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Old 01-28-2022, 05:20 AM
JimH JimH is offline
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Default Some cheek plates - My first tin bashing effort.

I'm not really a beginner but all of my proper experience involves using a machine tools to make a shape for me. "Sheet" metal work is almost always over 1/4" thick plate making big heavy things involving big grinders and stick welders. My other tin bashing problem is that my artistic development ground to a halt when I was about seven years old. I cannot draw and I certainly cannot sculpt. I have no idea how to make something go just there so it looks like that.

Which is a bit of a shame because we needed to make some bits for the current project. This is the second Super Sentinel we have done and when we did the first one back in the early 90s we bottled it and found a lad who worked at the local bus builder who made these bits in his spare time.

What we are talking about is this - A Super Sentinel. Not this actual one but it will do to give you an idea of what I was trying to do. What was needed was the pair of curved panels which fill in the gap between the front apron and the big hole where the windscreens are supposed to be although they were optional and not fitted to this one.



I fully appreciate that there are more than a few people here who are able to say, "Pshaw! Something as simple as that? Stand aside laddie and I'll do it after I've finished my tea." but I refer you to my opening paragraph where I admitted that even trying to think about what goes where makes my head hurt.

So as a first step we got a drawing from the Sentinel archive. Those looking at the picture above and this drawing may already smell a rat but I didn't until later. However, even to my untutored eye, the drawing did not look right. To be honest, it doesn't even look finished.



So I marked out the "development" as it was shown on the drawing and cut it from a piece of scrap aluminium sheet just to see how this thing was made. It was at that point I realised that what they were claiming was the development of the panel is nothing of the sort. It is a development of that particular section of the apron plate. At least I felt a bit better because the draughie who drew it didn't seem to understand much about it either.

So I did what I normally do in these moments and stood staring at the problem hoping for inspiration to strike. Which after a mug of something hot it did. With a pair of snips I put a couple of cuts in the scrap aluminium in my hand, bent it over my knee, trimmed the edges and jammed it into the hole I needed to fill.



Yes, I know it isn't very convincing but it did help me get it straight in my head how to approach the problem. What I saw were two sort of truncated cones with a section in the middle filling them in. I would make this panel in three pieces. So I set about making it in steel.

So after much clueless bashing what I ended up with was this.



I know that it isn't pretty but I was feeling pretty good at this point because maybe this would work. It fitted in the hole...



And even fitted reasonably well. It didn't look very pretty on the other side because I'd needed to stretch the flange because the apron has a 12' radius in it you need to match to.



Not looking brilliant but hey! this was my first try. It was at that point I stepped back off the platform and looked up at the fitted panel...

You know that drawing that was a bit wrong? Well the one thing I thought I would trust was the section which showed the radius of the mid point as 9". Well it turned out that was completely wrong too. Oh dear.

At that point I threw a bit of a hissy fit and went of to do something else for a year or so. A couple of weeks after I gave up in disgust we heard from someone who had a beaten up original panel that I could at least look at.



However, by this point I'd started on something else so this job can wait until it becomes urgent.

Take two shortly.
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Old 01-28-2022, 05:39 AM
JimH JimH is offline
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Right. Jump forward a year or so (other useful stuff was going on, just not this job) and the task has now become urgent so I need to stop sulking and have another go. For the second attempt I chose the same approach of making it in three pieces. This is the outer section which is relatively easy because the apron plate is flat at this point. I made the "cone" by breaking it using the folder which I now know was not the brightest idea in the world.



And the inner section which needs to be shaped to the curve of the front of the apron plate. While we are talking about lessons learned I've since stopped using that shrinking slapper.





Which just left the bit in the middle to make which I did using a sandbag which was bought to do this job.



Once I was happy that the offside one was heading in the right direction I did the nearside. I tend to find that if I am making two of something I like to do them at about the same time otherwise I burn a load of energy doing the first one, get sick of the job then do something else for a while. When I return to the job I can't remember how I did it.



At this point the job stopped because I needed to make the water tank. Try to suppress your excitement in the wait for take three.
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Old 01-28-2022, 05:48 AM
Jaroslav Jaroslav is offline
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Jim, you're close to the shape you wanted. I don't know what shaping equipment you have. But if you want to know the shape you need to make, learn how to make paper templates.
You can make the design shape from paper and masking tape. Then you make a paper stencil on it, which after you spread scisors out so that it is flat. The cutouts will show you where you need to shape.
In some of my threads there are examples of templates how I use them and why.
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Old 01-28-2022, 06:10 AM
JimH JimH is offline
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Sentinel Apron Plates 3: Now It's Really Urgent.

I hadn't thrown a tizzy but it was important that the water tank was made - this involved hand forming tight radiuses in 14 swg plate which was not fun in the least. What this meant was that when I picked this job up again it was to finish it rather than start over. Since we saw it last the apron plate was removed to allow a load of work to be completed on the boiler and associated pipework. We also took the opportunity to make another apron plate because we were not happy with our previous attempt. You will also note that the 1" D section beading has been bent and fitted.

So this is where I'd got to.



This gave me some hope that it was going to work this time. It was about now that I found a few videos of Wray Schelin talking about flexible patterns so I thought I'd make one of them. The beat up panel got tidied up a bit but the edges were very frilly and the corners were non existent so it couldn't be located as accurately as they were supposed to be but for the cost of some sticky tape it might come in handy.



So I tacked one up in situ then took it to the bench to weld it up. I can lay down a decent gas weld but my hands are not the steadiest in the world so it sometimes doesn't work out as it should.



This shows the other problem I was having. It's all very well laying down a sweet butt weld with two bits of flat plate but I was struggling to keep the gaps tight. I'd cut the parts to size, realise the curve still wasn't right then move things which would open the butts up in some places. What the more seasoned shaper will see is that I still haven't got that curve right.



So I cut out the middle section yet again and made another one but this time much flatter.



Bingo! This was actually the first time I actually felt good about this job. This is the nearside one welded in and offered up. The light in the big shed is not brilliant and I was struggling to see what was reflection of the shiny steel and what was just my rubbish shaping so I tried painting it matt black to see if that helped.





Which I was reasonably pleased with so I took them out and started trying to make them look a bit less hopeless. These are done in 16 swg which I was finding took some force to get into shape which left a lot of damage to dress out. I'll be honest and say that by now my enthusiasm for these panels was beginning to wane. However, this is how they ended up.



And just to show the inside face wasn't a complete disgrace (by my current standards)





And once it was in with some primer on it looks like a reasonable approximation of what it is meant to look like. These panels were stamped out originally so I was reasonably pleased to get this close.





The next one will be better. Promise.
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Old 01-28-2022, 06:35 AM
JimH JimH is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Jaroslav View Post
Jim, you're close to the shape you wanted. I don't know what shaping equipment you have. But if you want to know the shape you need to make, learn how to make paper templates.
You can make the design shape from paper and masking tape. Then you make a paper stencil on it, which after you spread scisors out so that it is flat. The cutouts will show you where you need to shape.
In some of my threads there are examples of templates how I use them and why.
I've been told in the past about paper templates and I have watch various videos on Youtube about paper templates, however, each time I have tried I've ended up screwing it all up because I've neither made them properly nor really understood what they were telling me.

It has since dawned on me that if I'm going to get better at this I need to shut up and learn how to use them. I'll go and read your threads.

Cheers.
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Old 01-28-2022, 07:24 AM
dwmh dwmh is offline
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The panel came out great Jim. Well done and thanks for sharing.
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Old 01-28-2022, 07:24 AM
Jaroslav Jaroslav is offline
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You have to take off the template and straighten it. You cut it with scissors so that it is a little straight. This paper will show you the neckline of the sheet metal. And places where the sheet needs to be arched or the fibers shortened.
The only thing you did wrong wasn't to cut the paper.

Don't worry - everyone does that. Everyone watches how the template is made, but they don't know why. I was explaining the principle to a very experienced colleague. It always makes a shape from the eye. Once he hits, the second time he doesn't hit.
Trial and error. Why.??


You have a good result. That's important.
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Old 01-29-2022, 11:27 PM
Charlie Myres Charlie Myres is offline
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Nice work Jim.

Have a look at this move by Peter T. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cX-lO0mwqQo&t=16s

Peter is amongst the best metal-shapers in the World, if not the best.

Better still, watch all of his movies and for basic instruction you can't go wrong to buy his DVD training series,

Cheers Charlie
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Old 01-31-2022, 04:20 AM
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Gojeep Gojeep is offline
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Well done on persisting with it and getting there in the end.
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