Went to a Car show that was put on by a local club. Super nice people and one of the better shows I have ever attended. I ended up winning best of show and the rule is that if you win that award, the next year you have to make the trophy for the next years show. No real rules but they want it to be made by the winner and incorporate the vehicle theme. Here is the build of what I did.
Album by Kevin Foust. 1 - 138 of 138 Total. 17728 Visits.
1 Started out with an idea in my head so I gathered up some materials. An old 60's taillight and some manufacturer emblems from some junked cars. I get more as I find them. I did buy some stainless brake line too. If you know me, I always have to have stainless on stuff!
2 The Caddy emblem will make a nice top.
3 Some .375 stainless strap will be used for tubing holders. A friend layout out the holes and outline on a CNC mill and then I drilled the holes to .250, the diameter of the tubing.
4 I then cut them out using a normal hole saw. Lots of oil, slow speed and constantly cleaning it and blowing air is the key to doing it. Try to force it and let the heat build up and you're done, you've work hardened it and scrapped the hole saw.
5 Where the tubing goes into the small disc I wanted to create the illusion of it bolting in. The bolt circle is too close so I had to trim the nuts down. Did the math and figured the center line and ground the angles on 2 sides. This will make sense later. I will drill the threads out to .250 so the tubing will just slide through.
6 Chucked the small disc in the lathe and stair step drilled it to .750, the center tube size.
7 Got a hard face DA sander and hit both sides with 150 grit. Then I used a soft pad with 500 grit. This will get it close for polishing. Next is to grind the edge smooth and put on a couple radii.
8 I made up a bushing to fit inside the .750 hole and drilled a .250 hole into that. This will allow me to spin grind the outer edge and put the radii on there too.
9 I'll be spinning this in a Harig fixture on the surface grinder. here you can see the set up. Bushing is thinner than the disc and all that is needed are step washers to hold the disc when the bolt is tightened.
10 The washers used.
11 Now I just knock it all central so as little stock as possible is taken off.
12 Once tightened up I spin it will infeeding into a dressed wheel. Makes a great finish that requires a lot less sanding for polish.
13 I then dressed a .075 radius on both sides of the same wheel. this way I don't have to take the part off the mount.
14 This part is done and I'll polish it later when all the other parts are done and it works.
15 Next up is to make the pieces to connect the 2 round discs. It will basically hang it in the air and make a nice waterfall effect.... at least that is the hope! I'm using stainless tubing/brake line for this. Used a wire for a rough guess of the length and cut them all using a tubing cutter.
16 The inner diameter(ID) gets a lip when cutting with the tubing cutter and it has enough bite that I can thread it. I use a tap in a drill and make quick work of that.
17 You can see here it should be enough to hold it together.
18 I wanted a bigger radius bend and wanted something that would repeat. I ended using a V belt pulley I had laying around and rigged it up in the compact bender. Put a bushing on the end and threaded a screw in. This will make the bends repeat as it holds it in the same position, not allowing it to move.
19 I take them all a little past 180 degrees and the pulley keeps it from having any kinks. The tape you see is my high tech marker of when to stop so they will all have the same shape.
20 Got them all bent and ready for a trial fit to see if it all works.
21 Success! Kind of like a jigsaw puzzle and you have to think ahead on how to attach everything AND still be able to assemble it.
22 With just the 2 discs it will not hold it all in place. The tubing would move around . I need a mount for the taillight to trap it on the inside so I'll try to kill 2 birds with one stone here. I took the disc and traced the holes. This gives me a pattern to make any size I want by just connecting the dots. Now I have a pattern to make the mount.
23 Drilled a center hole and drilled it along with the 2 holes to mount the taillight. I then center punched the slip through holes for the tubing with normal bolts holding the pattern. Here I am center drilling all the holes.
24 Holes are done but they will have to be angles later. I'll do that free hand after it is cut out.
25 Used a hole saw for the center hole. LOTS of oil and slow speed.
26 To cut the outer diameter I get a large round that is a .500 INCH smaller than I want. I use this as a guide to cut it out with the plasma cutter.
27 Once cut I use a belt sander to true it up and smooth.
28 I took it real close to the holes.
29 Ready to polish it out now. I use a die grinder with a soft pad. Standard sticky back sandpaper is used and cutter with scissors.
30 I'll start with 80 grit and work my way down.
31 Drilling will leave a burr so you have to try to do it even or you'll get waves in the finish.
32 I use a belt on an expansion wheel for the edge. Worked my way down to 600 grit here.
33 Ready for hand sanding on the edge.
34 From 80 grit I went to 150 grit. Then 600 grit. From there it is hand sanding to 2000 grit.
35 Then off to the buffer till it was mirror finish.
36 Skip some steps here but this will give you the idea on how I did the attachment screws for the lettering. I ground a slot in a round the same thickness as the lettering plate. I then clamped it tight in a vise and drill/tapped it. I did this BEFORE the radius was spun on the round. This is an after the fact visual.
37 Close up of how it works. Makes for a clean attachment.
38 I spun the radius in the Harig fixture. I dressed the radius size I wanted into a grinding wheel.
39 With that done I'll work out the top Caddy emblem attachment. I want it to work like it does on a car. Have a spring in there that will let it move around but hold it upright. This will take some doing to make it all hidden. I start by drill some round stock. I hold it in a collet to prevent marring. Use a straight edge to touch off the drill as the depth is critical to make it work right.
40 I zero out and go in the thickness of the straight edge and rezero. Now I know where I'm at.
41 Action drilling pic!
42 Here you can see why I needed to know where I was. I needed to co bore it without breaking through. There will be a spring inside there and the set screw will be threaded through the springs eye to hold it in place. Lots of stuff going on here.
43 Here's a visual of how it will work.
44 Now I have to cut the spring and feed it through the emblems eye. Hole is a taper so it will self center.
45 It worked so I'll now start polishing some stuff out. Sanded down the letters piece and it is ready to start buffing. Large flats are the hardest things to get right as it is easy to wave it out.
46 Rounds are the easiest to do. Here all the tubes are done.
47 The flat piece is done now and I'll have a friend mill the lettering in for me. I can't do this and a CNC does a great job on it.
48 Where the tubes come to the disc I'm going to slip nuts there so it looks more automotive. I'll polish these too and hand sanding on this.
49 I start withe 320 grit on a flat surface. Then go to 600 grit on all 6 flats.
50 I then thread them onto a threaded rod holder I made for doing nuts and such.
51 The back side of the holder is threaded to hold bolts of the same size. Gives you something nice to hold them.
52 I use a Bear Tex wheel to round the corners of the flats and spin a champfer on the top side.
53 You have to hold it so it wants to tighten it on the holder. Go the other way and you can watch it fly across the floor!
54 I does and nice job on this and quick too.
55 Now to the buffer.
56 Mirror polished.
57 With the long taper you can hold washers as well. You can tell this holder has been used just a little.
58 Using the Bear Tex wheel on these too. Excellent for rounding edges.
59 The screws for holding the tubing take less than 1 minute start to finish.
60 Bear Tex wheel again.
61 To polish
62 All done but I have a few to do.
63 All those done and I do the large washer next.
64 Nice and reflective.
65 Finished pieces are adding up!
66 I ground a taper on the short round that hold the Caddy emblem. Just made it look better.
67 I drilled all the nuts threads out so they will slip through the tubing. I also had to grind 2 angle flats on the ones going on the smaller ring. Just wasn't enough space between the holes.
68 Getting itchy to put it all together.
69 Took some time to assemble but it turned out like I had hoped.
70 Kind of a spiral waterfall look.
71 Here's the larger disc with the normal nuts.
72 center disc with the taillight lens installed.
73 Had an idea for another little detail. Ask around and a friend, Gary Turner, had a disc brake rotor from a Banshee that he wasn't going to use. I'll use this on the base.
74 It had some wear so off to the grinder. I want to put some type of pattern in it to reflect the light.
75 Dressed out a wheel the same width as the drilled holes and just eyeballed it. Once that was done I ground what was left in the triangular shaped areas a couple of thousands of an inch higher.
76 Gives it the look I was wanting.
77 With the rest of the polished stuff this should give a nice effect.
78 Now I need a collar that will neck down to the center tube. Got a larger piece of round stock to do this.
79 Center drilled it first and worked my way up with drill bits in the lathe.
80 Getting closer now.
81 Finished it to size by cutting it out once I had it big enough to get a cutting tool in there.
82 ID is done so I'm bringing the outside down a little smaller.
83 Turned a shoulder to basically a press fit into the disc brake rotor. I'll weld that on when done. Turned a angle taper here for looks.
84 Getting closer.
85 I want to have a light in the center of the tube so I found this flashlight at the store that was close to the ID size of the center tube. Really bright for it's size.
86 200 lumens will work nice and do the job.
87 back to the contour piece. After finish grinding it I spun it it to cut it off.
88 Here's a close up of the shoulder.
89 Polished the bushing and put it in.
90 Top view of what you'll see.
91 I put a few small welds on it using the TIG welder.
92 The flashlight was just a shade too big so I sanded it down on the belt sander till it would slip into the center tube.
93 It has grooves allready in it so I'll just drill and tap the tube for a couple set screws and that will hold it in place.
94 Ended up having to buy a brake drum at a swap meet. I wanted one with some fins on the side. It has a raised center edge and some cast in letters so I'll get rid of that now.
95 Grinding the center lip down here.
96 This will let the disc rotor lay flush as I'll bolt it down.
97 Grinding it down passed the letters here. Ended up being about .080.
98 All even and smooth now.
99 Took a die grinder and relieved the edges where the bolts slide through.
100 Got 4 carriage bolts and polished them out.
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102 Disc looks like it is floating in the drum and gives it a nice touch.
103 Picked up some hat pins and marked an even pattern on the flat surface I had ground. I'll glue them on but drilled some holes for the pin to set in the drum for a lock if you will.
104 With the other emblems I had it just sets it off a little.
105 Laid the emblems all out how I wanted them. Once that was decided I tore it apart to powdercoat the brake drum.
106 Shot the powdercoat on and baked it on.
107 Turned out pretty nice and once it cools off it ready to assemble as it is fully cured.
108 Highlighted the cooling ribs with white paint and glued the smaller emblems on.
109 Now I'll assemble the whole thing.
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117 Tried to represent the major brands. Figured with the top being able to be spun, they can put their favorite brand forward.
118 Nuts give it a nice automotive look to me.
119 Top view shows how it makes it look like a swirling fountain.
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122 Top Caddy emblem springs over like it does on the car when installed.
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124 Trying to show the light here. It really throws a lot of stars and is brighter than it looks in the pics.
125 Hard to capture in a pic but the light really looks nice in low light.
