good little project. We have a deal like that on our gate on most of these dirt buckets. Those things are a PAIN if everything is not lined up or something warps a little....but we only get to fix old ones after we break them. I like to see how you tacked it up. Do you leave the rod in each side during welding or leave it out?


Lincoln SA-250
Lincoln SW 200
Miller Thunderbolt

[BD1]

Cool!! That's got be one heck of a piano!!!

[zapster]

Well guys in a perfect world everything would work out nicely but with this that's not the case....

The customer dropped all the parts off and all I had to do was weld.

But the tubes were just drilled out...who knows if they were drilled dead center...
The bars were just flame cut..

If I did it the tubes would be perfect and I would have milled the 2 bar surfaces flat where the tubes went...
But after welding there was no way in hell the shaft was going back in without a fight.
The tubes shrunk a little bit and welding to a flame cut piece even though I took all the millscale off leaves alot to be desired...

So plan B is to use a 1- 3/16" shaft and it basically it made it perfect.
It hinges back and forth with no binding and its not loose at all.

Customer is very happy and so am I.
Second pass..every weld is like this....


All together.


Boy am I glad this went together with no hassle.


I get all the fun jobs...


...zap!

[billwood437]

What was your final weight on that piece? Nice welds btw.

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[zapster]

Weight?
No idea.

But 2 of can barely pick it up .
Thats what a hoist is for...

...zap!

[duaneb55]

Liberace would have been proud.

[mrmikey]

Making sure you tack each tube to the PROPER SIDE of the bars

Don't go there LOL. Don't know how many times I've done the wrong one to the bar. Bad enough when you do it tacking, worse when you do it welding.
I found it was easier if you either left a small gap on the barrel you're welding so the opposite barrel wouldn't bind or else cut the bar out a bit so it wouldn't bind on the other barrel.
Nice job BTW, not met as criticism just comments............Mike

[rlitman]

Making sure you tack each tube to the PROPER SIDE of the bars after each tack make sure it still rotates back and fourth..

At this point REMOVE the shaft and give each tube 4 tacks both sides...
If you don't..it will seize in place...

I am a bit confused here.
You think it will seize because of the movement due to welding, or because the shaft will weld itself to the tube?

The last time I welded a hinge like this, I left the shaft in, in the hopes that it would keep everything in alignment. I did graphite the heck out of it before welding though. It worked out for me, though it was admittedly MUCH smaller than this.

[zapster]

Don't go there LOL. Don't know how many times I've done the wrong one to the bar. Bad enough when you do it tacking, worse when you do it welding.
I found it was easier if you either left a small gap on the barrel you're welding so the opposite barrel wouldn't bind or else cut the bar out a bit so it wouldn't bind on the other barrel.
Nice job BTW, not met as criticism just comments............Mike

There is at least 1/8" space between the tubes..
I don't like a tight fit between tubes like that either...

Weld area marked with a X....
No weld no mark.


...zap!

[zapster]

I am a bit confused here.
You think it will seize because of the movement due to welding, or because the shaft will weld itself to the tube?

The last time I welded a hinge like this, I left the shaft in, in the hopes that it would keep everything in alignment. I did graphite the heck out of it before welding though. It worked out for me, though it was admittedly MUCH smaller than this.

Like I said in a earlier post..
Flame cut metal and not so drilled in the middle tubes = problems before we even start.

The original shaft worked for the inital tacks but once you put the machine on kill and have at it with 450 amps...
Things move.
Things bend..
Things distort....


The original shaft would not even start to go in either end tube because they collapsed somewhat and I am not fighting this thing.
So.....
Plan B goes into effect.

Problem solved.
.030 clearance per side works very nice.

...zap!

[Blocker]

Nice fix Zap.


Lincoln SA-250
Lincoln SW 200
Miller Thunderbolt

[85burbanator]

We used to weld hinges like that on dock levelers, now manufactures don't advise us to do that as a permanent repair because they want the whole leveler or lip assembly changed ($$$). Also opens us up to a whole host of liability issues if a Hilo falls through. We used to weld the tubes and cracks in the lips but not anymore, unless it's the only one we have to shut it down. The biggest reason for those failures is running a three-wheeled Hilo on a lever designed for a 4 wheeler hilo. Good job on the hinge

[HT2-4956]

zap,

The first thing that caught my eye in the pictures in the first post was that the hinge tube pieces looked a little on the thin walled side for that heavy of an application. I can see where putting two heavy welds down one side of them could cause some distortion issues.

On those hinges I've rebuilt for those EOD buckets we just used commercially available heavy wall DOM tube. The only real "machining" involved was putting the length of tube in the saw and cutting off the required number of pieces of the needed length.

[Hobbytime]

are there any provisions for greasing the hinge? any grease zerks installed?

[zapster]

No and no.

...zap!

[zapster]

zap,

The first thing that caught my eye in the pictures in the first post was that the hinge tube pieces looked a little on the thin walled side for that heavy of an application. I can see where putting two heavy welds down one side of them could cause some distortion issues.

On those hinges I've rebuilt for those EOD buckets we just used commercially available heavy wall DOM tube. The only real "machining" involved was putting the length of tube in the saw and cutting off the required number of pieces of the needed length.

Yeah I hear ya but the customer supplied everything so I just went with what was in front of me..

Found out that they tried to make one...
Got the pin stuck..
Failed miserably.

I can just imagine what may happen if they don't prep the area that the smaller bar will be welded to by their Maint. Dept.



I guess I will just have to wait for the movie.......


...zap!

[Fnord5]

We used to weld hinges like that on dock levelers, now manufactures don't advise us to do that as a permanent repair because they want the whole leveler or lip assembly changed ($$$). Also opens us up to a whole host of liability issues if a Hilo falls through. We used to weld the tubes and cracks in the lips but not anymore, unless it's the only one we have to shut it down. The biggest reason for those failures is running a three-wheeled Hilo on a lever designed for a 4 wheeler hilo. Good job on the hinge

Just finished up welding a bunch of cracks on two docks, about 20 minutes ago.
Some other company had LOTO the levelers, there was zero reason to. So we went in and repaired everything, saved the customer a ton of money.

[85burbanator]

Just finished up welding a bunch of cracks on two docks, about 20 minutes ago.
Some other company had LOTO the levelers, there was zero reason to. So we went in and repaired everything, saved the customer a ton of money.

We used to as well. We replace the angle or tube underneath that gets bet when the hold down no longer floats properly and jambs up. We also replace lip assemblies but no longer reweld them. If the deck is cracking, they are under rated or not built for the type of hilo driving over them. The three wheeled ones put alot of weight in the centers which bows them to the point that the lips bind up. Most of our replacements are do to rust and years of ****ty or improper repairs. The things are so simple though, just HEAVY. We did 14 a few weeks ago close to 4k lbs. wet. Easy money, never go under one wit a maintenence prop, a guy had one come down not long ago and they found him several hours later dead.

[Fnord5]

Yeah just had that happen in Manteca CA.
Always have the strut in regardless of what I am doing.
Just curious, what area do you work in?

[85burbanator]

S.e. michigan

[Weldordie]

Why tig, and not mig or stick? Heat?

[Mikel_24]

Why tig, and not mig or stick? Heat?

I guess that precission work such as this calls for TIG. MIG wil put less heath into the part though and I am pretty sure that any skilled weldor in this forum will know how to prevent cold MIG welds... however if ZAP made it, you can bet 99,% of the times, it is going to be TIG