making a custom flatbed truck side rail for a friend

[grsthegreat]

No way that could happen. There will be a solid panel to back up the cut panel when it’s finished. The inside panel will be powder coated to match trucks light trim color and epoxied ti the back of the gloss black powder coated cut section. This will make the artwork pop.

 

[jonsstihl]

I was thinking the same thing but the back up panel will really make things pop, Nice work

 

[grsthegreat]

I’m going to cut the panels later this morning. Then remove both sides, grind some welds and run it over to the powder coaters shop. I had the steel supplier shear the filler strips into 13” x 96” strips. So all I have to do is rip to length with plasma cutter. Takes a few minutes per cut. But will have to do 4 bends on brake.

 

[PILOON]

I usually do this kind of work in warmer weather, and like leaving roll up door open. Not an option lately. Make up air is a good idea. I have added heated make up air and even swamp cooler make up air in restaurants. Those hoods draw out a lot of heat and cool

I once owned an aircraft hanger that had previously done painting.
Naturally they had a natural gas air make up system that had been decommissioned
Problem was that the gas line had never been capped and a 'smart a--' tenant decided to put it back in service.

Now that was one close call! Good thing I have a sharp nose and know the smell of gas.
Mind U it was huge building and would have taken a long time to reach the correct mixture for big boom.

 

[Sberry]

Super nice. That's a hard job to do well. Lots of design details. The art work really sets it off. Personally tend to like paint better than the coating but that's rather irrelevant.

 

[Cat385B]

Looks like a fun project, nice work.

 

[grsthegreat]

It was a lot of work, but fun. We took all 3 panels and 14 backer panels in to be powder coated yesterday. Spent 3 hours cleaning up my shop. Sure made a mess.

 

[Rustyiron]

Very nice work :thumbsup:

 

[grsthegreat]

Thanks

 

[Renze]

No way that could happen. There will be a solid panel to back up the cut panel when it’s finished. The inside panel will be powder coated to match trucks light trim color and epoxied ti the back of the gloss black powder coated cut section. This will make the artwork pop.

I was just thinking when i saw that: one quick move to steer clear of an unattending car on a narrow road would send loose tools through the sides, bending your christmas trees and bears.
Personally i would bolt some aluminium panels behind it, as it doesnt rust when it gets scratched...

 

[4570Man]

I usually do this kind of work in warmer weather, and like leaving roll up door open. Not an option lately. Make up air is a good idea. I have added heated make up air and even swamp cooler make up air in restaurants. Those hoods draw out a lot of heat and cool

If you had a pipe to supply most of the air to the bottom of the table could you mostly circulate outside air without disturbing much shop air?

 

[grsthegreat]

I was just thinking when i saw that: one quick move to steer clear of an unattending car on a narrow road would send loose tools through the sides, bending your christmas trees and bears.
Personally i would bolt some aluminium panels behind it, as it doesnt rust when it gets scratched...

As I mentioned before. There are inside panels that will be solid, colored to match the light truck trim, that will be installed behind the cut out panels. There out being powder coated right now.

 

[John0829]

Just be sure to show us how it looks when it is finished

 

[grsthegreat]

Just be sure to show us how it looks when it is finished

Will do

 

[Rustyiron]

Are any of those designs pre programmed into your machine?
I have a nice Hypertherm and can add a "machine torch", but I'm not *confident in my ability computer wise.
*AT ALL:laughing:

 

[grsthegreat]

Na, my wife does the actual art work on coral draw. Than I run it thru a few programs. The first is to convert her drawings to a format that another program called Vextractor can work with. That program converts all artwork to an exterior outline. Than I import that into a program called EnRoute6 which I have automatically programmed into setting all the interior and exterior pierce locations and sequences for the plasma cutter. Enroute is an expensive but very powerful program that can even nest multiple cut designs so I use less steel plate when cutting.

I wish it was easy, but I can spend more time designing the artwork than actually making the piece.

Now if its something simple like the time I needed a 30 inch round disk with a 1” center hole for my fence unroller, I can get the art done and out to the plasma table in about 5 minutes. If its something like these racks, it’s several hours of work.

 

[Rustyiron]

That's what I thought, although it might take me several days (if I could do it at all)
Looking forward to seeing the finished project :thumbsup: