:::RHMT::: Real Home Made Turbo
General Category => Fabrication => Topic started by: mandrel-bends on November 11, 2011, 04:03:38 AM
-
We started our cutting shop last year with a high-definition plasma made by Komatsu. We've since sold that machine and are solely running waterjets now.
Our first waterjet - Mighty Midget (Flow Bengal)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fcuttingshop%2Fmidget1.JPG&hash=51504f585a0d34e2ee59650f2ffbf45519d29df3)
Nested stainless parts.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fcuttingshop%2Fnesting1.JPG&hash=46ff89121e3f23d3734d07e0f74c2db0dd05e072)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fcuttingshop%2Fnesting4.JPG&hash=f2b76338d8fbb3bbe24432ad1b784657e6b6ff0b)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fcuttingshop%2Fnesting2.JPG&hash=086149d7a61a50c25b91503f9d5f6c239359e59d)
Our second waterjet, a chukar/jet-edge machine, being put up:
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fcuttingshop%2Fjetedge1.JPG&hash=cc027293d53e8557b7840f9e86ef79f6f8402f2c)
Pump alone is about the size of the baby bengal.
When it's finished, it will look identical to this:
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fcuttingshop%2Fjetedge.jpg&hash=09096a468d215eb10c9bfe52013746cd998c6acb)
-
One of the most annoying things about waterjets is they give you these tiny little hoppers, that barely hold maybe 80lbs of abrasive.. meaning you gotta stop it and fill it every couple hours. If you don't, you end up blasting abrasive everywhere and screwing up your cut. We researched large hopper options, but most companies wanted $5-8k for 500lb hopper. So we built our own, out of a $100 air tank off craigslist and some fittings.
Pathetic 80lb stock hopper:
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fcuttingshop%2Fpathetic.JPG&hash=672638837190b7ad9284a6e9a49a6c6f7e335741)
$200 hopper we built from used air tank, and 3 pressure-proof viewing windows from grainger. We just cut off the top, flipped it, welded it back on, welded up a few (big -1 huge) holes, added a few fittings and wa-la. ~800lb capacity hopper. Thing even holds pressure - what do you know.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fcuttingshop%2Fbighopper.JPG&hash=95edacb4b7ce6004b66fac56fe4e031518363f8e)
-
Very nice. We should get the sponsors going back for this site. I just bought piping from eBay instead of you. I still need exhaust piping though so I will be sending a pm your way when I have some more cash to spend.
-
I appreciate the thought. We are a bit slower this time of year, so everything counts. :)
For those interested in our original plasma setups. The komatsu we originally started with underwent some pretty serious retrofits.
This is a video of the machine as it cut stock - ~30IPM @ 3/8" mild. Running a bunch of LS1 flanges.
LS1 Flange on KCR-0951 Plasma (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wv-onSQFDc8#)
This is a video of the machine after it received a huge amount of hydefinition hypertherm parts. (New Hydef Power Source, Controller, Torch Height system, etc). 80IPM @ 3/8" mild. I'm actually going to mount this power souce & torch system on the jet edge machine and run it as a mixed mode setup.
KCR-HD3070 Hybrid (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oMC5Wp_4B8g#)
-
Why water instead of plasma? What's the benefit of it? Cleaner cut?
-
Pretty sure cleaner cut is the reason.
Glad to see you back around here Adam.
-
The cut quality is superior to the hydefinition plasma and dramatically better to the laser cut parts we've been out sourcing for years. What we gained in speed on hydef plasma (cutting 80-120 ipm), we lost in clean up of the parts (you have to re-drill all the holes, and remove the slag) if there are a lot small holes.
That doesn't mean I wont be using the plasma head on the second waterjet for profiling. For a lot of our industrial customers - plasma is just fine, and they dont want to pay for 10 ipm on waterjet. Plasma is just really bad at holes that are near the diameter of the material you are cutting. (3/8" hole or near on 3/8" plate, etc).
-
PM me. I am looking for a new flange supplier for the shop.
-
Setup looks badass :noel: Do you happen to have any downpipe flanges for a Holset hy35? I dont see it listed on your site?
-
I have a drawing for the Holset HX35...? 1/2 or 3/8"? I'll put them up tomorrow just send me pm or leave the thickness here.
-
3/8"
-
what about a hx35? downpipe flange;)
-
HX 35
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fcatalog%2Fimages%2Fhx35-big.jpg&hash=560cd80832cf77f99d246975a58683be9c2011eb)
http://www.mandrel-bends.com/catalog/flanges-custom-waterjet-cutting-36/turbo-flanges-62/holset-hx35-turbo-outlet-flange-3-8-mild-steel-2206.html (http://www.mandrel-bends.com/catalog/flanges-custom-waterjet-cutting-36/turbo-flanges-62/holset-hx35-turbo-outlet-flange-3-8-mild-steel-2206.html)
-
Nice Adam, whats the nig nog rhmt hook up price shipped to 98370?
-
Setup looks badass :noel: Do you happen to have any downpipe flanges for a Holset hy35? I dont see it listed on your site?
HY35 flange is HX30 flange, IIRC, which I may not, and I think it's different from HX35, but could be wrong.
Glad I could clear that up!
-
Most hy35's that I have seen just have a cast 4"ish v-band that is all apart of the exhaust housing. Not a separate flange like the hx-35's. However knowing holset I am sure there are more then a couple variations of the hy35.
-
So which machine will you be using to cut your x-mas cookies for the company party this year?
Serious question, do you have the flange for the holslut HE351VE, the oddball VGT? I don't need one atm, but I know others have in the past and nobody had them.
-
I gave away an HE351VE the other day. If I'd known it was a big deal I'd have copied the pattern.
-
So which machine will you be using to cut your x-mas cookies for the company party this year?
Serious question, do you have the flange for the holslut HE351VE, the oddball VGT? I don't need one atm, but I know others have in the past and nobody had them.
I have a flange if somebody want to copy :noel:
-
I'll see what I can find for an HX30 then. Thank you for the clarification.
Most turbo or exhaust flanges can be shipped in a usps small flat rate box for ~$5.
-
If we dont have the pattern, and it's something others could use, we will likely cut one for free if a gasket/flange/dxf/etc is provided and we will return your samples back to you on our dime. I just want to clarify that it would need to be a pattern that others would need as well (ie: common automotive or industrial). :)
-
So which machine will you be using to cut your x-mas cookies for the company party this year?
Serious question, do you have the flange for the holslut HE351VE, the oddball VGT? I don't need one atm, but I know others have in the past and nobody had them.
Not to take business from Adam, but Weir does for sure, I sent him the pattern and had one cut. Used it on a manifold about 6 months ago.
-
In fact I just checked my email, and still have the dxf in my email, if anyone wants it pm me.
-
bump for my boy adam. He came thru to the pnw fluffy meet with some free goods!!!
-
bump for my boy adam. He came thru to the pnw fluffy meet with some free goods!!!
Yeap and as soon as I replace the radiator support and straighten the nose of my car, I'll be using some of those 3" pipe goodies.
Adam you the man, hope to see ya at the next meet, with twincharge madness. :noel:
-
bump for my boy adam. He came thru to the pnw fluffy meet with some free goods!!!
Yeap and as soon as I replace the radiator support and straighten the nose of my car, I'll be using some of those 3" pipe goodies.
Adam you the man, hope to see ya at the next meet, with twincharge madness. :noel:
I want to hear that m5 scream on the dyno again :evil:
-
bump for my boy adam. He came thru to the pnw fluffy meet with some free goods!!!
Yeap and as soon as I replace the radiator support and straighten the nose of my car, I'll be using some of those 3" pipe goodies.
Adam you the man, hope to see ya at the next meet, with twincharge madness. :noel:
I want to hear that m5 scream on the dyno again :evil:
That was sweet sound.
Wonder where the vid of that is at?
-
I appreciate it guys. I will be back this year with more goodies and a slightly whistling m5 for the dyno. My 5 year old will likely be coming as well this year - she doesn't let me get out of the house without her these days!
Anybody need some aluminum work done? I don't have to charge much for the material - I've got ~800-1000bs of 6061-t6 drops from a job we just ran, all 3/8" with huge sections left in the plate skeletons and highly usable 11" circular drops.
-
What ever happened with those anti reversion chambers you were doing? Did the idea die off?
-
We sell a lot of parts to make them to certain companies. I use them on all of our performance vehicles as well. Since I dont own the patent, I can't really do more then give advice and parts on how to build them.
-
I don't really understand patent law, can you sell an unwelded kit?
-
We sell a lot of parts to make them to certain companies. I use them on all of our performance vehicles as well. Since I dont own the patent, I can't really do more then give advice and parts on how to build them.
Which reminds where did that write-up go, on this? :noel:
-
Looks like that thread is history. I'll see if I can find my notes from that discussion.
-
I don't really understand patent law, can you sell an unwelded kit?
-
Even though our design differs from the patent enough to be fine, It's not worth the liability for us to do that.
-
Looks like that thread is history. I'll see if I can find my notes from that discussion.
Kool, looking forward to reading it again. :noel:
-
So what are you doing with the table from the high def plasma rig?
-
PS, get some Sch 10 butt weld fittings back up on your site. I want to place an order but you're cramping me with having to get shit from 2 different places!
I'll order some flanges from you today or tomorrow and check them out.
-
The komatsu gantry itself is in storage right now. All of the cutting components for it are being re-used on the jet edge as a 3rd or 4th torch setup though.
I will get more fittings in eventually. We just haven't been focusing much of pipe lately.
-
Didn't you refit the the gantry with ac servos? What resolution are the encoders? How much Z clearance between the beam and bed? Wanna sell it?
Do you have an old pines #2 with plane control you want to get rid of? Doesn't need to be cnc, I have two recurring jobs I want to bring in house to cut down on lead times.
-
isnt that patent from the late 80's? if so, it should be fair game at this point.
-
What size is the job and what is the radius? Pines #2s rarely have any type of plane of bend control - most are b (bend head) axis only. C/Y axis stuff are only cnc machines and single axis + 1 machines. A #2 sized machine with a plane of bend is going to be a trick to find. I personally detest #2s, they work ok for small tube - anything below 2", but otherwise they suck. They just arent rigid enough to do anything. For instance my 3" capable #2 weighs about 4500lbs. My 3" capable eagle weighs 18,000lbs. Just my .02.
You just interested in a gantry + servos + control, or just a gantry? My servo's were overkill - 256,000 ppr ac servos I ran in position mode with a closed loop beckhoff cnc control. The beckhoff control and servos were over $20k by themselves. I was going to put them on this new machine to increase ITS resolution (DC brush/allen bradley9).
-
What size is the job and what is the radius? Pines #2s rarely have any type of plane of bend control - most are b (bend head) axis only. C/Y axis stuff are only cnc machines and single axis + 1 machines. A #2 sized machine with a plane of bend is going to be a trick to find. I personally detest #2s, they work ok for small tube - anything below 2", but otherwise they suck. They just arent rigid enough to do anything. For instance my 3" capable #2 weighs about 4500lbs. My 3" capable eagle weighs 18,000lbs. Just my .02.
You just interested in a gantry + servos + control, or just a gantry? My servo's were overkill - 256,000 ppr ac servos I ran in position mode with a closed loop beckhoff cnc control. The beckhoff control and servos were over $20k by themselves. I was going to put them on this new machine to increase ITS resolution (DC brush/allen bradley9).
3/4" diameter 304, .065 wall, 1 3/16" clr, 180* bend, and a 90*bend that is 90* off the plane of the 180
Also need to do 2" diameter 304, .065" wall, 2.25" clr, maybe 30* worth of bend, single plane.
I had seen a couple old #2's with plane control so I thought it was somewhat standard, but I'm not a bending guy. What machine would you recommend? I don't really have any need to bend anything over 2" diameter with .065" wall, if I ever did I would buy something substantially larger.
That control and servo system is overkill for what I need, I am just hoping to come across something with AC servos instead of DC.
-
A #2 with pressure die assist could pull off both of those bends. The 2" x 2.25" 304 setup would be tricky, but it could be done. If you were going past 45 that would worry me tho. A substantial step up would be either an Eagle DB60, Eaton Leondard VB200, or maybe schwarz-robitec sw60cnc. The DB60 you can find in push assist models as well that add y+ axis push during bending for tight radius. In terms of preference I would go: pines, eaton leonard, eagle/schwarz - the last two being tied.
The issue with AC servo's I ran into is if you are running them in torque / velocity mode with most controls, you are negating the real benefit of their design by running them in analog mode. There are very few controls on the market that can make use of AC servos in true digital positioning mode which was why I did what I did.
-
A #2 with pressure die assist could pull off both of those bends. The 2" x 2.25" 304 setup would be tricky, but it could be done. If you were going past 45 that would worry me tho. A substantial step up would be either an Eagle DB60, Eaton Leondard VB200, or maybe schwarz-robitec sw60cnc. The DB60 you can find in push assist models as well that add y+ axis push during bending for tight radius. In terms of preference I would go: pines, eaton leonard, eagle/schwarz - the last two being tied.
The issue with AC servo's I ran into is if you are running them in torque / velocity mode with most controls, you are negating the real benefit of their design by running them in analog mode. There are very few controls on the market that can make use of AC servos in true digital positioning mode which was why I did what I did.
I kinda figured bender mfg's fudged their bending claims when it comes to SS. Seems like push assist would be huge for bending tight rads.
Do the profile guys ever build machines with machine tool controls? Even old or basic Fanuc, Yasnac, Siemens or Mitsubishi controls are going to be more accurate then gantry profiling hardware.
-
The profiling hardware is mostly just used on plasma machines. You don't find many waterjets or lasers that run anything less then a hardened cnc machine controls. Fanuc/mitsu/beckhoff are all common in those industries. Siemens I see in mostly euro machines like trumpf.
A lot of machines are rated at 2D for stainless. Unfortunately you need a pressure assist to do less then 2*D, and that necessitates an electronic control of sort so most cheap/ish #2s are going to be out of the question - and honestly they bend like crap for the most part so I wouldnt suggest retrofitting one. They just have to many design flaws. I can't tell you how many clamp slides I snapped the neck off at $1200 a pop to replace.
-
Ah that makes sense the rating for stainless is at 2d. Well too bad the cheapo #2's are out, I see those things floating around for 20-30k. Can I get anything decent used for 60k? I don't really have any other parts to bend so I don't want to spend a ton of money. The dies look easy to make, the only thig I would likely sub out or buy would be the mandrels, I don't know of any good bard chromers up and all the mandrels I see online are hard chromed.
I'm not interested in doing a retrofit (although it would be fun), if I buy something I just want to run it, I am just finishing up nearly 8 months worth of machinery repair and restoration and have had my fill for a while.
-
I'm thinking about bringing in another container of schwarze cnc bender's out of the netherlands this summer if you'd like to get in on that. They are all late 90s machines and fully functional. I imported my schwarze sw60 last year and I am very impressed with the machine, easily the best built bender anywhere - but they are not common in the states, and when they are available they are crazy money. I can get them for about $40k-50k each, then I can either run them as is or rebuild them. The european recession has filled a lot of machinery houses over there with some very top end machines that are an incredible value.
-
I'm thinking about bringing in another container of schwarze cnc bender's out of the netherlands this summer if you'd like to get in on that. They are all late 90s machines and fully functional. I imported my schwarze sw60 last year and I am very impressed with the machine, easily the best built bender anywhere - but they are not common in the states, and when they are available they are crazy money. I can get them for about $40k-50k each, then I can either run them as is or rebuild them. The european recession has filled a lot of machinery houses over there with some very top end machines that are an incredible value.
I like the sound of that. I'd also want to try and find a Kaltenbach Kks400, w/ bundle loader, auto mitre head and parts sorter.
-
Our adige ts71 cnc automatic cold saw is roughly 50 feet long by 12 feet due to its bundle loader, and I've been considering sticking it in storage due to the footprint it consumes.. Bundle loaders seem like a good idea until they eat all your floor space. The adige/blm make the kaltenbachs look like toys IMHO. However we actually use our drastically cheaper scotchman cpo315hfa the most of any saw here because its so simple and compact. That saw spits out >1000 parts a day.
-
Our adige ts71 cnc automatic cold saw is roughly 50 feet long by 12 feet due to its bundle loader, and I've been considering sticking it in storage due to the footprint it consumes.. Bundle loaders seem like a good idea until they eat all your floor space. The adige/blm make the kaltenbachs look like toys IMHO. However we actually use our drastically cheaper scotchman cpo315hfa the most of any saw here because its so simple and compact. That saw spits out >1000 parts a day.
Yeah the space consumed does suck, I've been thinking alot about what would be best for my needs. Right now I am not in a hurry as my neighbor has an automatic saw and cuts all my parts for me, but the shitty thing is lately I've been paying him more then a saw payment would be. I like the bundle loader for lights out operation, I hate running multiple shifts, and I am not big on employees to start with, too many problems.
I've worked on a couple older 80's/early 90's Adiges and getting parts for them has been a nightmare. Otherwise I like the machines. Kaltenbach still fully supports saws they built in the 1890's, no shit. Which is kind of nice.
Is you Scotchman a pivot saw or a vertical slide machine? I'm not real big on the pivot machines. I wouldn't mind having a little Dake/OMP 370, but the up cutting Kaltenbachs just really appeal to me.
-
All the scotchman machines we have are pivot. A 350ltvs manual, a 350lt-pk, and a 315hfa-ltvs. Outside of just normal wear and tear items on them, I would estimate I have over a million cuts on these machines easily with nothing more then a few vices breaking and a plc battery dying every couple of years. Not bad consider we are talking about saws that were $8k, 12k, and 18k respectively. Chump change in the land of $500k adige saws.
Lights out sawing huh? Although we have the capability to run lights out sawing, I will admit I dont trust any of these machine well enough to leave them alone to run without an attendant. When I'm here in the evenings, I run sawing lines, waterjet and deburring machines all simultaneously and I just do other work in the office with the door open to listen for bad noises. Since the cost of destroying material here far out weighs the labor involved, many times 100:1, it's just not worth it IMHO.
-
All the scotchman machines we have are pivot. A 350ltvs manual, a 350lt-pk, and a 315hfa-ltvs. Outside of just normal wear and tear items on them, I would estimate I have over a million cuts on these machines easily with nothing more then a few vices breaking and a plc battery dying every couple of years. Not bad consider we are talking about saws that were $8k, 12k, and 18k respectively. Chump change in the land of $500k adige saws.
Lights out sawing huh? Although we have the capability to run lights out sawing, I will admit I dont trust any of these machine well enough to leave them alone to run without an attendant. When I'm here in the evenings, I run sawing lines, waterjet and deburring machines all simultaneously and I just do other work in the office with the door open to listen for bad noises. Since the cost of destroying material here far out weighs the labor involved, many times 100:1, it's just not worth it IMHO.
Yeah scrap happens when doing lights out, but you get the hang of it after a while. I'm used to running lights out on a wide variety of equipment, saws being one of them, and being that they are the least complicated and expensive I wouldn't sweat it one bit. But maybe the labor rates are drastically different between here and there. Up here there aren't any skilled trades people that know anything automation, the ones that do are 40-50 $/hr and then all the bs taxes and workmans comp on top adds another 5-10/hr, its cheaper long term to just automate everything. A lot of it has to do with how much employees just frustrate me though, it blows my mind they can do a task 10-10,000 times and still fuck up a batch of 500 parts because they aren't paying attention as they are just thinking about getting off work and buying another 20 bag.
I want to automate all production, to run lights out, and only use the 8 hour day shift for maintenance/setups/prototypes etc. I'm sure going to hate myself if it doesn't work the way I want it to :P
-
I got pissed off a couple years back and layed everyone off and tried to do it with just my wife and i - it didn't work out so well for us. We made it 2 weeks working 20 hours a day and we could only get a fraction of the work done and were completely burned out. Ultimately I make a lot more money with employees. Making the parts only takes 4 people due to our level of automation. Taking all the orders and shipping everything out, that takes 6 more people. I just try to keep my employment costs below 10% of our gross revenue. When somebody is sick here - let me tell you we all get overloaded.
-
Lol, yeah I have thought about firing everyone, but I still work enough by myself on evenings to know that I would never get anything out the door. Sometimes I wish I was just an employee. But things are getting better, nothing money and work can't fix, right?
-
There's a thread on YB about employers vs employees you two would fap to.
-
There's a thread on YB about employers vs employees you two would fap to.
Link?
-
There's a thread on YB about employers vs employees you two would fap to.
I've been talking about selling my company and become an employee alot lately,
I'm just worried I'll be shooting myself in the foot though.
-
You can do nothing but romantizie the idea of being someones employee.
-
Dave what did you end up with for a compressor? After 7 years my big 25hp ir 3000 decided to bomb out. Not sure if it's worth fixing or if I should move up into a new rotary screw. Looking at the Eaton 30hp VSD unit. Did not have a good experience with my IR SSR50 way back in the day, but I've been reading that the new screw compressors are pretty bullet proof. The eaton has a 5 year warranty on it if you buy a $500 maintenaince kit once a year from them. Our air demand seems to be pretty high now.
-
If I was going to do it over I would buy a Kaeser rotary screw, I tired to do that initially, but our local Kaeser dealer fired a bunch of people and was having some problems, bla bla bla. But they have something ridiculous like a 10 year warranty as long as they do the annual service ( I think around $200-300).
I was desperate for more air so a local shop sold me their backup quincy 20hp rotary and Hankinson dryer, then I grabbed a 400 gallon receiver at an auction, then Kaeser decided to start answering their phones and sold me some aluminum airlines so I got those and slapped the system together. I can't run a complete loop at the moment so I have another 60gallon tank at the end of the system.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi94.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fl83%2F935racer%2Fphoto41.jpg&hash=a975b2cf869787f8af3413b091363d071696f2ab)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi94.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fl83%2F935racer%2Fphoto32.jpg&hash=f3b26358f42c5b7637d46c6819ea5d7ca6803cad)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi94.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fl83%2F935racer%2Fphoto12.jpg&hash=bcb0eaf08eaa4b7b59abe46c27d40d63e0482ff1)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi94.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fl83%2F935racer%2Fphoto22.jpg&hash=ba8efe86e8907513a161108bf0261eb06936d0ba)
Including labor and wiring I think I did the whole system for under 20k, not bad for a reliable 100cfm@90psi of clean dry air.
-
Adam, can you cut me a hx35 exhaust flange without the wastegate hole in it?
-
Sure, just need to get this bastard compressor running again though - each waterjet uses 30cfm and the compressor we rented today - blows. We traced the problem down to the motor finally gave up. $2200 later, we have a new baldor motor here being installed right now. :(
-
Dave I was drooling over the KAESER units myself. The lead time from everybody really killed my immediate upgrade thoughts tho. I dont want to buy a used rotary compressor if I can avoid it and 4-6 weeks lead time is a lot time to be down. So we are going to fix this one, then order a replacement machine and move this old one to our shipping warehouse. Going to arm the girls with pneumatic staple guns - it will be scarey.
-
Adam, let me know when your up and running and ill shoot you a payment
-
Dave I was drooling over the KAESER units myself. The lead time from everybody really killed my immediate upgrade thoughts tho. I dont want to buy a used rotary compressor if I can avoid it and 4-6 weeks lead time is a lot time to be down. So we are going to fix this one, then order a replacement machine and move this old one to our shipping warehouse. Going to arm the girls with pneumatic staple guns - it will be scarey.
I hear you, I didn't want a used compressor either, but same problem, lead times. I needed something RFN and this unit had squat for hours on it as it was emergency backup only. When I get some more hours on this and get another hmc cell system I'll buy a new Kaeser airend and revert this Quincy to a backup. Parts for this quincy are a heartbreaker, a full service, belts, two filters and oil is $1000, no labor, but the oil is good for 8000hrs and filters around 3k so at least you get good life out of them.
-
You guys have machine shops. Why dont you make your own damn compressors ::)
-
I would rather push a couple days revenue into a new compressor then spend 3 months trying to design, machine and assemble something that someone else can do better and more then likely would end up costing more then it's worth.
-
But you could be like "fuuuuuuck yeah i built this compressor", or you could be like "Oh yes, I feel like I have made an excellent choice in purchasing this compressor. The time I saved purchasing this compressor allowed for me to use my time making widgets for other people and to run my business more efficiently. I feel complete."
Up to you, bros.
-
First of all I wouldn't ever build a commodity piece of equipment unless it was something I was planning on marketing.
But if I really had nothing to do I absolutely could machine a case, a couple rotors and shafts and roll my own. But it would cost more then anything I could buy. That said I was planning building my own air receiver, and some sanitary stainless air lines but the tank popped up the day I was going to order materials and it turned out SS lines were going to cost a bit more then the Aluminum lines which are much better suited to the job so I just bought them instead.
-
Got the big ingersol back up and running finally. The old motor drew 37 amps at 480V. The new one draws 23. So atleast there was one positive from this thing taking a crap. Never realised how many machines and tools use air until we didn't have it.
Ill throw that hx flange up tomorrow. Gotta run a rush job for monday that has the machine booked up for 13 hours today. Probably wont be sleeping much tonight. Need to get the jet edge cutting, trying to run all this work on one machine is stupid crazy.
-
Sweet! Thanks Adam.
-
God damm. That entire thread went clear the fuck over my head
-
That hx flange with deleted gate opening is up.
-
Some progress.
Finished up the tank. Sand blasted it and painted it with two coats of Dupont Industrial coatings color matched to the machine.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fwaterjet%2Ftank1.JPG&hash=3601f612909a895118e10ba570b752e68bf45d40)
About 85% done with all the wiring now. What a pain.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fwaterjet%2Ftank2.JPG&hash=bcd9c3de91c0131738db288571fce3ddb716a40c)
-
are you going to leave your ball screws exposed? water and abrasives are not good for ball screws
-
No. There are covers that encapsulate the screws and blowers that maintain a positive pressure on the screws to keep abrasives out. The screws remain exposed until we dial the slave encoder into square with their setup program.
-
Take some old engine blocks, change the valve springs to be one-way valves (soft spring and a limiter), put check valves in the spark plug holes (or have delta double-lobe the intake cam), then hook up a big fat 440v 3-phase motor to the flywheel. Sure it may waste some energy, but people have done this for years and they work. If nothing else, it would make for a high-cfm backup unit.
-
or do that to 4 of the cylinders and use the other 4 to run it. no electricity needed. lol
-
The only engines I have sitting around as backups are a BMW S85 and a N62 in the event our cars go boom. I dont think either would make good sacraficial air compressors. :) I did pickup a spare 30hp IR head when this thing went south just in case. We really depend on air it seems.
On a low note, I accidentally cut off the tip of my finger loading the water jet tonight with 1" plate by myself. I was being a bit too clever with the crane, working night shift alone, and I thought I had more clearance. Plate landed on my finger that was just about an 1/8" over the top of slat. Really gross. Hurt like a bitch. Really need to get a vacuum lifter for the crane to to avoid this in the future. Getting the chains out is super dangerous.
On a high note, I just cut our 165th nest of parts since we opened the cutting shop. We average ~32 parts per nest. Which brings baby waterjet to a part count of >5280 parts since we turned it on 3-4 months ago (if even that long). She has run on average 450 hours a month. ROI on this thing has been incredible.
-
You dont realize how much you use air until your pump locks up and it smokes the belt and your buddy who locked it up replaces the belt(not looking into what he did) and turns it back on and makes awesome shavings in your pump...... then you go to use it and its fucked. I need troubleshooting friends instead of trouble friends I guess. Thatd be trouble shooting on my part
-
That sucks about your finger. Sometimes it takes something like that to realize the danger of the things we do complacently.
-
Thinking about getting a vacuum lifter of some sort. Found out that two other people here have cut themselves relatively badly loading the damn machine and didnt tell me. :(
Maybe this:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Anver-M150M-Vacuum-Plate-Lifter-w-12-cup-Used-z030-/280750885770?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item415e0e8b8a (http://www.ebay.com/itm/Anver-M150M-Vacuum-Plate-Lifter-w-12-cup-Used-z030-/280750885770?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item415e0e8b8a)
Or maybe this:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/ANVER-Self-Contained-Vacuum-Sheet-Lifter-600-LB-Capacity-13-x-4-156-x-48-/230702168034?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item35b6ebb7e2 (http://www.ebay.com/itm/ANVER-Self-Contained-Vacuum-Sheet-Lifter-600-LB-Capacity-13-x-4-156-x-48-/230702168034?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item35b6ebb7e2)
-
Thinking about getting a vacuum lifter of some sort. Found out that two other people here have cut themselves relatively badly loading the damn machine and didnt tell me. :(
Maybe this:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Anver-M150M-Vacuum-Plate-Lifter-w-12-cup-Used-z030-/280750885770?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item415e0e8b8a (http://www.ebay.com/itm/Anver-M150M-Vacuum-Plate-Lifter-w-12-cup-Used-z030-/280750885770?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item415e0e8b8a)
Or maybe this:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/ANVER-Self-Contained-Vacuum-Sheet-Lifter-600-LB-Capacity-13-x-4-156-x-48-/230702168034?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item35b6ebb7e2 (http://www.ebay.com/itm/ANVER-Self-Contained-Vacuum-Sheet-Lifter-600-LB-Capacity-13-x-4-156-x-48-/230702168034?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item35b6ebb7e2)
Is the wt. capacity enough for plate your dealing with?
-
Not looking like it. Just ran some calc's on large plate weights... I guess we need more like a 1500lb capacity minimum. Hmm. What to do....
-
Looking for suggestions on a large turning center.
Requirements:
8" Bar capacity through spindle
25" swing min
800 RPM min
Hydraulic Chuck
We are building a new building to house this machine and a few machining centers so 40,000-85,000 lb machines are OK.
So far I've identified a few:
>200k range:
Daewoo Puma 700
100-200k range:
???
<100k range:
Warner Swasey SC-25 or SC-28
Suggestions?
Our current supplier runs the majority of our parts on a PUMA 700ML and 400L
-
*Edited because I am a retard
-
Most of the parts are 3-5" long, but are 4-8" wide. It's a lot of pipe to pipe and tube to tube couplings. Billet heavy wall reducers and unions. Specialty alloy stuff. Nothing particularly special. We had company that was doing these by cutting down 12" pieces of material and then turning out 3 pieces of product but it lefts tons of dead rems and was a real waste of money. The current company bar feeds most of the parts I believe.
We also need to be able to build tooling in house. Our monthly tooling bills is staggering for just maintenance items (new mandrels, wiper tipers, etc)... Not to mention everytime I need to buy a new tool set I'm looking at 10k for a small diameter, and 20k+ for a large diameter. I'm also paying out of the butt for waterjet maintenaince items which are just mostly turned parts.
-
Most of the parts are 3-5" long, but are 4-8" wide. It's a lot of pipe to pipe and tube to tube couplings. Billet heavy wall reducers and unions. Specialty alloy stuff. Nothing particularly special. We had company that was doing these by cutting down 12" pieces of material and then turning out 3 pieces of product but it lefts tons of dead rems and was a real waste of money. The current company bar feeds most of the parts I believe.
We also need to be able to build tooling in house. Our monthly tooling bills is staggering for just maintenance items (new mandrels, wiper tipers, etc)... Not to mention everytime I need to buy a new tool set I'm looking at 10k for a small diameter, and 20k+ for a large diameter. I'm also paying out of the butt for waterjet maintenaince items which are just mostly turned parts.
*Edited because I am a retard
-
All of the parts have an array of holes on the outside. The largest diameter of this type would be 8" for current product line. I could expand the couplers up into larger industrial sizes if I had the machinery.
My concern with gantry loader is the waste product. Arent you going to end up with a big rem at end of the blank because you need something to hold onto?
-
All of the parts have an array of holes on the outside. The largest diameter of this type would be 8" for current product line. I could expand the couplers up into larger industrial sizes if I had the machinery.
My concern with gantry loader is the waste product. Arent you going to end up with a big rem at end of the blank because you need something to hold onto?
Nope not at all, your waste material is the width of your saw blade.
-
I'm not following. How do you hold stock in the chuck if the rem is only the width of saw blade? When we used to turn these parts on turret lathes here - way back in the day, we had rem chunks everywhere from having to have 2-3" left in the 4 jaw chuck to turn it. What machine would you recommend?
-
I'm not following. How do you hold stock in the chuck if the rem is only the width of saw blade? When we used to turn these parts on turret lathes here - way back in the day, we had rem chunks everywhere from having to have 2-3" left in the 4 jaw chuck to turn it. What machine would you recommend?
Adam don't take it personally, but I deleted my posts because I setup a customer doing the same thing we are discussing here, and it took a while to come up with the best setup for lights out machining of pipe flanges.
I will say you can absolutely chuck these parts and have zero rem, but you'd probably have to pay me to find out how :P
I want to help, but I am kind of biting the hand that feeds.
-
Thats ok. The current setup being run on the big puma 700 w/ bar feed has little to no rem, just a nub at the end of the bar. I may just end up duplicating the setup I know the parts are successfully produced on but I may scale it down to just a Puma 400 stay below 200k.
-
Little update:
We've been running baby waterjet 16 hours a day. We were rebuilding the pump about every 600 hours but we had a catastrophic failure last week when we trashed the crank assembly. It really wasn't designed for this level of abuse. So while we wait on an new crank case setup, we picked up a new pump, Omax 2010 P4055V. 40HP - 55K PSI.
Bought it with 460 hours on the meter since new. Demo unit. Totally stoked. This bastard pumps 55K @ 1.5 gallons per minute means I can run dual 12/30 nozzle setups or one huge 15/50 setup.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fcuttingshop%2Fomax1.jpg&hash=c3330e9e5c2dc6ada02ec6d40df3b774ec5d8c05)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fcuttingshop%2Fomax2.jpg&hash=4713958ef8b0328476d0aae0bbd27df5d9ab94fc)
-
Fuckin a dude! Good score! 460hrs really ain't shit!
-
Lots of 1/2" aluminum drops this week if anybody needs some cheap aluminum parts.
Adam
-
i could really use a steel or stainless flange to fit a 4bbl carb manifold. 1/4" thick or so. im not picky as long as it wont warp when i bolt it down. ill make it myself if you can just send some material at a reasonable cost. no good metal shops within an hour drive for me.
-
I got some 1/4" running tomorrow. Got a drawing or specs?
-
no, i dont. i was planning to just use a gasket to trace onto the steel and cut it with my plasma cutter.
this is basically what i need. i have searched all over the internet and cant find a file to cut with or any sort of measurements. i can take a pic with a ruler or take measurements and sketch it all out or whatever works for you.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.topspeedautomotive.co.uk%2Fmedia%2Fcatalog%2Fproduct%2Fcache%2F1%2Fimage%2F8753c54a9ac503b0f3c90095a0d2d13c%2Fm%2Fr%2Fmrg-54.jpg&hash=d29947623ee1860940a21637c2e624545e1f1eb7)
-
1/4" cuts fast, wont cost much. Just get some measurements over to me and we can get it cut right 4 u.
-
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimages.anilos.com%2Fgalleries%2Fjanet_mason%2Fanilos_hardcore%2Fjanet_mason-1_024.jpg&hash=27b3ad932f577f9a7cf77fb456684dfc00b720b8)
-
It looks like it's missing a couple critical bolt center to centers that are just below the piston housing assy drawing. Does anyone have those #s?
-
It looks like it's missing a couple critical bolt center to centers that are just below the piston housing assy drawing. Does anyone have those #s?
That is all I can divulge. Save that picture because I am going to take it down soon for obvious reasons.
-
I will get measurements when I get home tonight. I'm in florida so I'm a couple hours ahead of you. Hopefully I can get it to you early enough. I'm not in a major hurry and can wait till the next cut if this doesn't work.
-
I'll be running 1/4" plate today, monday and wednesday so no hurry. Customer bumped their quantities by 100. Maybe I'm quoting too cheap or something?
-
Wait to raise your prices till after I pay for this flange. Ha ha
-
ok, not real sure what you need since i have never cut a flange with water or a computer before. here is what i have
it can be made with the narrower opening the whole way. i dont need that extra bulge. its a 300hp crate motor
bolt centers are 5 6/16"
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi571.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fss152%2FSecksyPeePee%2Fed16561d.jpg&hash=568e3f2e0d8024c12ce2ebb8cdf04bf5cf39a148)
these are 4 1/4"
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi571.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fss152%2FSecksyPeePee%2Fe7a019e0.jpg&hash=1553ca86392f5ce1fec97f7168ded70c52628f89)
this way is 7"
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi571.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fss152%2FSecksyPeePee%2Fb78f3423.jpg&hash=1bf70f0318770b891e78583ec4786b8b2de0a815)
-
I'll be running 1/4" plate today, monday and wednesday so no hurry. Customer bumped their quantities by 100. Maybe I'm quoting too cheap or something?
Curious how much for Clutch Master Cylinder spacers using the 1/4" or 1/2"?
-
I can do those in 1/4" at $6 each. 1/2" would $12.
That carb spacer would only be $15 bucks or so in 1/4". I'm concerned that the measurements wont be 100% perfect though so I'm trying to locate a gasket locally. I doubt you are the only one who will need that.
-
Awesome. I'm sure you could sell a good bit in aluminum. I doubt steel will sell very well. I just can't weld aluminum so I'm making what I need in steel. Considering a lot of old v8 stuff came stock with steel manifolds I'm sure it will be fine.
-
So we finally got our vacuum lifter. I found one that could lift the big plate but with a small enough foot print to load the little waterjet. This one was $10k new, we bought for $4k. It's a new old stock that was sitting in a waterjet shop that closed. I still feel slightly bent over, but I guess it wasnt too bad.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fcuttingshop%2Fanver1.jpg&hash=ba6104540f7a5ad3d4384cb4716492a26f02274c)
-
Nice. How many sq ft is your guys shop?
-
We own 3000 sq feet of mfg space in downtown st helens and about half the block that warehouse is on. We also have two more warehouses about 4 mile away that give us another 11,000 sq feet of warehouse space that we finished building in 2010. Then we have a satelite office about 3 miles away for accounting and another one in washougal for phone answering. Pretty spread out and the mfg space is tiny.
The big building is coming though. We have a construction project going on we just completed phase 1 (purchased the land and cashed it out) that is a 200x250 steel building (50,000 sq foot) that is scheduled for completion in 2014 with Heavy Industrial zoning. We will be able to bring everbody under one roof and move employment from 17 people to as many as 100 if needed. Right now we can only run 6 of our 14 benders and 2 of our 3 waterjet systems in the current building. (I just picked up a Flow IFB 60120)
-
For our business, the raw materials are the majority of our cost. So by dramatically increasing our ability to warehouse I can circumvent the middle man warehouses like marmon and tube service and buy the materials directly from the manufacturers by the truck load. For a business that buys as much as $800,000 in raw materials a year, we could conceivably be getting a 50% savings on the material. We've done a few pilots this year for some of the higher volume sizes and instead of getting 4000ft for $28k, we spent the same money on a complete truck load and got 8500ft. It was great until we figured out how much tube that really was and didn't have a place to store it.
-
Wow, Biz sounds like its good. Good for you man.
-
We finally got the Jet Edge Waterjet fully functional and running. Yanked the old Allen Bradley 9 control off it. Had a company fly up from california that specializes in waterjet retrofits, and they put a brand new Centroid M400 control on it. Which btw - they advertise the controls at about $14k + install. But by the time you add all the features and options, it's more like $18k + install.
Anyway, we have both the 55k intensifier (waterjet pump) going and the Hypertherm HPR130 HyDef cutter going on it. I think we are going to buy a spanner bar so we can mount two waterjet heads plus the plasma all the same bar with adjustable center-center distances. Outside of that, just waiting for sigmanest to build me a new post so I can control all the machine functionality from our nesting software.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fsigmanest%2Fjetedge.jpg&hash=29c57e0d3bcbcd4d1c6ef9e82d61b817d4f36308)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fsigmanest%2Fcentroid.jpg&hash=1e8d976ef2f79b915b154b63ff57d46fc505fd0b)
Also decided about two months ago that I should go back to school and get my master in business administration and masters in engineering. So that has been not all that fun going back to school after being out of it for 10 years. I'm still trying to decide if I really need these classes or not. It's almost like I get one good idea per 4 hours of sitting there wanting to kill myself from shear boredom. I guess we will see.
-
That is awesome, never too late to go back to school. :noel:
-
Since you have used both, if a small shop was trying to decide between cnc plasma or water jet, what would you recommend? Shooting for making 4-5 truck bumpers a week. I'm leaning towards cnc plasma due to upfront cost. Plus it would take up less space.
-
My preference is 1. waterjet 2. hydefinition plasma.
Cost wise: Waterjet's are very steep - 130k (used) to 300k (used) or around 220-600k for new. Oxygen plasma cnc system - 20-30k. Hydefinition plasma cnc system 60-250k.
Waterjet cost the most to operate. It cuts 10x slower then plasma. Parts are ready to ship right off the table. I regularly cut parts that hold +/- .001 tolerance. I can cut any material I put down on the table. I regularly stack sheets, so for instance copper gaskets, I cut 5 sheets stacked at a time. The resultant speed is faster then plasma or laser when you factor in you are cutting 5 parts at once. Waterjet's come with a significant cost of operation and maintenance, and it's not uncommon to have one go down for a week or more if you have trouble determining the issue which happens. We were down once for a month and a half. This year alone I've spent $30k on waterjet maintenance & consumables. However, we also run them 12 hours a day.
Hydefinition plasma cut looks very similiar to laser. It has a wider kerf then waterjet (0.080-.120 versus 0.030), has more spatter, but it has minimal taper compared to the oxygen plasma and it's very fast. With a good xyz system you can hold .005"-.010" pretty commonly with good consumables. The cut quality and accuracy are all related to the condition of the consumable, and where oxygen plasma just uses compressed air, hydef's use as many as 5 gases to get a good cut and maximize the consumable life. This doesn't come for free though, the consumables and high gas usage is a significant cost. You can retro a hydef power source to a standard xyz table pretty easily, but torch height control has to be addressed at the same time. It needs to be accurate to .01 V.
Oxygen plasma cnc systems are everywhere. Those are the torchmates, plasmacams, etc. They run hypertherm, thermal dynamics, etc oxygen power sources. They will give you an ok cut. If you are ok with spending a significant amount of time cleaning up parts, want to spend under $30k, and want to limit your spending to just torch consumables and not industrial gases - then it might be a good match. I haven't dealt with these much, but I have customers that send us plasma flanges for their assemblies, and they always look and weld like crap.
-
It will only be for truck bumpers that will be mig welded, a little grinding is no big deal. It sounds like the cheap CBC plasma makes the most sense in this situation. I appreciate all of the info. I just don't see anything more in the budget
-
I would agree. I wanted to clarify the higher costs with waterjet as it sounded like you were interested in comparing it. It's cheaper then laser, but far more expensive then plasma - either conventional or hydef.
In fact, just this last week I spent another $2k in parts trying to keep this omax pump running, and I'm likely going to be spending another $80k this year buying a bigger intensifier (75HP) to replace this omax pump because quite frankly - it sucks - because it keeps breaking. We will run no direct drive pumps here soon!
-
Lol. Yea, you did a good job of convincing me that water jet is too expensive. In this situation the grinding with plasma is a non issue since the initial cost is so different. It will cut 3-4 bumpers a week unless something magical happens that I can't foresee.
-
Do you have or know where to get these?
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimage.hondatuningmagazine.com%2Ff%2F9346002%2F0503_HTUP_06_Z%2BJohn_Grudynski%2Bantireversion_chamber.jpg&hash=bad94868157ab8c8b93686ba415272a2218cbf13)
-
I think those are hi-tech anti-reversion chambers. I would try hi-tech. Those are specialized end forms that we don't do.
-
It is a pic from a hy-tech article. I'm guessing that exact shape is patented, just thought I would check with you first for something similar.
-
how works that?
-
the quick answer is that it is a check valve for the header tube. google "anti-reversion chamber" or whatever that is in spanish. lol
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.abload.de%2Fimg%2Farchamber022ngy.jpg&hash=0a8515fd6fd387e130cfcbc2847f1813097d9ed6)
-
I posted a "how to" w/ dimensions for something similar with transition cones in one of my m5 exhaust thread builds on here. These shapes are patented, which is why I dont sell them directly. They are easily built though.
-
I talked to John Grudynski of Hytech. He said he would sell them in any size made from stainless for $20ea. They wouldn't be complicated to make, but at $20ea my time is better spent doing other things.
-
Here's the jet edge running some 1/2" SS at 5.9IPM (Q=3). We finally got our machine post from sigmanest a couple weeks ago. Machine has been a virtual paper weight for months while they coded the post. We could run small jobs, but nothing like the 2 meg gcode file we are running here. Bastard thing always sprays me anytime I'm near it. This was no exception. Runs nice. Happy this project is finally done and making money. I have about a $100k (cash) in this machine at this point w/ controller retrofit and everything. I just saw one of these machines go used for $85k w/ the original allen bradley 9 controller. Jet Edge wants $70k to put on their new control, so I think I came out pretty good on it.
http://youtu.be/egkgMX4dgFg (http://youtu.be/egkgMX4dgFg)
-
Weeks to make a post for a 2.5d parts? How the hell is that a 2 meg g code file? Looks sub 150k if you aren't using sub routines, if you do use subs should be able to get that code down to 30 k or less. What am I missing here?
I just don't understand how it could so complicated if its running G code.
2 meg is a program size you would see for 3d surfacing.
Glad you got it up and running, sucks to have machines down :(
-
You could run normal g-code. It was a bunch of custom stuff. Some z lift logic (a crash avoidance algorithm that drove them crazy), multi torch processing with waterjet and mixed mode plasma, an etch algorithm, some speed pierce features like oscillating/circular pierce by material type, nozzle/orifice combo, and of course material thickness.
I couldnt really use the machine without the pierce enhancements - it takes pierce times from say 15 seconds with a stationary pierce to 0.8 seconds with a circular pierce, and when you have 1400 pierces on a plate its a big difference. We cut a lot of 2" material, and the 2" takes almost 10 minutes to pierce stationary. With circular, it's about a minute and a half.
I don't know enough about subroutines to answer why they dont use them, but each part is different due to optimized lead-in and lead-out locations for tip-up avoidance, which may make it difficult to do some of that. I know our code for the flow machines which is in .ord, their own optimized thing, a 20x40 sheet were 125-150k as well.
I think they just thought I was being crazy, but all these things make the machine much more useful and far more profitable.
-
You could run normal g-code. It was a bunch of custom stuff. Some z lift logic (a crash avoidance algorithm that drove them crazy), multi torch processing with waterjet and mixed mode plasma, an etch algorithm, some speed pierce features like oscillating/circular pierce by material type, nozzle/orifice combo, and of course material thickness.
I couldnt really use the machine without the pierce enhancements - it takes pierce times from say 15 seconds with a stationary pierce to 0.8 seconds with a circular pierce, and when you have 1400 pierces on a plate its a big difference. We cut a lot of 2" material, and the 2" takes almost 10 minutes to pierce stationary. With circular, it's about a minute and a half.
I don't know enough about subroutines to answer why they dont use them, but each part is different due to optimized lead-in and lead-out locations for tip-up avoidance, which may make it difficult to do some of that. I know our code for the flow machines which is in .ord, their own optimized thing, a 20x40 sheet were 125-150k as well.
I think they just thought I was being crazy, but all these things make the machine much more useful and far more profitable.
You can't use a Macro (does this control support macro B?) or a custom G code and create a canned cycle for the lift logic? What is the code for the oscillating/circular pierce? Can you not use g2/G3 Helical interpolation?
I understand the needs for the enhancements but I am having a hard time wrapping my mind around what the problem is on implementing them into the post, of course if you can't run type A, B or C type G code that would maybe explain it...
Sub routines are awesome, depending on controller type ( A, B, C and age) you can use local or extended sub routines. Some controllers also support program copy, which will allow you to do the same basic thing as local subroutines.
So for example. I see you have a whole bunch of rectangle parts there, using extended subs, which is most common you can program them like this.
O1234 (Main program)
G00 G90 G54 (calls rapid positioning, absolute coordinate programming, and the G54 coordinate system)
X Y Z (call out your start position)
G1 Z (Feed movement, and move to your Z plane) Not sure if you need to call a torch offset? G43 H...
M98 P1235 L32 (sub routine call, sub program number, repeat 32 times)
xyz (now these are all the start positions for the sub routine for each part)
xyz
xyz
etc.
O1235 (sub routine)
G1 x-4.
y-5.5
x0.
y0.
etc etc
M99 (return to main program)
-
Poof, my head just exploded with all the technical babble. Me caveman, post porn!
-
I understood about 6% of it. Lol
-
The posted code and resultant size is probably indicative of the original post they used to build my customizations. I think they used as basic of a gcode post as possible to start, and tweaked and added my modifications to suit, as my machine was basically a one-off. I know the flow posts are highly sophisticated and a 4x8 sheet nested on a flow post is about 400k (ord format) instead of my 1-2mb.
My control is not program size or memory limited, so it's not really necessary to run more sophisticated things like macros and sub's. In fact, I just load the parts onto the sheet, tell it how thick it is, what the plate dimensions and material type is, specify part quantities, hit auto nest, auto nc and post. The file is transferred over ethernet to the machine and all they have to do is load it and hit go. No tweaking necessary. It's basically stupid proof, which is how I set things up around here.
The circular pierce is done with G2s, full circle, with the nozzle size as the circumference - typically 0.030 or 0.040. We timed the cycle time of 100 circles @ 30IPM to get them a time per revolution, then from that the post looks at a tec table and figures out how many times it needs to circle to get the correct circular pierce time. So it just repeats G2s until you pierced through, then it moves to a lead in.
-
I would love to hear more about the custom macro's though - I dont know anything about the them. We bought a Takisawa TS-40 big bore, super heavy bastard of an older CNC lathe, which runs an archaic but fully functional Fanuc 6T. It's extremely painful to program as it has a 10k memory limit, no G53/G54 coordinate offsets and you specify your tool coordinates at G28 U0W0 with your G50 (G50 X12.5 Z14.2 S1024, etc).
So when we are running all of our vband products we basically have to copy the code multiple times and modify the G50 values incrementally for the tools for each part. It's really a piss poor way to do it. Makes beautiful parts sure - but we have to load 3 programs to do a full 12" bar. I just ordered a memex board for it to go 512k and it cant get here soon enough.
-
If you are doing V bands I would write one Macro that would do all the different sizes you do. Then the operator just needs to fill out the appropriate variables to specify what size of V band it is and bam, the macro does the rest. So you can keep just one program in the nc and when you want to go from a 3" v band to a 4" the operator just changes the variable and hit the go button.
But for something as simple as a V band I probably wouldn't bother, you could program all the different sizes by hand before you could write the macro. And the file size would be small anyways.
Instead of incremental shifts and all that gay shit, why not use a bar puller? Then you can either do a M30 at the end of the program (if you have an operator picking the part) or if you want to just drop the parts in a catcher or the chip conveyor just run a M99 loop. It would be less code then this post.
-
For 2013, we are buying the building across the street. It was our old newspaper in town is which moving/shutting down, we close end of february on the building. It's a 5000sqft concrete block building. Needs some updating, but enables me to keep an eye on the guys across the street as well. In March they are going to be installing 800 amps of 480V for the machine shop side and remodeling the offices. It will be for the first time in 10 years, that I have an office that is bigger then a shoe box that people don't directly walk into off the street.
This building is being setup to manufacture pipe fittings. I've purchased a pipe specific forge bending machine that is being tooled for 1.25", 1.5", 2.0" sch10/40 long and short radius bends. It's also getting various support equipment for pipe trimming, beveling and laser etching. I'm intending on manufacturing a quarter million pipe fittings this year. We will see how this goes. I have 40,000 feet of pipe being manufactured right now in anticipation of this machine.
-
Good to here that a nog on here is very well in business. :noel:
-
Sounds awesome. I'm thinking about going forward facing manifold late this year.
-
Congrats, that is great news and it sounds like a ton of fun!
-
Thanks guys. I'm most excited about the office. Everyone that's been down here to our original building (purchased in 2004), has seen how I've dedicated almost every square inch of this place to manufacturing space. It will be nice to answer phones without waterjet pumps, benders and grinders ringing in my ears.
-
I know that feeling. I have to answer a phone in an open hanger about 500' from the active runway. Most single engine planes don't cause much trouble, but the jets and turbo props make hearing impossible. We have a Northrop Grumman facility here that refurbishes jets. It's pretty common to hear them.
-
Do you do small runs of mandrel bent parts? Might need some intakes made from one piece rather than multiple pieces welded together.
-
You can send me an email and I can take a look. Really depends on a lot of factors.
-
Ill do that when I have some pics. Thanks
-
We got keys to our new building today that I bought. 5000 sq feet. 1500 sq feet office. 3500 sq feet dedicated to cnc turning, milling and pipe product production. I will post pictures as we do our remodel.
-
Congrats!
-
Some pics of the new office/machine shop expansion building.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fbldg.jpg&hash=f641096d044c98222f3b91497aa9206c828d1bbd)
Outside of Building, Concrete Block Construction, 14 foot eves
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fdemo1.jpg&hash=ee069f1263c23851b02014a607f8b18585d7a06b)
Office Demo in progress
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fdemo2.jpg&hash=d9c1ff458fffe25c3d706baf5546adcf9dd1ce8d)
-
Back Left Welding Shop 30x30, Needs demo and cleanup
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fweldshop.jpg&hash=a178cf28250acf62a9cec4af525b01e09d6088d1)
CNC Shop (32x85), Needs center wall demo
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fcncshop2.jpg&hash=015a5e00b756dfe83d024b74ff1cd9db332c6ead)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fcncshop1.jpg&hash=1f97c0ab09b58f8499415505041a322318885f89)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fcncshop3.jpg&hash=0c0586f035a5d01d2c9ba917ee4de53f8ca12218)
-
Tiny power (200A 240 1PH) - New Power going in 400A 480V 3PH
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Ftinypower.jpg&hash=41927cc9f1e9ca3362838b390a46c9bb4e0fd59c)
Ancient at&t phone system. Being replaced with Cisco VOIP (UC520s)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fphone.jpg&hash=7201ce4e815e2b4a1ef78ebed8fb65cc030fde29)
Location for roll up door being added to the back of the bldg. (One on each side)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fdoor.jpg&hash=5e62e4093f996ac716c6549d9d6ffaee49cd581d)
-
Looks good. I'm surprised a place like that would only have 200a power coming in. My house has 300a. 200a for the house and 100a dedicated to the shop.
-
We're 99% sure they down graded the service. There is 700 MCM to the weather head, and the meter/distro box is setup like a 400A service where the power doesn't actually go through the meter, it's just sensed. That said, even if I swapped it back, 400A of 1PH is relatively worthless for our equipment. Probably fine for a newspaper though (what this place was for past 25 years).
-
Yea, I'm sure a huge chunk of your stuff is 3ph
-
New building looks great!
-
Well, I decided I didn't like anything about any of the walls. So I knocked them all down (with the exception of the cement wall down the middle that I cant mess with.) Just couldn't get an efficient layout.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fcarnage3.jpg&hash=c0d757e933b3b1e0514276baea2f40d6504b6334)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fcarnage2.jpg&hash=44c5520e5077df46348709ab15b1b30f4d7a9240)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fcarnage1.jpg&hash=3e9e2de430a9436e778dc6cbad5847f176a4587b)
-
The walls weren't sealed very well. So we tore all the old crap off. They are using some sort of sealer, then foam board, then sheet rock.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Ffixing-walls.jpg&hash=bd2d87221ef449d0949a5f2a39f331ca64ca2db1)
Trying to decide on colors. I like the right one. The wife and employees out voted me and they are using the middle color. Notice the greasy hand prints on the 4 color swatches on the left, part of their "testing".
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fpaint-colors.jpg&hash=eacb88311cd53ccfa42944e6227da363c01800ae)
I've come to the conclusion that I dont get an office this month so I moved into the cnc shop temporarily. It's not bad.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Ftemp-office.jpg&hash=623a6c52caf659b06b7c8dd8793827065bcc233d)
Atleast dont have to listen to waterjets 5 feet from my office anymore.
-
Looks good Adam.
-
One day forums will have "like" buttons. I have nothing relevant to say, but like where this is going.
-
I remember doing this the first time back in 2004 when we bought our first building, and I really wish I had documented it. This building looks like a golden nugget in comparison to that pile.
-
I understand if you don't want to answer this in public, but I'm curious how that kind of cash is acquired. Do you use a line of credit, or keep that kind of cushion in your checking account?
-
It depends upon where you are in your business life cycle.
If you are a startup or within the first 2 years you use what you can get. We maxed our credit cards, student loans, parted my car, and sold almost everything we owned. Then re-invested every dime we made back into equipment and inventory. My wife actually paid the bills the first 2 years while I worked 18 hrs a day trying to pay off our first bender.
Now a days, we don't operate with any loans, or lines of credit for inventory or expenses. We pay for all current liabilities with cash flow generated from daily sales. The only loans we carry are a few mortgages that are left, but for the most part we own almost all of our facilities.
-
I should note that businesses that operate on cash flow that don't own their inventory, or cant control their expenses can get themselves in deep shit operating like this. I knew a certain tuner that was doing $250k a month in sales on a margin of about 25% before expenses. He built up this huge staff to achieve those sales, and if I remember correctly his payroll was right around $90k a month. His profit on parts sales were only about $62.5k a month before expenses, and he was operating the entire operation off the net30 float. A couple years of this killed his business and when he shut down he had outstanding debts totaling over a million.
-
Got some less than wonderful news yesterday. Anything that we touch related to moving electrical circuits around to change lightning configurations between the rooms has be redone with the steel sheathing over the wire to meet current code.
-
Like conduit or a type of wire?
-
I guess back in the day it was ok to run romex everywhere. Now-a-days they require you to run it in shielded cable for commercial. Just a stupid requirement.
These pics are from last week. Haven't been to work since thursday, this bug/flu/sinus thing
that is going around has been seriously kicking my ass.
This is the 2x8 wall dividing the front office from the back shop. The area behind that wall is 40x40 minus a 10x10 bathroom in the right corner. Major improvement from the incredibly strange room that was back there before.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fwall1.jpg&hash=ec7acfe74a6e25b4e9c71d37e7d62bfd22ab940f)
The huge door frame for our steel fire door. Still cant believe an interior door can cost $1200. :(
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fwall2.jpg&hash=5c080538ac55e008aaaf2e7c92e16c47505620df)
We kept some of the old paneling and plastered in the grooves as I'm notoriously hard on sheet rock walls (personally). I tend to knock/punch/bump holes in them over time. Ive already tried to punch through this stuff and it took it just fine. ;)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fmud.jpg&hash=cc11fceb0f54c6df6d37ff8abd7ebdf69cb7ebe7)
Supposedly the walls all textured and primed aside from the new wall that they are still doing some fire proofing things to. Hoping to be able to crawl out of bed tomorrow and see how close we are getting. There electricians were in there all weekend fixing all the old romex crap.
-
that door is nowhere near big enough to cost $1200
-
I should note that businesses that operate on cash flow that don't own their inventory, or cant control their expenses can get themselves in deep shit operating like this. I knew a certain tuner that was doing $250k a month in sales on a margin of about 25% before expenses. He built up this huge staff to achieve those sales, and if I remember correctly his payroll was right around $90k a month. His profit on parts sales were only about $62.5k a month before expenses, and he was operating the entire operation off the net30 float. A couple years of this killed his business and when he shut down he had outstanding debts totaling over a million.
That is retarded on so many levels. I know four man operations doing almost that in sales - their dyno collects dust, it's all sales. I doubt there is more than $16K/month in payroll there.
-
This was painting yesterday.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Ffirst-coat1.jpg&hash=4a585a372b317e08294160256a4d592b29cc806e)
One of the offices.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fpriv-office2.jpg&hash=169550ad30b1a047d4e3126e6af850e33b43b633)
All the power & data/phone lines installed in the new wall.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fdatacomm-wall.jpg&hash=f8bd133a6164124e123af2ffb127293378b1a04f)
Finished removing debris from demo. We are just about to remove all the lighting and all the ceiling tile/tracks. We have to open this room up to a full 12' height. The machines are tall. Going to sheet rock the ceiling, then re-install lighting.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fwj-shop-cleaned.jpg&hash=d6a93aefd29d92cd93e4dccc5b312048270d4d94)
-
Updated expenses below.
-
Looks good. Its amazing how paint can make everything look better.
-
They got the ceiling out of the back room.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fback-room-ceiling-removed.JPG&hash=9a245057178fdbd9c0b1d7563d43e94b8561ceca)
Lighting wiring through the rafter so we can sheet rock.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Flighting-wiring.JPG&hash=1c5200d86b5ef7413c48271753fab20cd38e531d)
Probably the last day this room will look like this. All the ducting is being redone tomorrow, and all the walls are getting foam boarded/sheet rocked.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fback-room-fixing.JPG&hash=cdc5e343a5294b45d7f50954a0a8e8c556606f17)
Dad's office window. It's a slider. He's very excited.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Ffront-office-window-inside.JPG&hash=31b295ea3bc18ca8a69149856d3a1664956088ea)
From entry way.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Ffront-office-window.JPG&hash=0ca5dbd2d3b9d581f072c688673f9e42981f2e3e)
Data/comm rack partially populated. Most of the patch panels are fully wired, just not patched into switch yet.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fdatacomm-rack.JPG&hash=06b358e370f747322bceb67c13a72d26fd8f5063)
-
Looking good Adam.
Btw, I sent you an email about an intake plenum spacer.
-
A $1200 metal fire door. :P
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fbig-ass-door.JPG&hash=09220a621bf6eab713b8df2c7fea0978f9c7abcf)
Wall being sheeted from front side of office.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fwall-2.JPG&hash=5d97092a35e572c8f16b32259e81e4443e4127b6)
The wall is 2x8, and they are jamming as much foam and insulation as possible into it. This back room will have 2 waterjets and 4kw trumpf laser cutter, so it will be very loud in here.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fwall-3.JPG&hash=0a2d949355d5255a7b0a771f2671f882198d2b6b)
Carbonized Bora Stranded Bamboo Flooring. Being installed saturday morning.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fflooring.JPG&hash=5ea27930eca0268f82b59b71ab59909ac88f41ca)
Wi-fi bridge (bridged link), ~300 mb/s @ 560ft between buildings across the street. Amazingly these are only ~$220 a set.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Flink.JPG&hash=73e92afae60597c3d96e19aabaa5a6499e50d8c0)
-
For those who love to ogle the numbers. Here are some updated totals from the past month:
Electrical: $4655 (includes materials)
Contractors: $6395 (includes some materials)
Permits $1077
Engineering: $1800
Shop Labor $2650
Rental Expense: $842
Data/Comm: $1460
Bldg Materials: $1104
Flooring $5240
Furniture $2200
Fire door $1200
Dump Runs $630
------------------
$29253 for March :'(
Predicted expenses for April/May:
Electrical 480V 3PH Install: $18.5k
Door Cut outs $2k
Steel Framing for Exterior Doors $1k
Engineered Wall to abutt the rear wall (seismic requirement) $1200
2 Roll up Doors $10k
Office floor Install $2.5k
Addtl Office Furniture (4 wrk stations): $5k
Addtl Office Computers $5k
Contractors: $8k (w/ materials)
Our Labor $5k
------------------------
$56.2k for April :-X
-
These expenses make me sick. I hope this thread is illustrating relatively typical costs to build out a building with very minor upgrades. I know businesses that have spent 3x this much money in 6 months building out their space ... in a *leased* space even at that. Absolutely insane. ***always buy your buildings if you can -- BEFORE you build them out***
-
That's crazy. I couldn't imagine spending that kind of money in 2 months. That's half of my house price.
-
That exceeds my house price by the amount of my student loans.
Its a lot of money, but its not in the long run. You will make it back having the increased space and capability.
-
Oh yea, for a business it's worth it easily. But for broke ass me that's a huge amount of money for just making something work for you.
-
Problem is if you don't set everything up correctly at first, it will cost you so much more down the line to tear down / stop production / move equipment / remodel. In my first building, I had to spread similiar costs across almost a year because I was so broke just buying the building to begin with and I had to work in those unfinished conditions just to keep paying the contractors. Those were back in the days when it was me, myself and I doing everything. Not fun.
-
Floor guy is pretty fast. Did that room in about an hour.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Ffloor.JPG&hash=55042c771f47785a38eb2db368ad7654d992be6e)
Stuff floats on special mats that go under it.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Ffloor2.JPG&hash=82db0010c008f3bf442a6b1665015baf8a5fc3d4)
-
I'm thinking about doing my house with that stuff eventually.
-
Some finished office pics:
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fethospace.JPG&hash=317bc17651240feed3e557fd01ebe45e0384907a)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Foffice-done1.JPG&hash=e265121946c5a6b01d0e6e640fa01651bdb1ac3f)
-
Fuck yeah. Looks great!
-
Looks aesome
-
Next week we put in the two rear door frames and finish cutting out the back walls. Both frames get welding inspected on monday. They are massive 7x5 upper beam, with 7x3 side beams, 0.3125" wall. What's really insane is to meet seismic code, even after installing these beams in the wall, we have to build a 2x4 wall in front of the back wall and tie it into the header to meet code.
-
Fun times. (NOT)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fwall0.JPG&hash=f01c6b8a4aca12ae4be7384232bf316c047f76cf)
Cut
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fwall1.JPG&hash=ff58fb882e179833834e5509a12a0a9a50a919f1)
Bust it out
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fwall2.JPG&hash=266d813f7bf3bbd59d41abc2ab88a2041d5237ed)
Frame. Notice big ass bolts sticking out of it to be grouted in. PITA
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fwall6.JPG&hash=e2dc15a306df96cf7fb2356edcceb3948c84b736)
Not easy to get into place with bolts sticking up out of top!
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fwall4.JPG&hash=493565f6d505130cae988dbddf65eeff22167801)
Front office getting closer to 100%
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fwall3.JPG&hash=50a8980f54ae5faf7535975bd462df90aae0ce3a)
2" Foam board insulation going into rafter before sheet rock. Notice they had to drill all the beams for cross-flow.
-
You do nice work sir
-
Outside of the telling them what to do, design and engineering, I take no credit. My guys are doing all this work. We are about 2 months into this building now, averaging about 2 of my guys per day (the last two weeks) plus a family member who is a paint contractor.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fpouring-walls.JPG&hash=fe759147e8e2e413eea788b57e9a86bdd2ad7220)
Pouring the support/lock column. This grouts the wall to the beams over those bolts we welded to the uprights.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fsealing-wall.JPG&hash=6e4ee091792cc14f9b4795ccb221f59e2b002f6c)
Sealing the old block wall. Getting ready to strip/insulate/sheet. This room is getting masonite panels glued down over the sheet rock so we have a water proof surface. It's like dry erase board and waterjets make a major mess.
-
sweet! I take it you haven't looked to see how much you've spent? I noticed you stopped doing the running tab thing....lol
-
I ended up buying a 4000sq foot building down the block for my wife's new kid play business, so I'm running multiple contractors in both buildings right now, so I need to sort the receipts so I'm not counting those costs as ours. It's .. a lot though. Probably more then I want to think about right now. :?:
-
Should pay off though, plus if none of it is borrowed still, no interest to payback.
-
Nope. No loans, no interest, no nothing. I don't mind risking my money, but borrowed money? Yikes.
-
That's looking fucking tits. What flooring is that?
-
That is a compressed stranded bamboo. It's 5/8" thick, and it's a solid material all the way through the board. So it can be resurfaced over and over again. It's a floated floor so it's glued together and set of a special mat. The stranded bambo is super tough compared to regular hard woods and about twice as tough as regular directional bamboo floors. It was $3.80/ft + $0.80/ft pad + install. So 1200 ft was like $8k installed.
-
Door frame is all done. All concreted/grouted in. We've got it sheeted in until the doors arrive.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fdoor-frame.JPG&hash=ae976a5b85b716fe28bbc1ae16488869a77bc4cd)
This was a bitch. We had to pull it with the forklift to take out the little bit of twist it got in it during fabrication. So last night our toyota forklift was strapped to the top left corner of the door all night long as it curerd.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fback1.JPG&hash=c7b7f9a9280a58232f3b548c8bfbf1316cad6f7d)
All the walls sealed. Camera and electrical pre-wire is all done. All the beams are cross drilled for flow. All new insulation almost completed. We are going to start on the shear wall that abuts the back CMU wall for the retarded seismic requirements next.
-
That is a compressed stranded bamboo. It's 5/8" thick, and it's a solid material all the way through the board. So it can be resurfaced over and over again. It's a floated floor so it's glued together and set of a special mat. The stranded bambo is super tough compared to regular hard woods and about twice as tough as regular directional bamboo floors. It was $3.80/ft + $0.80/ft pad + install. So 1200 ft was like $8k installed.
Nice!!!
-
Looks amazing. All I saw when u started was a shit pile of a 1970's building. Looks great man. Keep up the good work.
-
Any plans for the exterior? May not be much of an issue though, you probably don't get many walk customers I'm sure
-
We get 6-10 pickup orders a day. It's not a lot in comparison to what we ship, but I'm not going to half ass any aspect of this.
-
Insulation / Vapor Barrier Going up (R13 per inch). These back walls are getting foam boarded, sheet rocked, then covered in masonite (dry erase material), so they can be hosed down. Waterjets ruin sheet rock.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Finsul1.JPG&hash=192a34f5645af7b1fcabbfda5a609afc32afa0d5)
Back Seismic wall tied into Beam
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fbackwall.JPG&hash=ea018df98d11e41463dfd5e85f8d50318bbb9316)
Backwall is now effectively 14" thick from inside to out thanks to this stupid engineered wall.
-
Could you actually use the walls as dry erase if you wanted? That gives me some ideas
-
Wow that is a lot of work. Its looking great but don't envy all the setup work you are doing at all!
I'm sure you will absolutely love it when done though. Its always worth going the extra mile.
-
Definitely a lot of work, and a lot of money. Just starting to go over budget now. :( I was expecting to be finished mid month. I think we will go another full month though.
For now, we are just buttoning up the ceiling and the back wall.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fback-sheet1.JPG&hash=65b70eb0b8f423158e745af7e08772e84f14a9c7)
Notice the back wall is sheated with plywood. This is part of the engineering that relates to the seismic stuff.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fback-sheet2.jpg&hash=c81638d12e73b4a844ee9001459369555e9eb301)
If you've got kids in this area, you might checkout the wife's kid playland facebook page. We are just in the demo stage on her building right now, but I've submitted all the plans to the city friday for use change. Her website that takes you to the facebook page with pics:
http://www.playlandfamilyfun.com (http://www.playlandfamilyfun.com)
-
Damn, thats a lot of hard work. Office looks tits, can't wait to see the mostly finished shop space populated with machinery.
-
Damn, thats a lot of hard work. Office looks tits, can't wait to see the mostly finished shop space populated with machinery.
I'm sure you are not alone, Adam is probably stressing out at least a little with all the money he has spent.
But once everything done, he'll be paying construction bills off for a while. :noel:
-
I'm paying cash for everything as I go... Which is why doors and electrical service isn't in yet. Thats about 40k cash that i was saving for last out of necessity. It's a little tricky running the cash flow for the main biz which pays cash for all materials plus the cash outlays for all of the remodel.. Construction loans and credit cards would make this easier but I'm averse to credit in general.
Current progress: The second door frame is cut and in the wall. The rear shop is basically done. All painted, lights hung. The right half is now getting insulated and sheeted. I'm a bit behind in pics but I've had a busy couple weeks. Had to finish my bachelors in electrical engineering to get full enrollment in MBA program. So I graduated on Sunday ... and been trying to catch up on everything as I got slammed with senior design project and finals.
My wife's building is also taking a lot of design time right now. I'm doing the architectural work in conjunction with a structural engineer which is proving to be a exercise in futility as we're basically having to design a building within her building that meets seismic code. Not fun.
-
These were images from the last week or so.
Back shop ceiling done.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fceiling.jpg&hash=3530b369020076eaf1a46bdfcc7da7f5d4653ac8)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fceiling2.jpg&hash=51f936a64b671e9e184520aad131cb9dc68a05b8)
Right side shop, mid wall demo.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fmid-wall.jpg&hash=7622041b40a0cb89aaf39c77e5313cabf9f20299)
Right side, Back door #2 going in. 12x10 door frame.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fdoor2-1.jpg&hash=03ff8682f4095caa79640457e215e53cc73cb8db)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fdoor2-2.jpg&hash=0cab246640ffc2395371f683e010bd4d3c5bfcaf)
-
Right side back ceiling is being demo'd next.
-
Geez, you are turning into quite the business pimp.
Looking forward to seeing the iron get skated in!
-
Soon for sure. We have to re-line the parking lot, "screen" the gas pack's on the roof (ac/heat), and build a garbage/scrap enclosure (CMU const) to get the occupancy change, and then we can start moving in equipment. Although in reality doors and electrical need to go in first or there is little point in having equipment in here.
In 7 days we are going on 3 full months of remodel. ;(
On the bright side, we did get our "ucoat it" floor epoxy in today. It will be interesting to see how this stuff lays down. We are doing the right side (long room) first, so we are going to pressure wash out the room then apply a muriatic acid to the surface (twice), then coat according to their instructions. Never done it before.
-
Stealthmode has that shit on lock down, hit him up for tips
-
Lot that stuff, keep us posted!
-
The biggest discrepancy we've found between their instructions and videos is the amount of "sand" that you are apply to the base coat. In the videos they are throwing that stuff everywhere. In the kit I bought for the specific floor space, it came with maybe 3-4 little 12 oz bottles of the "sand". I think its an aluminum oxide, but I'm not sure. You definitely can't be tossing that stuff everywhere with that amount though. Maybe I'll email steve and see what he says.
-
All I can say is make sure your floor is extremely clean. Like I would probably rent a concrete sander and sand it down. I tried the acid bit on mine and it looked great for about 3 months. After that it went to shit. I remember steve talking about possibly renting a floor sander next time he did one instead of doing the acid too.
-
I wouldn't put any of that shit down. We had our hanger done with it and it was horrible. It shredded the mops for cleaning the floor and the mop hair stuck to it
-
DO NOT put the sand in, that stuff sucks so bad. Catches dirt, makes the floor impossible to clean, nothing slides on the surface... Avoid it like the plague if you want you floor to look good next year and beyond.
I've done a couple epoxy jobs. I'd do stain for my next building for sure, epoxy kind of sucks but its half the price (or less) of stain.
If you have any oil on the floor you need to get an emulsifier on it and soak it all out. Once your floor is clean of contaminants use the acid to prep the surface. Two times is probably sufficient. Then rinse it 2-3 times. Crank the heat to 90*, get some fans and let it dry for a couple days minimum before applying. You can check to see if the you have moisture in the concrete by keeping the heat jacked, and putting a plastic sheet on the floor and taping it to the floor. If you get condensation in there the floor isn't actually dry or ready.
Here are a couple pics from my shop before I moved in:
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi94.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fl83%2F935racer%2FP1010020.jpg&hash=a8df5e9af2c5e2cda72b617ad07b65e0abcc9f5e) (http://s94.photobucket.com/user/935racer/media/P1010020.jpg.html)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi94.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fl83%2F935racer%2FP1010023.jpg&hash=9a6e72dc7fd11d4fdc3f8f98a4146dd7a91c6ad0) (http://s94.photobucket.com/user/935racer/media/P1010023.jpg.html)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi94.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fl83%2F935racer%2FP1010021.jpg&hash=9821883cd438dd4283683d79aebf69ea79f14a6c) (http://s94.photobucket.com/user/935racer/media/P1010021.jpg.html)
This is like painting a car, the prep work determines the quality of job.
-
We rented that concrete sander for the office to knock down all the high spots. We could do that over there as well I guess. So sand the floors instead of acid or sand them then acid? And no on the sprinkled sand crap .. ?
I looked at stains as well, but our floors are in shit condition and it wont hide anything.
-
i get the non skid idea behind the sand, but you will end up sanding the floor and doing it again cause you will hate it.
-
Tentative Floor Plan... Going back and forth on either silicone production in the front right of the building or studio for sister in law. Take one guess which I would prefer?
Notice the insane Eagle DB-150NR I crammed in there. Bitch is 28' long x10'6 wide and 9 feet tall. Double stack 6" machine and weighs 46,000lbs!
We are trying to concentrate benders by size, and these are mainly large 2.5" and bigger bending machines over here. 2 of the eagles are for pipe fitting manufacturing. With these all in place, we will have 11 benders fully operational.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fbldg2-layout.JPG&hash=579038bf786a23a074bee11255c1469e04d5abaa)
-
We rented that concrete sander for the office to knock down all the high spots. We could do that over there as well I guess. So sand the floors instead of acid or sand them then acid? And no on the sprinkled sand crap .. ?
I looked at stains as well, but our floors are in shit condition and it wont hide anything.
Sand them and acid! And double negative on the sprinkle crap, you will regret it the first time you go to clean it (once a week really if you wan tot keep it in nice shape).
The sprinkle crap is for home hobbiest type garages that never get worked in or dirty.
Stains aren't meant to hide shit, they are meant to give a surface that resists stains and making cleaning up a breeze. While the surface color of my floor is very uniform is sucks up oil stains like crazy, if there is oil or coolant on the floor for more the 5 minutes it starts to stain the epoxy. I HATE IT. With the stain you can have oil and coolant sitting for weeks, and then clean it up and it will look exactly the same as it did before.
I saw your floor plan before I read your text, and as soon as I saw double stack 6" machine my eyes were like :o
That is a serious mofo. Can't wait to see it all come together.
Oh and btw, I think the studio for the in law is a poor choice when you have a need for silicone production... I have done shared space before. Holy fucking disaster, and it wasn't even family... I think its great that you want to help her. Help her get her own space :P
-
I agree. Keep your businesss space yours. And get to making some couplers. Because I'm still rocking the ones I bought from u years ago and they are solid! Even takes my bro into ordering some for his project and he was even more impressed with the quality. Keep up the good work Adam. Its really coming together.
-
Said bender. I fly to michigan next week to inspect and sign the final invoice. She's in storage right now. We are going to refit a bendpro g2 to her like all of our machines. (We buy 99% of our machines about ~10 years old and then refit them to modern standards.. saves us about 50-60% over new).
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Feagle-6in-4.JPG&hash=0d214387bb7d0cb307b847403c6608c3871e2c1e)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Feagle-6in-3.JPG&hash=0e6ed1911689764b1e774410d890b3c0f819c122)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Feagle-6in-2.JPG&hash=1c9c96d7d1218a035041d25bcecc91dd0cd516ee)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Feagle-6in.JPG&hash=9967a0a6a09afc07c706abb659664a6fce5914b1)
-
Thank you for the support. I'm definitely leaning towards silicone production.
I agree. Keep your businesss space yours. And get to making some couplers. Because I'm still rocking the ones I bought from u years ago and they are solid! Even takes my bro into ordering some for his project and he was even more impressed with the quality. Keep up the good work Adam. Its really coming together.
-
I will have them rent a sander and do the acid then. Anything is an improvement over what they have in the main bending building, which is just bare concrete. I will count your opinion as a second vote against the shared space as well.
We rented that concrete sander for the office to knock down all the high spots. We could do that over there as well I guess. So sand the floors instead of acid or sand them then acid? And no on the sprinkled sand crap .. ?
I looked at stains as well, but our floors are in shit condition and it wont hide anything.
Sand them and acid! And double negative on the sprinkle crap, you will regret it the first time you go to clean it (once a week really if you wan tot keep it in nice shape).
The sprinkle crap is for home hobbiest type garages that never get worked in or dirty.
Stains aren't meant to hide shit, they are meant to give a surface that resists stains and making cleaning up a breeze. While the surface color of my floor is very uniform is sucks up oil stains like crazy, if there is oil or coolant on the floor for more the 5 minutes it starts to stain the epoxy. I HATE IT. With the stain you can have oil and coolant sitting for weeks, and then clean it up and it will look exactly the same as it did before.
I saw your floor plan before I read your text, and as soon as I saw double stack 6" machine my eyes were like :o
That is a serious mofo. Can't wait to see it all come together.
Oh and btw, I think the studio for the in law is a poor choice when you have a need for silicone production... I have done shared space before. Holy fucking disaster, and it wasn't even family... I think its great that you want to help her. Help her get her own space :P
-
That is one bad mofo Adam. I'm jealous! Would you be willing to share roughly what retrofitting a new control costs? Ballpark on a 6" machine like that?
As for shared space, at least there isn't much of interest or value business wise for your in law to come bother you and your people for things on your side. Which was a major issue in my situation.
Too much daily family stuff can really be a pain, if you haven't already experienced that. But the main thing is if you have a need for the space for work that is already tied into the building, like silicone production, you should keep it under one roof. Go buy, or better yet rent a small 500-1500 sq/ft place for the photo thing and see if its worth pursuing.
-
Eagle is no longer in business anymore, they are owned by addisson mckee which is a UK company... So I dont have an exact quote on a replacement cost.
I do have the invoice from our 3" Eagle EPT-76 PA/MS/HD (push assist, multi-stack, Heavy duty, CNC) which was $460k in 98. I would expect this bender to have been more then double that cost.
For price comparisons, I got some new quotes on 6" cnc benders, and they average about (single stack) 550k-850k and (double stack) 750k-1.2M depending on who's building them. Please note that I'm not getting quotes from anything chinese or shitty IMHO. I've owned a lot of benders, so I dont even shop half the companies that might be cheaper. If the shit breaks all the time it's no deal IMHO and some companies designs are just garbage and shouldnt considered.
Retrofit cost for control only (Bend Pro G2), about $60k (45k control, 15k install). We've done this on 4 benders here. You can get single axis bender controls for about $10k + $5k install. CNC .. G2 or nothing IMHO.
I got some quotes back on rebuilding this specific machine from the ground up, including one from the company who is selling me the core, and they were about $450k-500k plus the cost of the machine. Which is new hydraulics, new control, new paint, rerouting, upgrading some stuff, shipped to us done at our door. 6 months turn around time. A total rip-off really. But that's about average rebuild cost. They figure 6" CNC .. 1M machine, I can get 40% of the new cost for rebuild.
My wife works in the main office, my dad works in the office next to mine. I'm surrounded by it daily. ;)
-
Yeah I hear ya on the cheap stuff. Its never worth it. I only buy premium machines, its the only way to actually get anything done, especially when you work with stainless.
I'm having a hard time understanding how it costs 500k to rebuild a 6" bender. I can see 80k for control and refit. 20-40K for all new top line Parker hydraulics, Omron limit switches... Maybe 30K to strip the machine, do any re machining, bushing etc, paint etc? Ship and bla bla, 200k? plus core of course.
I've never really worked with benders but they seem pretty simple from a moving parts and automation standpoint. I'd think what really matters is fucking iron/weight to take the bending forces. The beefier the better.
My girlfriend works for me, so I know it can work, I just sure as hell wouldn't move a family biz into my space when I need it for manufacturing (thinking long term here).
-
For some reason machine rebuilds in the bending industry seem to be less related to actual cost and more a percentage of a new machine. A lot of 3" cnc benders are ~125-150k for a build with core. You see 4" machines in the 200ks.. 6" machines in the 450-600ks. It equates effectively to ~50% of a new cost to rebuild one from the ground up. I can see how you could get there with a 3" machine .. Control you'd be 60-80k into alone, but on the larger machines its a lot of profit.
-
Right side sealed (kilz):
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fwalls-sealed.jpg&hash=8c4eedb3faa96706aba0068a84e9496d1cafaefa)
Door #2 Frame installed / concreted / grouted :
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fdoor-frame-in.jpg&hash=6b0168a413a5de84a12df46c522e0d1231a310e2)
Custom counter added for Coffee/Microwave/etc for Employees
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fcustom-cntr.jpg&hash=66c55dc917bee60107be3b962efc25c3b645bf33)
Left Back shop, All mudding done. Getting ready to texture/prime/paint.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fback-almost.jpg&hash=a8bd0e3e8adae1a6e99bb0ad4d9d7659eb6a5d65)
-
Looking good sir
-
wow, looks good.
-
Proof of concept for the first stage of our pipe fitting manufacturing line. The machine bends 20 fittings per 6 foot length for 1.5" SCH10/SCH40. Then we cut the chains down into fittings, tumble blast, cnc trim/chamfer, laser mark, then wash.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fbend-chain.JPG&hash=140f73830c6b9ef5f7d96adbc9b59f45ae017644)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fchain-close.JPG&hash=43b346d8e1052df49caf278a95e8e325d10d048c)
Back left is just about done. Needs the lights to completed, all outlet plugs to be replaced, all switches to be replaced. Trim to go down, and then floor epoxy.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fback-almost1.JPG&hash=080acaee624b5e83a7ad0def461dc771a88eb080)
Left side is underway now. Acoustic wall going up. Structural wall on the back up and almost ready for inspection.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fback23.JPG&hash=29b977d445b2f0c6293191ec46e2aa9dd148f1f0)
-
Ball park pricing for fittings?
-
Wow, that snake bend is wicked! Cool to see what it can do.
-
bro someone bent your pipe all up. its definitely supposed to be straight.
-
What are you doing to cut them? Seems like a perfect application for a Kaltenbach kks400 with auto miter head...
-
Probably either a HEM or Marvel Vertical Tilt / Power Feed w/ a t-slot table. Those are tube industry standard for part trimming of this sort.
A few years back I ran a lot of production trimming on our cold saws with custom t-slot tables and fixturing for ATV exhaust parts, and wasn't really impressed with blade life or performance. You get resonances in the parts (just the variability between parts) and it just nukes your blades.
We get 2500-3000 cuts per blade cutting straight tube/pipe (double supported on either side of the blade with the self center tube clamps). With the t-slots and multiple clamps we were getting 250-300 with the same feed rates. Sucked.
-
Theoretically I can manufacture them for 56% of the cost of the best supplier I ever had in China for this part # @ container load levels. We will see how the theoretical and the reality pan out though before I start counting my chickens and pricing them.
I've designed this line to be able to produce ~300,000 fittings a year with 3 operators, 8 hours a day, so we will see. If it works well I'm going to setup dedicated lines for each pipe size.
-
Putting china out of business? :mexi:
-
Insulating and sheeting right side of shop.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Falmost%2Finsulate-side.JPG&hash=a21b93f985e57767c5cdc76710b031eb25b8d577)
The acoustic wall is taking 4" of foam then we sheet over it. The effective wall thickness is 14" on that wall, which blocks the offices from the CNC shop.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Falmost%2Finsult-right.JPG&hash=1e0af8f1c9567dfd59a4c287fb50b55db805ef8d)
Doors are ready to go in. They should be here next week (finally). Gotta get this thing inspected this week.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Falmost%2Fback-door-readtoinspect.JPG&hash=f549d316c43751d142d2b1127d871c0f92f532a4)
Cleaning out the left side shop for epoxy floor application. This stuff better not suck.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Falmost%2Fleft.JPG&hash=829cc1ae9a6475b88d70873dbb16e7f415ce1a6d)
Added a receptionist cube up by the window. Gotta figure out some way to prevent people from just barging in here like they own the place.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Falmost%2Frecept.jpg&hash=93db7e4b17d9149d1663c1b68887723e7ab52aad)
-
Oh and went and bought that eagle 6" bender. It's hard to tell from the picture, but the bend arm by itself is over 6 feet wide from the center of the die mount. The pressure die sticks out another two feet past it as you can see in the pic. I've never seen a mandrel bender that big in my life. You actually load it from a platform as the centerline of the tube is around 6 feet off the ground. (It was awesome!)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Feagle-6in-2.JPG&hash=1c9c96d7d1218a035041d25bcecc91dd0cd516ee)
-
That looks BIG!
-
That's what she said
-
Putting china out of business? :mexi:
Certain types of manufacturing have been cheaper in North America for some time now, partially due to small owner-operators willing to work for less in order to get business. And, while there are manufacturers in china willing to do a good job, on average you get better work (and can build a better relationship) with folks this side of the Pacific. Local, even. CNC Zone is the absolute best place to find a talented guy an hour from your house willing to work to keep the lights on. Factor in rising production costs in china, and increasing costs to transport material, and "reshoring" is expected to be in full swing 2014.
This is half the reason OP is expanding his lines. Business may not be the best ever, but if you work hard and do a good job, it doesn't suck.
-
Anything you can take the effect of labor out of the equation by either increasing your manufactured quantity or automating the process, you can do well against china. Freight on heavy goods is a real equalizer as well. We've been competitive with china since 2009. Once we had the volume, the other aspects fell in place.
All of this is an attempt to move from 8 bending machines that are constantly having tool changes, to 40+ dedicated, one size/radius benders that will enable us to take on short order custom work and produce our stocking quantities on demand. This is the business model of the largest of the bending companies in the US, and most of these guys are 400-600 mil + a year companies. I'm a zit in comparison right now because I can't do custom or short order production work. I probably turn down 3 mil a year in this stuff alone right now and the big boys wont even talk to me yet. Still too little.
-
Dropped all the panels. Tomorrow we are going to jack up the drop ceiling 18" and re-support it. The ept-150 bender is 8'4 to the top of the electrical panel so the existing 10 feet clear height wasn't going to cut it when we moved it in (a bit too tight). We will be at 11'6 after we do this mod. All the power is going to be run next couple weeks as well with the ceiling down.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Falmost%2Flifting-ceiling.JPG&hash=bfeeba1c6acf1485a03fddccda27c98c6e053c53)
-
I want to play with your machines.
-
I want to play with your ______.
-
Gotta love this economy. Made a 40% offer on another Eagle bender (3" VB-76), and it was accepted yesterday. 2 years ago these couldn't be found for under 60k used. This one even runs and was rebuilt in 2004!
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Feagle-vb76-3.JPG&hash=942ff2da279d2dd84fcfdd86002606d05719cac6)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Feagle-vb76-2.JPG&hash=1b1ea20331d6657cf9c53df555b171e070045366)
-
i'd wish you be in Europe :-\
-
Do you need an inspection/quality lab? ???
-
For ISO certs, yes. It's part of that big next (step / leap). No point yet tho. Don't have the production capability to handle the contracts that require it.
-
More fire doors going in. $3k for both. :(
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fdoors%2Fsingle-door.JPG&hash=894b62fec88a2f09ff4f7a71eb0363435c8b6b53)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fdoors%2Fsingle-door1.JPG&hash=f46772cbf33dc0246485595a6c7cbc8d3713c4c6)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fdoors%2Fdouble-door1.JPG&hash=07de6bd1fb8080d52158e23c17c1e2c20129875a)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fdoors%2Fdouble-door2.JPG&hash=506d7b91d3f23a72def341b2d7e1a5b75c062a80)
-
Getting close. All inspections passed. Sheeting up the last wall. Back roll up doors go in next friday.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fdoors%2Fracetofinish.JPG&hash=716c1e3b582f4a7a67ce663b46cbb0a9a92d4f68)
-
Fuck thats a badass setup!
-
Big doors are in.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fdoors%2Fdoor2.JPG&hash=c3b7bcbbae9eeab63989cee0fd11f5d1c77c4e8f)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fdoors%2Fdoor1.JPG&hash=4c2811c30127a8906340a501a4b436ea6153da37)
-
The foam tower for insulating above the drop ceiling as they repair it. Also 480V->240V transformer, lights, 400A outside service panel, and a bunch of other electrical things.
480V service going in next week. Going to start working on the bathrooms and the outside soon. Getting there.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fdoors%2Fnext-weekfun.JPG&hash=bcdd0bfa13c9a1b4aac041f419f4fa0095e542d7)
-
All I see is $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
But it looks real good!
-
I dont even want to think about the cost at this point. Just glad it's almost done. I got machines we need to start shoe horning in here.
-
Those overhead style doors are really nice. Good for you for being able to afford and complete this project, I would have been bust two pages ago :P
-
Raw enclosures and transformer mounted, 42 breaker panel boxes, 1 480V 400A, 1 240V 400A.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Falmost%2Fbig-power1.JPG&hash=c0c97960f8cdae800c6b50f75de61a04105d4166)
Ceiling partially fixed. Need to do perimeter. The openings are where the new lights are going and the track lighting is coming down in the back. We need every inch to get these big bastard machines in.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Falmost%2Fceiling.JPG&hash=4b9c553dc291ec90f75d8371005dd97ff52a0de9)
-
Has not been easy. I'm way over budget at this point, and 2 months behind where I wanted to be. Ultimately what it came down to though was I changed everything instead of just a handful of things. So it's my fault in reality.
Those overhead style doors are really nice. Good for you for being able to afford and complete this project, I would have been bust two pages ago :P
-
I hate the drop ceilings, why did you decide to use them?
-
Acoustic dampening. The other room where we deleted the drop ceiling is insanely loud in comparison and this room is going to have HUGE pumps. The EPT-150MR's pump is 150HP.
-
http://www.offroadfabnet.com/forums/showthread.php?t=9678 (http://www.offroadfabnet.com/forums/showthread.php?t=9678)
FYI ;DDD
-
Been awhile since I updated this. Building interior is mostly done, less the bathrooms. Outside is getting there.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Faugust%2Foutside.jpg&hash=cdb51d8b96547da452dc151acc011dd47dbe7148)
Outside mostly done.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Fbldg.jpg&hash=f641096d044c98222f3b91497aa9206c828d1bbd)
Old look
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Faugust%2Fpower.jpg&hash=5a1873ca36cc6080fff6c324f61d8d0d3eb20aaf)
Big Power is in.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Faugust%2Fext-pad.jpg&hash=5eaf0b907d308f6eecdacdfcb78bcb7cc7390bed)
Pad we are putting in the back. The existing pavement was higher then the bottom of the doors, so it left a dangerous ledge.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Faugust%2Fcnc-room.jpg&hash=04534ed73067f15e25f001884b3c7f7c48699092)
One of the CNC rooms, getting ready to acid wash the floors. We've mechanically removed all of the glue from the previous floor tiles.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Faugust%2Fbender-room.jpg&hash=e7831aba4f906422475f5ccb87cd77311105c1d7)
This room is done, as I'm not going to coat this floor as nobody thinks it will survive moving the 70,000lb ept-150 into the building.
-
This is where i want to be in 10 years. Great work man!
-
I bought the first building (across the street from this one) in October of 2004. We spent about 6 months remodeling it (just interior), and nearly went broke doing it. 10 years later, we are finally going to paint the building to match this one. It's such an ugly turd. I'll have to get pictures of that one too.
-
Looking solid Adam!
I just bought a few units myself so I might be doing some remodeling this fall.
Do you have any tube benders you want to sell? Still think about buying something to bend the tube for my egr deletes. Speaking of which did you get around to installing that kit you bought from me? How did you like working on a 6.0l :-X
I have another part I have a couple shops fuck up for me sometimes, its a low qty thing. 6061 round, 4" OD .125" wall, 4"clr about 70*. Can you do it? You can send it to me in T0 and I can heat treat it here... Only need like 50-100pcs at a time...
-
Congrats on the units dave! Are you going to remodel then move? Nothing like owning your own building(s).
No tooling for 4" x 4" here. I don't go near the 1D radiuses. No money in parts that fail 25%+ of the time on the bender. I do some 1.625" x 1.625" 0.065 and 0.125 stainless 304 for in house parts and its a mandrel breaking nightmare.
EGR delete install went smooth. Took two of my guys about 15 hours to do it (first time). They broke a coil plug, but other then that it went ok. Damn F550 has been a money pitt lately tho. Stock tires starting blowing out @ 35k miles. Then it started shaking going down the road. Had to replace all 6 tires, u-joints, and the steering ball joint. Fords are such a piece of shit.
Benders ... Most of what I've been buying lately are late 90s/early 00 Eagle EPT cores with bad/older controllers then I retrofit. I have had some interesting stuff coming in the email from sweden lately for schwarze-robitec benders, but the exchange rate is pushing them higher then I like and the robitec controllers are all but impossible to debug so they have to be retrofit with a bend pro or like. ($30k control by itself). You can always buy a shitty old pines :). I had a guy email me pictures of his bender he bought new in 2008 from Pines he was trying to off load, couldn't believe it's still the same outdated pile of crap design you see from the 70/80ss. No wonder he went out of business. He wanted $60k for the package as he paid well over a 150k+ for the bender and dies new (LOL!)
-
After a long wait, our new servers came in today. This is a Dell M1000E Blade Chassis & 2 Dell M620 blades. Dual fiber channels on the back, 6 4600w redundant power supplies, dual switches, blah, etc, etc.
In an effort to reduce our colocation & dedicated server costs (exceeds ~4k a month), we've run a bonded dual T1 line, a 100meg comcast and a 40 meg dsl into the building and combined them all together with some Zyxel firewalls. Hoping to be running 6 servers out of this chassis within the next couple months (pocket book allowing of course).
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Faugust%2Fm1000e.jpg&hash=f7ef3d7cd302b03db0cddfae9fb1b744733b41f6)
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Faugust%2Fm1000e-back.jpg&hash=9587dcc44368723449830413d86f7d8f84947049)
-
All I have to say is congrats on your success. That's a bitchin shop.
-
Ok well I thought I'd ask anyways. Woolf is gonna give it a try for me again.
If you ever want to sell a bender let me know... I don't have a huge need and its not a priority but keep me in mind if you need to offload something.
I just bought the two units I am in plus one beside me. Was going to buy all 5 in my building, plus two more in the building beside me, and then my land lord passed away unexpectedly, so then I got thinking about only buying just the 5 units in my building, got approved and all that, and then the guy renting the first two units in my building gets fatally squished by his car:(
So then I was like shit, everyone keeps dying, maybe I'll just buy my two and one more beside me and focus on getting the business more organized and profitable instead. We'll see how it goes. I take advantage of my vertical space pretty well, and will just continue to do that and buy some Kardex, Megamat, or Remstar type vertical storage units for parts storage so I can maximize the usefullness of my sq ft.
Keep posting updates as you move the iron in, that is what we all want to see!
-
Keep posting updates as you move the iron in, that is what we all want to see!
W3rd!!!
We like seeing a fellow Nog succeeding. :noel:
-
Your 2629 building is a neat building. What did you end up paying per square foot?
-
Your 2629 building is a neat building. What did you end up paying per square foot?
Yeah its a great building! I'll buy the remaining two units when I can afford it.
I paid $128.80 sq/ft which is a pretty damn good deal around here. So the 6k sq/ft was $750,000
The shitty thing is the $52,000 in tax, and $20,000 in legal fees :-X
What does it cost down there?
I think after I fill this building I'll do my next shop in the USA, its too damn expensive here and impossible to find employees.
-
Holly fuck that's a lot of money per sq ft.
-
Holly fuck that's a lot of money per sq ft.
Its closer to 150-165 usually around here. I don't understand why that is, it doesn't make sense because the annual property tax is sky high as well, my 6k sq/ft is 11k/yr... I did some math and in order to have a tenant cover your mortgage payment and property tax at normal rental rates for the area you need to buy at $100/sqft.
-
That's not bad actually. Oregon seems to be pretty similiar. Your average condition steel buildings seem to average around $80-100/sq foot. Concrete block/tilt-ups, around $120-$140+/sq foot. There are a few new listings in my area for commercial that are $168 and $180 per square foot which is insane.
The market really dipped bad at the beginning of the year (tons of inventory, nobody buying) and I was able to pickup the building I've been remodeling for ~$52/sq foot with cash. Jen's building I bought for $32/sq foot with cash a month later. As soon as I closed on her building though, it was like a whirlpool and all the commercial properties got sucked up and now there is nothing in our area for under $140/sq foot.
-
I should note though that none of the buildings were listed for prices anywhere near that. I made 50-60% offers on 4 different buildings with cash, and 2 of them closed. Total luck and/or landlord desperation.
-
Wow dude nice scores! I thought I was lucky!
How are the closing costs/legal fees/taxes down there?
I feel like the 70k I gotta dish out is pretty harsh, its damn near 10% of the purchase price! And the annual property tax seems steep too.
We have lots of listings for $180/sqft and up but no one pays that. Selling prices are more in the 130-150 range. You can get into the high 90's and low 100's but that is only on larger buildings (20,000sqft and larger), that only have one title. My little 5 unit building has a title for each unit.
-
Property tax is assessed at the county level here, and our county is pretty low. About 1.2%. Typically the county appraisals don't match the building appraisals, as they are supposedly ~5 years behind current pricing standards on purpose. But from my experience, a $1 mil building will have a tax assessed value of $500k and taxes around $6k a year. The office building private appraised at $600k when I bought it, and it's property taxes are inline with a 400k building. Not sure on the other one. I know that total out of pocket expenses to close was under $10k for both buildings as I negotiated the seller to pay all closing costs less taxes, doc fees, and title insurance. I don't use attorneys for real estate transactions, but I know people who do and its about 2% of purchase price on average (rip off). I just use standard real estate forms.
-
Updates DUDE!
-
Bldg is nearing completion. Going to get our final inspection 10/1 for occupancy then we can start moving in equipment.
Only thing to note as of late, acquired waterjet #3. Flow WMC2. 100HP dual intensifier, dual independent heads. Will likely be selling baby waterjet. I've wanted one of these for about 3 years.
(https://realhomemadeturbo.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mandrel-bends.com%2Fbldg2%2Faugust%2Fflow-wmc2.jpg&hash=6cd904d328af8254c1ffeac332d99125e3630c47)
-
Double the parts in the same amount of time... :noel:
-
The only trade off is the nests are less efficient as they have to be mirrored. Most of the time, you can get within a few percent of plate utilizations, but for odd sized parts and such it can make things kinda tricky. I spent a couple days up at sigmatek training on dual head nesting and it's kind of a pain. I'm hoping it proves to be a lot easier in practice then it was in training.
-
The only trade off is the nests are less efficient as they have to be mirrored. Most of the time, you can get within a few percent of plate utilizations, but for odd sized parts and such it can make things kinda tricky. I spent a couple days up at sigmatek training on dual head nesting and it's kind of a pain. I'm hoping it proves to be a lot easier in practice then it was in training.
So this means you can't shift the cutting head? I would have figured that would be standard on profiling machines?
-
The cutting heads are independent, on y, but x is still shared. So they still have to be a mirrored nest unless your doing simple profiling and such (large diameter circles, etc). Powered independent cutting heads really just allow for on the spot center to center mirror centerline adjustment, and little else.
-
The cutting heads are independent, on y, but x is still shared. So they still have to be a mirrored nest unless your doing simple profiling and such (large diameter circles, etc). Powered independent cutting heads really just allow for on the spot center to center mirror centerline adjustment, and little else.
Sounds basic to me. Sometimes you might have to accept you might to run one head on some or all of the sheet, or put it on a different machine, but most often I would just deal with some scrap material.
Where are all the pics of the machines jammed in there dude!?