My name is Diogenes (Dio) I just had a chance to know the VHS Space yesterday and I got super excited about it!
I’m looking to make a simple motorcycle rack and some brackets for a new headlight, but I have zero experience with metal (I use to make stuff with wood), and I would like to know if there’s any workshop or something like this so I can learn how to use the tools.
Also, since this is the first time working with metal, I would like to ask if someone knows the best way to approach this, like the best materials, welding etc. I’m attaching some drawings with the idea.
Thank you so much! Hope you all have a great week!!
Cool!
I’ve done a few small things for my bikes at VHS, and I have another project I need to do soon.
First, GREAT designs and drawings. Having this drawn up makes life way easier, and you’re already way ahead of many people who look to start a project like this.
For metal, I’d suggest steel tubes, and welding. I’d use MIG as I’m most comfortable with it, but there are more experienced metalworkers than me on this forum who will likely chime in. Bending is going to be he hardest part, but it shouldn’t be too bad. What I’d do is set up a wood form, and use a bit of heat to bend some long steel tubes around the forms. You have some leeway, since you can just hammer it till it’s close enough, then weld on the tabs after to match up exactly.
For process of learning, your best bet is to decide how to do something, and ask if anyone has some spare time to help you achieve it.
Get your hands on the raw material, plus a bunch of extra to learn with. There will be mistakes, but mistakes are actually a pretty cheap way to learn!
Thank you so much for all the information, this is a great starting point for me, I’ll read the link you sent more carefully, I didn’t think about looking for other similar projects, I completely forgot about it for this one haha.
For the materials, I was thinking on something that I could minimize the welding points, so it would be more strong, also I think that since I don’t have experience, bending would be easier than welding everything.
Where did you get this price from? Someone told me about the Metal Supermarket but I don’t know if there’s another better/cheaper place to buy from.
Don’t be afraid of the welder. The joints are very strong, ideally stronger than the tube. And it looks great after grinding and paint. As for experience, this is a great first welding project, and as long as your timelines aren’t tight, you can find more experienced people to help do the welds. There are really only about 10 welds to do on the thing, it’ll be quite easy. Getting everything prepped is the time consuming part. In fact, I find bending is much harder than welding. I’m not sure you can easily get the bends in your drawing with the tools we have right now at VHS
I think I’d make the rack as two pieces, that join in the middle. Pretty much split it down the middle vertically from the top view in your drawing.
This is from Metal Supermaket! I just did some pricing out for a different project, and it’s generally the easiest place to get stuff. There may be cheaper, but buying from metal supermarket eliminates a variable, as you get exactly what you expected.
The Panel part looks like it’ll be just bending some sheet metal. I don’t have a ton of experience with it, but we do have a metal bender at the space now, so it’s in theory doable! Again, somebody with more experience can chime in.
One of the last steps will be painting, and as of recently we are well set up for that! Hang your part in the spray booth, turn on the exhaust fans, and hit it with some spray cans. Wear your PPE.
Oh wow thank you so much for all your replies! That’s awesome!!! To be honest I was almost giving up on this project, I’m trying to find a place and or professionals to do it since last October!
I’ll do some mockup in real size for this parts so I get more accurate sizes etc. For the front panel, some people that I’ve shown the idea, told me that would be easier to do it on a lazer cutter, I don’t know if there is something like this at VHS.
Tonight I’ll search more about the materials and tomorrow night I’ll go to the Open House at VHS to see when I could start it.
…and we have a plasma cutter. Which can cut steel and follow wooden templates, which you can cut on the laser cutter.
Tubing would be stronger and much lighter than building the thing out of solid plate, but bending is more work and its easy to collapse thin wall tubing when bending. Solid steel rod is a compromise as its fairly easy to bend, decently strong, but heavier than tubing without really a gain in strength.
I would be tempted to bend solid steel rod for the corners, then weld it to a piece of tubing for the straight runs. More welds and slightly heavier but easier bends. There are also techniques to pack the tubing with sand, and bend it that way.
We do also have a metal brake that can bend up to 16 gauge steel for the bottom panel.
I’m going to buy the stuff tomorrow to start the fabrication, for the rack I’m going to get some solid 3/4 mild steel, but for the front plate, what would be the best/easier material to get for cutting and bending?
So… 3/4" steel is going to be really, really heavy (like 30lbs/sf) and a right bastard to work with (not sure what the max cut capacity of our plasma is but I would be surprised if it can even cut more than 1/2"). You don’t want to be carving steel as if its wood, you will have a bad day.
We use 1/2" mild steel plate for rigs holding up entire train cars, steel is stronger than you think basically.
Thickness and material are going to depends on what kind of loads you are putting on the thing but my guess is you’d be looking at something like 5/16" or 3/8" round for the curved bars and 1/8"or 3/16" x 1" flat bar for the tabs, could also build up the bottom pate from a series of flatbars welded together.
We also cant put anything thicker than about 16 gauge sheet on our metal brake if you are planning to go that way for anything, 1/8th and 3/16 flat bar can be bent in a vice with a hammer pretty readily.
Thanks @dbynoe, the front plate will only hold two headlights and the instrument panel, basically plastic stuff, and will be placed on the frame, so I don’t think it will have problems with overload. The rear rack will be holding just my backpack with a gas can when I’m travelling or my bicycle that will be attached to that eventually, but the rack will also be mounted on the frame of my bike, will not be hanging like some motorcycles. I’ll do as you said, and get thinner mild steel then…
Hi folks! I finally started this project!! Since I’m a noob to the metal craft, I didn’t know how to bend the bars to make the base for the rack, so I just cut it
Now I’m wondering if there’s a way to make the corners round even with the welding, and talking about welding, I have no idea how to do this, so any help (if possible because all the COVID restrictions) would be amazing and I can pay with some beers, milk, kombucha or something like that =) because I won’t do it myself since I barely know how to weld two little wires together haha
Also, if you see on the drawings, the sides are not completely straight, they are slightly curved to follow the bike frame, do you think that would be possible to do? The last thing, what would be the best solution for the front bracket, is there a way to bend the sides in perfect 90º angle, or should I cut and weld it as well?
Thank you so much, and I hope you’re all safe and sane =)
Happy to help weld sometime this week.
(*Edit: I pushed submit too soon)
You’re best to do two things before welding.
Arrange the pieces on a pieces of plywood or something to get the angles right. If you wanna be ultra fancy nail in some little strips of wood that hold the metal in place. This will make the welding much easier. Welding is all about the prep. Clean the ends a bit (but this is less important in MIG than TIG)
Cove the ends of the rods with an angle grinder and table vice. Do all rods that are going to weld at 90 degrees to other rods. It doesn’t need to be perfect, we can fill in some gaps with the weld bead, but a bit closer than square is good. Remember that your measurements fit to the bottom of the cove.
See this image:
hey Dio…Really glad you are getting started on this.
quick question. is that tube or solid rod? The reason i ask is that solid steel is going to add extra weight to the rack that then translates to unnecessary force on the brackets and welds.
BTW… what bike are you putting it on… Hope to run into you at the space one of these days.
As for getting the bends you want, arrange the pieces as nicely as you can on your template that match the shape you want. Since you already cut up the pieces, I don’t think we can get a nice radius like in the drawings, but if you just weld them at the angles you want, then soften the edges with a grinder, then paint it, it’ll look great.
