Harbor Freight English Wheel Upgrade - Project2 by Spike Category: welded Shop tools

Hey folks,
I've been using a Harbor Freight english wheel many years ago. It's served me quite well, one of the best performing things i've gotten from HF to date.
Now that i've finished building my custom power hammer, though, i find i need my english wheel to have a little more "OOMPH" to keep up with the power hammer's shaping speed.

I've heard some stories from people about needed to 'true' the wheels or surface problems on the anvils or bearings, but i lucked out and my wheel has always tracked true and never given me any problems that way.

So, since my wheel works great, i just want to improve it... namely i'm going to stiffen the frame up to add the needed rigidity to shape panels more evenly, accurately, and speedily.

Starting with this:

http://i1168.photobucket.com/albums/...ps3e3cc6e8.jpg

I plan to triangulate the frame above the upper arm and back to reinforce and stiffen the chassis.

Grinding off all the thick powder coat can be a pain, but i use a trick: i use a cut-off wheel turned sideways like a grinder. The extremely aggressive grit cuts through the coating in one pass, and since the wheel gets worn away, it doesn't get hot and load up with melted powder coat like a sanding disc or flap wheel.
http://i1168.photobucket.com/albums/...ps219671ae.jpg
http://i1168.photobucket.com/albums/...ps60014f49.jpg

Mocking up the vertical and horizontal beams on the frame:
http://i1168.photobucket.com/albums/...psda34c06f.jpg

Now, over the years my frame has "stretched" up a little bit, from the constant upward pressure of wheel work. I don't want to reinforce the frame like this, and i want to keep the heat from stretching the arm even further upward while welding. So i used a few tie straps through the top wheel and around the lower arm to pull the upper arm back down into position.

http://i1168.photobucket.com/albums/...ps094a1cd8.jpg

Some welds on the Arms to get them in place
http://i1168.photobucket.com/albums/...psa3316258.jpg

When welding tubes like this with rounded corners together, make sure you get a good solid root weld into the valley.
http://i1168.photobucket.com/albums/...ps3efa71f1.jpg

And while you are welding, don't weld in one spot on one side too much, otherwise you will warp your frame. Stagger your welds from one side to the other in different areas to keep heat-warp to a minimum.
http://i1168.photobucket.com/albums/...psf00b089d.jpg

First round of welds all done
http://i1168.photobucket.com/albums/...ps43f3ead5.jpg

And i was mocking up the upper bar for the triangle when i ran out of work-time for the day.
http://i1168.photobucket.com/albums/...ps3c0d64d9.jpg

I'll post up some more pictures when it's done.

Very nice! I appreciate how you've annotated all of your thought processes and steps. Looks pretty beefy.

Agreed, nice presentation. Now if I ever do get one, I'll know to beef it up right out of the chute.

Got the to bar cut and welded in today. The wheel works a lot better now. I think i'm going to have to triangulate the bar on the back to get all the rigidity that i'm looking for... But its a great improvement over the original design. I'm very happy with it.
In the picture I've sprayed some paint on the edges just to keep them from rusting before I can figure out what color to paint it.

Do yourself a favor and get one of these for the top roller and you will be please with what you can do with it.
http://www.castercity.com/eshop/10Ex...To=../pwic.htm

here is a video of my wheel with one on it
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kkRIf7k402c

have fun

Tom

Yep yep. Mine is green.

Put the back triangles on the wheel this morning.
Attachment 9340

This tempts me to go get one of these.

YOu may want to look over this guy's site for the modifying he did to the HF E wheel.

http://www.jamesriser.com/Machinery/...l/Finally.html

have fun
Tom

Another option for a soft wheel face is a band cut from an inner tube. Easy on and off as needed, since you can leave it on the machine.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fmLGbW9neEg

There's some great stuff posted here on E wheels! I wish I had the space for one of the HF E wheels. I might make a smaller vise mounted version in the future, after seeing a lot of good ideas posted on the machine tooling and metal working forums. It's too bad your frame from HF is powder coated, as it seems like everyone modifies the HF frames for more rigidity anyways. Paint would be a lot easier to remove!

BTW, I love your shop setup. Well equipped and a lot of space for projects. Good thinking on bringing in that monster TV and the couch to go with it!

Careful on grinding with those cutoff wheels, I've seen a few fly apart when they get side loaded like that.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by agent4573

Careful on grinding with those cutoff wheels, I've seen a few fly apart when they get side loaded like that.

---

Its not so much "grinding" down to the metal as "cutting sideways" along its surface. I'm not interested in digging resin wheel pieces out of my arm... I should have been clearer in my post. If using a cut off wheel sideways *DO NOT PUSH DOWN.* if you apply pressure like you would a flap disc it will explode.