Show us your welding cart/trolley...

[Hood]

To smooth out the ride and corner better.

Aye thanks for that

 

[arther dailey]

what suprised he didnt go for air ride

 

[slim_boy_fat]

The next generation of welding cart......

 

[Aesgarth]

I've almost finished my new cart. It's a bit... Big, but it does accommodate my MIG, TIG and plasma cutter. Waiting on the 10mm plate for the top, should be here on Monday.

 

[Aesgarth]

Pretty close to finished...

 

[arther dailey]

Top job ,especially the top plate, might be an idea to put some plate vertical at the bottle end to stop those gauges getting smashed

 

[3000alloy]

My effort, I have a multiplug on the other side of the cart to use with the grinder. Upper and lower trays are from road signs I acquired over the years.

 

[3000alloy]

Yup, that will do.

 

[Mannyroad]

Hi guys, went on an introductory course to welding at my local collage recently where we got to play with gas, MIG,TIG and arc welding. Loved it, even if it was only one day per subject. Anyway, no point doing the course if I don't start practicing, so I decided to get a combi-welder and picked up an Oerlikon Citimag 200 off Gumtree and had a go at my first welding project, this welding cart. Quite happy with the result. Welding isn't perfect, but hey I'm a beginner, though it'll do for the girls I know, hee hee! The two holes on the sloping shelf bolt the welder in place to stop it falling off/sliding backwards. I need to get stuck into serious practice now, to get used to this welding malarky. We did brazing on the course; loved it. Not sure if I can get small (10L) bottles of oxy/acetylene though; the big bottles is waaay too much for what I'll be doing (small repairs/fabs etc.)

 

[Hood]

Very nice indeed

Regarding the brazing, you can get small cylinders from the likes of SGS and Hobbyweld where you pay a deposit and after that you only pay for refills. If only doing small amounts then that is likely the best way, if doing a lot then BOC may be cheaper but that is unlikely.

 

[Mannyroad]

Thanks Hood, advice much appreciated. Will check out SGS/Hobbyweld. Personally, I enjoyed the gas welding on the course best. Slower but you got to see what the puddle is doing better, so for me, as a begginner it seemed easier. The hardest part for me when MIG or stick welding is seeing the puddle, or the joint line for that matter. No matter what shade setting I use on my Parweld helmet I can't seem to see where I'm going when welding along a joint line and so keep drifting off line. Not quite sure how to fix this. Perhaps I need to raise a seperate thread for advice on this.

 

[Hood]

Is it a half decent Parweld or an old one? Are the lens covers clean and scratch free? Also is the area well lit? that can help a lot. I have seen people running a chalk line along where they will be welding as well, it gives them something contrasting to follow.

 

[zzr1200]

If anybody is interested how its laid out, a closer look.

The welder pivots out on a double layer shelf unit, with the foot pedal under the inverter, the earth and tig torch hang on the side, the whole unit just lifts of the pivot pin post.

Stored in the box is an electrode stinger and a 17 gas cooled tig torch for max ampage tig.

The box has now been updated, with a para weld water cooler and a 25ft water cooled 20 tig torch.

 

[Munkul]

The box has now been updated, with a para weld water cooler and a 25ft water cooled 20 tig torch.

More pics please. That is the smartest and best laid out site box I've ever seen - I love the pull-out swivel base for the welder!

Is it just for forklifting around, or do you have castors on the very bottom as well?

I need to make/buy a site box at some point.

 

[zzr1200]

It gets moved on a pallet truck if it needs be, its it's more to keep fiddling fingers out than anything else. Theres a couple of people that can weld but it's my welder not the firms.

I'll take a couple more photos in the new year.

PS. One of the guy asked if he could try the welder, so I gave him the 140 amp inverter stick welder from the back of my van,,, he hasn't asked again..

 

[Dcal]

This is where I'm at with a trolley for my mig.
It started out as a fire extinguisher station that I pulled from a skip which turned out to be made of very light tube and box.
I should have put it back in the skip and started from scratch.
Maybe next time.

I wanted it to be as low and compact as possible and I also wanted the welder to swivel on the trolley so I can get at the front panel without moving the whole thing.

View attachment 181334

Added a couple of hooks to have somewhere to store the leads tonight.

View attachment 181332


View attachment 181333

At some point I'll call it finished and give it a coat of paint, but not just yet.

After using the cart for 6 months as is, I have finally got around to finishing it (I think)
It worked absolutely fine, but there was an awful lot of real estate going begging so I thought I would use that wasted space up and fix the problems that I saw.
Biggest problem I saw is although the hooks for holding the welding cables were big enough, I always had to take three or four cables off to get to the one I needed so wanted to add a few more.

Bur first job was to make and install a proper bearing for the welder turntable which I really like and will keep as a feature. It was originally just two bit of pipe that were an approximate fit.

I have plenty of UHDPE (ultra high density polyethylene) so that was a good place to start.
First I had to make something to hold the UHDPE in the lathe chuck, just a 12mm coupler with a hex screw welded to it.



Then cut the plastic roughly to size in the metal chop saw.



Then mount and machine it to what was required.






Then machine some pipe to suit.



Then weld to the frame and machine and check the fit with the base plate and spigot for the turntable.

 

[slimjim]

Thanks Hood, advice much appreciated. Will check out SGS/Hobbyweld. Personally, I enjoyed the gas welding on the course best. Slower but you got to see what the puddle is doing better, so for me, as a begginner it seemed easier. The hardest part for me when MIG or stick welding is seeing the puddle, or the joint line for that matter. No matter what shade setting I use on my Parweld helmet I can't seem to see where I'm going when welding along a joint line and so keep drifting off line. Not quite sure how to fix this. Perhaps I need to raise a seperate thread for advice on this.

You probably need a cheater lense in your mask, or more light before you trigger the arc, or both.

 

[Dcal]

Decided the inside of the box would make a good receptacle for a pull out handle to pull the cart about instead of using the mig torch.

More plastic, a bit of pipe, thread bar and I had the start of the handle made, haven't decided on grip yet, I will see what works best when it's all together.





I folded a bit of 16 gauge and put a floor in to take my plasma



This left a good 6 inches of space above the plasma so though that needed to be filled with a drawer.
One set of 400mm long Screwfix runners, some flat bar and more 16 gauge and I had what I needed.







Just seam welded the corners with mig and again haven't settled on a handle, I think I have something suitable in storage but I'm not sure where.

Next more hooks
The couple I installed work well so just added 4 more and spaced them so that had as much room as I thought reasonable between them.



I ran out of argon so had to mig most of the bits on, which is fine but a bit more grinding required.
And the biggest problem with a design evolving from an unsuitable base and using a mix of rusty scrap, is the amount of work required to prep it for paint.
I should have blasted it but it's too big for my cabinet and I couldn't be bothered with the clean up if I blasted it outside so wire brushes, DA sanders, flap discs, emery paper and quite a bit of elbow grease later and it's still rubbish.
As it will live inside, I called it a day and we will see if Jotun 87a really is a surface tolerant paint.



Two coats of 87a later and at least it's all the same colour.



Do you think I might be spending too much time on this? I certainly do.

 

[Wallace]

Top job ,especially the top plate, might be an idea to put some plate vertical at the bottle end to stop those gauges getting smashed

Dropping the bottles down lower would help. Nice simple trolley bench though, I tend to over think my stuff and it never quite gets finished!

 

[Wallace]

Do you think I might be spending too much time on this? I certainly do.

No, it's evolving. Call it development and we can then steal your ideas! I really like the rotating top, mine will probably end up over engineered with taper roller bearings and a brake then hardly ever get used.