Cone Roller Part II

I think the pictures tell the story quite well.....

The roller has been welded to a large flat plate of steel. I made a handle from  some electrical conduit.

The conduit handle is removable. It simply slides down over the two bolts I welded to the angle.

The ultra-precise angle gauge - consisting of a wood shim clamped to the rotating section, and a bit of scrap wood. Here's how it works:

Keep bending one spot until the mark just barely shows. Then readjust the cone for a new bend. This keeps all the bends the same on each pass.

Time for some action:

Bend on all the radius lines, in between or wherever you like as long as you are aligned with the radius. Stop on the line, and you are safe against overbending. Keep increasing the angle, and make several passes:



Getting close now. Don't overshoot the angle! I had a little tweaking to do, but I ended up with this:

Not bad for a first try, eh? The slip roll machine that this replaces looks like this:

This particular slip-roll had no price tag, instead it says "Call for price" and "Financing available".

Similar machines are anywhere from $200 to $2000 dollars. My cost? About $3 for the steel from the steelyard. Plus I burned up about four welding rods. And then there's labor....Labor is high, you know. ;)

Cone Roller

I have mentioned before that I am building a gasifier; this will require welding skills which I don't yet possess. But I see this as an opportunity, not a headache. I want to learn welding, and this is a prime opportunity.  So far my welding has been nice little beads on flat steel, and welding up scraps of steel. Here's one of my creations, showing my beginner's welds:

Today I actually built something useful, called a cone roller. Those of you who have done machining or custom fabrication work know that steel cones and cylinders are generally made from flat sheet metal, rolled in a slip-roll machine. That is the best and easiest way. Unfortunately for me, slip roll machines are many hundreds or even thousands of dollars. Since I don't plan to be rolling very many cones or cylinders, I can make do with a very simple bending device. Here's how it will look eventually (photo from member Pepe at Victory Gasworks):

I have the guts of it done, namely the hinged angle iron and the one inch bar. Next comes the handle, and then I have to find something sturdy to mount it to.

Some detail shots: