What did you do today?

[john b]

I guess money does grow in trees

[PStechPaul]

Yesterday I got a free kids' electric tractor. I figured I might be able to use the motors or other parts for my dead mower or something. But I was surprised how tiny the motors are!




Today I found this butterfly noshing on my dog's poop:

And this one joined in the fun:

[swatkins]

Today I went shopping!

Came home with a 165 lb Peter Wright anvil in great shape for 650.00

Also went shopping in a surplus steel yard in Houston , My kinda place! ... Came home with 9 feet of 6 inch round, making 12 risers for my Axelson 20" out of that... Also bought a 2 foot piece of 24" , 1/4" wall pipe for a foundry I want to make and a 20' piece of 10" parallel leg C channel for the side rails on my Plasma / Router table.. It was a good day and the salvage yard was amazing... Almost everything in the video is 35 cents a pound... My friend Don just can't wait to go back

[DennisCA]

Was gonna cast the last part of my shed foundation today but I noticed I saw the sun through my cement mixers bowl. It's getting worn out. Think this coulda been a job for a MIG and perhaps cutting some new sheet and pounding to shape, but I don't got one and I wanted to get it working in 10 minutes. So TIG and silicon bronze is what I chose because this old rusty metal is a PITA to weld.

[Tim The Grim]

Paul, Those motors are probably RS-550 or equivalent. They pack a pretty good punch with the 12v battery supplied with the toy. I spliced in some contacts so I can run a 20v Porter Cable battery in our “quad” and it really wakes it up.
My wife rides our grandkids on ours and gives me a frown when she realizes she only has the 12v in there.

Today I was told I’ve been exposed as of a few days back. So far so good. Idiot 30 somethings.

[PStechPaul]

The toy tractor has a high/low/reverse joystick. In the low (1) position, only one wheel is driven, and it turns pretty fast. In the (2) position, both wheels turn, but more slowly, and after a few seconds, they stop. There is what appears to be a thermal overload switch that is probably tripping. I suspect maybe one of the motors has a fault, or maybe the gears are binding. I haven't done any more testing. I'm not sure what I might be able to use this for, but it's beyond fixing for its original purpose. The motors seem to be about the size of those in a cordless drill. I have a good size 12 VDC series wound dual shaft motor that might be beefy enough for the cordless lawnmower, but I'm hoping to find a mower with a bad battery for cheap or free.

[mattthemuppet]

Also went shopping in a surplus steel yard in Houston , My kinda place! ...

which scrapyard was it if you don't mind sharing? We might be heading down to Houston this week to look at a car, so I might be able to, you know, drop a scrapyard visit into general conversation

[PStechPaul]

I completely disassembled the kids' tractor, and checked out the motors. One of them ran normally, very fast at 8 volts about 2 amps. The other drew 4 amps at about 2 volts, and ran roughly, like it was unbalanced. I took it apart (as far as I could without removing the pinion gear from the shaft), and could not find anything obvious. I think the speed control put the motors in series or parallel.




The reduction gears may be useful. The final drive is 32 tooth. Then double gears 13-30, 12-48, 15-76, and 10 tooth motor pinion. So overall reduction about 150:1. Probably 15,000 RPM to 100 RPM. If the drive wheels are 12" diameter, that would be about 300 feet/minute or 3.4 MPH.

[swatkins]

which scrapyard was it if you don't mind sharing? We might be heading down to Houston this week to look at a car, so I might be able to, you know, drop a scrapyard visit into general conversation

It was Triple S Steel on Jensen Drive ( North Store ) Located on Jensen one block north of North 610 Loop.... Bring a trailer

[swatkins]

Today I fixed an Axelson lathe and started cutting up material I bought at the scrap yard

I bought a 9 foot piece of 6 inch material that needs to end up as 4.5 inch risers for the Axelson... Need 12 of them so I started cutting up the 9 footer into 20 inch blanks, so I could manage them without my tractor...

[PStechPaul]

Yes, RS-550 looks like what they are. I was able to remove the armature but could not find any obvious problems. It did seem like I can push on the shaft and cause it to bind up a bit, but it just needed all the spacers replaced.


I found one vendor on eBay that showed specs for this model motor. It states 19,300 RPM at 12 VDC and 62 oz-in torque. This works out to 1.2 HP or 882 watts, which would be 73 amps at 12V.

[Bob Engelhardt]

... I bought a 9 foot piece of 6 inch material ....

The $0.35 per lb that you mentioned before sounds cheap until you realize that 9', 1500lb piece was $525! Big machines need big budgets.

[mattthemuppet]

It was Triple S Steel on Jensen Drive ( North Store ) Located on Jensen one block north of North 610 Loop.... Bring a trailer

thanks! A trailer might be pushing it, but we may end up with 2 cars going back, so plenty of space for the stuff I work on

[swatkins]

The $0.35 per lb that you mentioned before sounds cheap until you realize that 9', 1500lb piece was $525! Big machines need big budgets.

Yes they do I think lots of guys buy big machines cheap and they become the project, you know fixing them up and bringing them back to life, just because materials are expensive. And there ain't nothing wrong with that !

[swatkins]

thanks! A trailer might be pushing it, but we may end up with 2 cars going back, so plenty of space for the stuff I work on

Sometimes they will cut a piece off and sometimes not... Kinda depends on who is working there that day., I have learned that you just buy what they have already cut...