BIG Gantry Fabrication

[Geof]

I apologise if this should be in a different forum but this seemed to most suitable.

A number of years ago I started a big, and I mean BIG, gantry machine; then stopped and never restarted. I had the gantry fabricated and machined and have kept it all these years.

Now is the time it has to depart either to the scrap yard or free for the taking to anyone who can make use of it. It is heavy; the tubes are 4" x 4" x 0.25" hollow structural, total weight around 400lbs.

It is 10 feet long, 2 feet wide and the ways are machined. It was straight to within about 0.002" but was never normalized so the weld stresses may have relaxed to give some distortion.

I can stick it on my GR510 and run a dial along the ways to check the straightness if someone is seriously interested.

[dertsap]

holy smokes man , how big of a machine were you going to build

[epineh]

I would bring the ute around now but there is one slight technical problem, mainly the Pacific ocean...

I am actually contemplating building something similiar myself, maybe a bit wider though...hang on a minute, was that going to be the actual gantry part???

You could just about build small houses with something that size

Russell.

[Geof]

Originally Posted by dertsap holy smokes man , how big of a machine were you going to build

10 feet by 8 feet.

You might have heard of the parts I planned in doing with it; Strainer Plates for Hydraulic Debarkers. These are either sheets of UHMW or steel plate with a hole pattern on 1" centers covering the entire plate. How would you like laying out a few thousand holes and center punching by hand then drilling on a big Radial Arm?

I planned on building a machine that would mechanically move from hole to hole over the entire plate with the spacing controlled by limit switches on rack drives. Then a big recession came along in late 1982 and I went broke. When I did have the money to complete it there was no longer a need for the plates.

[DR-Motion]

Drool... she's beautiful

[Geof]

My Pack Rat gene took command and even though I said scrapyard I took it home and tucked it in the shed behind my barn.

And within a few days a PM came through and now it has gone to a new home.