Originally Posted by
koenbro
That's what I'm afraid of, TBH. This hobby is sucking me in, and I don't even try to resist it.
I'm a "do'er" and every time I turn around theres another idea of something to make. That's just the way my head spins. I'm always thinking about "gee, this would be nice to have", or "this doesn't work the way I think it should", or "I have such and such challenge and nothing to meet it". The sucking in is real - the "black hole"... you never escape.
I made a set of cone wrenches a couple months ago - just because - I was doing some wheel work and my regular wrenches wouldn't fit so I thought I'd just make some. Used sheet metal for the wrench claws lined with 70k psi tensile filler metal (7014 electrodes) for the faces, ground to fit. They work great.
Next fab project appears to be a trailer for the bike. I am contemplating trying my hand at welding aluminum. I have electrodes, and can get more at my local welding supply. If I could TIG I would, but you can most certainly stick aluminum. It just doesn't work, or look, nearly as good as TIG. We'll see. I am more confident with steel, by a long shot, but it would be a neat project to try aluminum. The same advice I gave earlier is very much true here - weld test pieces and destructive test to prove the process before going hog wild on the assembly only to run in to problems.