Big Barn’s Retirement Farm Shop

[aczlan]

Very cool idea.

Aaron Z

 

[Rustyiron]

I'm gonna have to make some of those.:thumbsup:

 

[pmsmechanic]

Nice!

 

[Kyle_in_Tex]

nice again!

 

[dstig1]

Good stuff! I've always just used another scrap in the vise for short pieces. The angle bracket is something i am going to need to make soon. I am going to be making a bunch of railings and need the angle to be consistent. It is of course some oddball angle like 39.xx or whatever, but jigs are your friend! Many long years of experience to learn that point...

 

[TMGT]

BB, can you at least wait till I'm moved into the new shop before you start making more projects for my list! Geeez

 

[spitter]

Re: Big Barn痴 Retirement Farm Shop

I built a lift kit for my jet h/v band saw brought it up to table hight . 2 hernighted disks I could not take bending over any more . Built it out of left over punched iron and put swivel casters on it . Works like a charm little top heavy but better then my back hurting all the time.:drink:

 

[Big Barn]

Re: Big Barn痴 Retirement Farm Shop

I built a lift kit for my jet h/v band saw brought it up to table hight . 2 hernighted disks I could not take bending over any more . Built it out of left over punched iron and put swivel casters on it . Works like a charm little top heavy but better then my back hurting all the time.:drink:

Good plan. Bending over to line up the cut gets old awful fast.

I ditched the wheel kit on my Ellis and built a new base to raise mine also. All the bases I build allow for pallet jack use for easy machine relocation.





View of Infeed roller table




View of detachable outfeed roller table



Closeup of clip on mounting point for outfeed roller table

 

[BigBlue1]

Re: Big Barn痴 Retirement Farm Shop

Quite often the workpiece is too short to be clamped securely in a chop or bandsaw痴 vise. There are several ways of getting around this problem including using a piece of EQUAL thickness to shore up the 兎mpty side of the vise jaws.

This is the simplest method I have found. Credit goes to Bob (BD1 on Welding Web) for sharing his idea.

Essentially it痴 a short length of pipe cut in half lengthwise.

That is a fantastic idea! I may have to steal it!

Rob

 

[Big Barn]

One of the tenants in my maintenance yard is the local branch of a small national building maintenance company specializing in tenant improvements.

I’ve declined doing welding repairs and custom fabrication jobs for them because some may be beyond by skillset but mainly because I have no desire to HAVE to do something. However I am more than happy to do any personal repairs or projects for them if I can.

No money is ever exchanged as quite honestly I would end up thinking of it as a JOB and not enjoying it.

I am more than aptly rewarded though as I am privy to a plethora of goodies.

For instance on renovation jobs for some big box stores and a popular PNW based coffee chain, stuff they remove cannot be resold or reused. It must go into the dumpster.

They recently did a quarter million dollar reno job on the staff lunch room of a well known electronics store. Someone else had the contract for the retail sales and storage areas...so much for the demise of brick and mortar stores. I can only assume this business model helps drive sales to their online venue also.

..... fortunately I have these three bins in my yard. One for paper and cardboard, one for scrap metals, and one for “garbage”



Needless to say I do a lot of “dumpster diving”

Here’s a small sample of discarded items:


All sizes and configurations of Metro shelving



A rolling warehouse ladder



25’ x24”x8” glulam beams one of which I used to make an eight foot bench.



Yesterday they were cleaning out one of their service trucks and dropped off these excess shop supplies me.



The most interesting “haul” occurred late last year when someone drove into a gas station/convenience store to retrieve the ATM.

Because of all the broken glass and spilled liquids EVERYTHING had to go in the dumpster. Oil, additives, cases of soda, food everything. They had a dumpster on site of course but a couple of service truck loads of stuff found good homes.

I guess the point of my story is; retired life is good here at my farm shop. Good friends and always something going on. I am very grateful.