Attaching wedge to beam: Best method??

[LD1]

Looking for the best method/style of connection for attaching the wedge to the beam on my upcoming splitter project.

Not looking for type of rod, style of welding, or any of that. Just the type of connection at the joint. Please see attached crappy paint drawing. Black is the 6x6 I-beam and the red is the splitter wedge. The Wedge is going to be 1" thick by 6" wide steel by whatever height I need depending on style.

Top is just sitting on top of beam
Middle is on back of beam
Bottom is notched with a little weld on both.



So what is the best/strongest method of attaching? or does it likely not matter with a small 4"/~18 ton cylinder??

 

[Shield Arc]

I would go with the 3rd / bottom drawing. Or cut a hole in the top flange of the beam, cut out the web. Insert the wedge in the hole. This way you get a lot of weld volume. You can leave 1 or 2-inch of beam behind the wedge also.

I did this for the pad eyes on my bridge crane.

 

[LD1]

I actually like that idea. But man that is a whole of torching vs none...

 

[Shield Arc]

My brother-n-law and I built a log splitter for him a couple years ago. You could go with this design.

 

[LD1]

I dont want a horizontal/vertical. Already have one.

I want a strictly horizontal with the wedge on the beam and a small table off the end to catch the pieces that need split again, and allow the already split pieces to fall off the end.

With the wedge on the cylinder, once the piece is split to size, it needs handled again to chuck it away from the splitter. That is the step I am trying to eliminate. Similar to the super splits wedge design and table, but fast hydraulics. (22gpm pump and 4" cylinder).

I also am not a fan of capturing the pushplate or wedge around the beam like that. I like speeco/huskee's "log cradle" design. As that is what our other splitter is. Seems simpler and easier to fab and works just as well. So that is the route I am going with that.

So basically if you look at a huskee/speeco design for horizontal only, that will be similar to my build.

 

[Shield Arc]

I think any design you posted above will work for this situation. More weld volume is always nice.
Pad eye design for heavy lifting you'll just about always see the inserted style.
Hard to see in this picture, but all the pad eyes are inserted from flange to flange, and we were only picking 300-tons at a time.

 

[mrmikey]

Go with the bottom design.
Although mine is a moving wedge http://tinyurl.com/q9esre6 it'd be the same principal as my cylinder mount only in your case it'd be the wedge. Not that your weld is bad but you're not totally dependant on the weld to the flange, some of the stress is on the web also. ...Mike

 

[doxford jim]

The last sketch would be what I would go with. You are getting twice the holding from the welding making it a much stronger component.

 

[grsthegreat]

i see what your trying to do, and my buddy has a similar unit. but he still has to handle the wood as he has to turn them and do a 2nd split or the pieces are too large. Also, when he completes the cycle, a lot of the time the pieces arnt completely separated but are hung up with shreads of wood connecting the 2 pieces.

hope your work better. of the 3 pics, i thing the 3rd would be the strongest.....more welding paths. but thats just an opinion

 

[7879fordman]

Yap the 3rd of the three is it .

Sent from my iPhone 5 using TractorByNet

 

[2458n]

The pick points on the spreader beam remain in the solid plate no welding effects the piece with the holes. Welding is done on the ends of the beam which is under compression. When you are picking. I do like the third attachment method as long as you can slip a 4-way over it.

 

[LD1]

Well, now it sounds like I have to decide if I want to take the easy way and do option 3, or take the time to do it like shield arc posted?? Same material either way. Not that it matters as I have a 20' stick of 1"x6".

Grsthegreat: I am in visioning it working lots better. For starters, the wedge will be taller than ones like the super split. Likely around 10" tall. And there will be a short table aft the wedge. So ones that need split again can be slid right around to go again.

If you watch any of the YouTube videos of the ss or Dr inertia splitters, that is basically how this will work, but with a taller wedge and fast hydraulics.

 

[yomax4]

You could do # 1 with #2 behind it. Or # 3.. Both will work. When you get your wedge failures is mostly when you add height to the wedge. I never had any issues with an 8" wedge no matter how it was sitting in the I beam. when I turned it into a 12" wedge it would tear off unless I did a 1-2 combo or #3. Also as much as I hate to admit it. It held best when welded with 8018 as compared to Pulsed Mig..

 

[Arc weld]

You could do it like the 3rd picture and put fish plates inside the I beam extending on to the wedge. If you wanted to get really fancy, you could cut the I beam and the wedge on a 45 deg. angle and do it like the 3rd pic. Then you'd get a lot more weld. You could even leave the flange longer on the bottom to put some nice fillet welds on the wedge and the bottom flange. Probably overkill but you'd never have to worry about it breaking.

 

[Arc weld]

I would go with the 3rd / bottom drawing. Or cut a hole in the top flange of the beam, cut out the web. Insert the wedge in the hole. This way you get a lot of weld volume. You can leave 1 or 2-inch of beam behind the wedge also.

I did this for the pad eyes on my bridge crane.

I'm :shocked: Maybe I'm seeing things but it looks like there's a couple of flaws on that pad eye. Top left and lower right. You might have downgrade the 80 ton rating... to about 79.5 tons.:laughing:

 

[Shield Arc]

I seen that too after taken the picture years ago to post on one of the welding forums. I went back out to the shop to look. It is just the picture. For me it's a lot easier to weld than take a good picture! :confused3:

 

[Shield Arc]

I like Arc weld's idea of notching the top flange and web back, let the bottom flange run under the wedge to get a full fillet weld! I'm wondering in this case if it would help to take a hole saw and cut a 1 1/2 to 2-inch circle in the inside 90-degree corner? Or just leave it 90-degrees and get a full fillet weld?:confused3:
I'm always interested in different joint designs!
Please forgive my quick and dirty MS Paint drawing, hopefully you get the idea of what I'm trying to say.

 

[LD1]

I like Arc weld's idea of notching the top flange and web back, let the bottom flange run under the wedge to get a full fillet weld!

Thats what I am starting to think. Allthough, I would also consider leaving the top flange full length also, kinda like your first idea, but no webbing behind the wedge. Cause I do plan on adding a table anyway. So no point in cutting out metal (top web) just to add it back later in the form of a table.

Here is a crappy MSpaint drawing. Black is beam, Red is wedge, and Green being table.

 

[Shield Arc]

That's a really good idea too!:thumbsup: Look at all the weld volume you get there.
I like the table idea too. Wonder if it should be bigger, or at least lips on the outside edges to catch the wood from falling?

 

[LD1]

That's a really good idea too!:thumbsup: Look at all the weld volume you get there.
I like the table idea too. Wonder if it should be bigger, or at least lips on the outside edges to catch the wood from falling?

The drawing is really not to scale. But I dont want lips on the end as I want the split pieces to fall off the table. The only ones I dont want to fall off are the ones that need split again. But once splitdown to the right size, I want the next round I put on there to push those pieces off the table. So no lip on the end, but maybe on the sides??

Watch this video of a supersplit inertia.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V95e-sMQTL8

Thats how I invision splitting wood. Similar table and wedge. Only with Hydraulics that will be a touch slower than that inertia.