Wow. Been a while since I've been on the forum. Thought I'd provide an update on this mini-me type of build. I ended up foregoing the 4 bolts and just welding the brackets and their plates to the main body of the skid plate. You can kinda see the stitch welds in this final installation test picture:...

Well fellas ... bunk. I snatched time today to play around with the skid plate for Ol' Blue just a bit. I cut the new brackets (the "feet"), grinded them and refined their shape such that they would clear the front crossmember's feet by a good margin: skid plate 13.jpg I then performed mul...

Crazy busy week. No time for much of anything project-wise. Tonight I managed to apply the cookie cutter to the plate templates for the skid plate brackets. Then grind, drill and bend them into rough shape: skid plate 11.jpg skid plate 12.jpg They came out ok-ish. I've decided to go with the bolts-n...

With the holiday today we had family stuff going on all weekend. I had time enough to begin the fabrication of the brackets 'n that was it. The driver's side: skid plate 7.jpg And pax: skid plate 8.jpg Neither of which would remain in the 90-degree position long enough for me to snap a picture dontc...

Well, in the case of a Ford Panther (Crown Victoria, Grand Marquis, Towncar, Marauder) the steering rack stud is merely a solid metal rod that has threads on both ends. One end is threaded into the front crossmember. The rack slides onto the stud, covering the non-threaded portion of the stud. Then ...

Welcome back! good to see you're keeping busy :) Thank you sir! I hope that all is well with you in South TEXAS. Still gotta do a TEXAS meetup someday... Since my last post I've continued working on the build for the wife-eee. However that work is automotive in nature so I haven't mentioned it here...

As I have mentioned in another thread a short while ago, I have been doing automotive related projects for the past few months. Thus no real fabrication to speak of, at least in regard to an actual fab project of one sort or another. I've missed the forum and the folk here (hey Oscar!) but this curr...

Hi Jeff- Well I'll contribute my experience with the welding table oddessey. Although I continue to have hope-on-hope that I'll be able to have a larger workshop someday, if-and-until that day arrives I was forced to consider an outdoor option. I happened across a local fella who had purchased sever...

I'm in WRT Oscar's WT&T weld-o-rama event, provided that COVID receeds sufficiently. We're still sheltering in place for the most part. Not too much time as of late for fabrication projects on my end, unfortunately. 'Been doing too much automotive stuff, but that's how I spend most of the free t...

Alright thank you for the feedback. I wouldn't have thought that you should paint the inside, but wanted to verify. I've read about the "burn it out" business, as well as the seasoning deal. Never done those things though. The first is straightforward; the second doesn't seem too bad eithe...

Alright, I ground the edges of both chambers down to smooth, bare metal such that I can grab the ends with my bare hands and not run the risk of a cut. IMG_25112020_160847_(920_x_690_pixel).jpg IMG_25112020_160901_(920_x_690_pixel).jpg As a first time BBQ smoker builder, I gotta ask: what should be ...

I forgot to mention that I ran the numbers on the chimney stack length today while we were waiting on the tire thing. The stack that came free with the tubing we purchased is actually 6" ID (wow!) and they gave me almost-5 feet of it. The calculator states that I'll need about 33" for the ...

:lol: Well I don't know about that. I'm sure that the more experienced in this forum, folk such as yourself Oscar, can out-project me any day of the week. As I've mentioned I still consider myself a fabrication newbie, even though I've been at it for a couple of years plus now. Speaking of the curre...

I decided that I wanted to use my new welding table to complete this job, so I loaded the burn and main chambers onto the table via the gantry: Raw tubing material 12.jpg Raw tubing material 13.jpg The plan tomorrow is to elevate the main chamber to the mating point that will result in an approximat...

The plate that will become the end caps for the smoker was ready for pickup today. They also had a 12'-and-then-some length of schedule 40 pipe sitting around that they were looking to unload. So they made me a deal on it if I would take the whole (shortened) stick and I agreed. The son and I went t...

Alright so ... in preparation for the eventuality of sourcing the plate. I thought I'd do the homework in the interim. What homework? The stuff that you do to calculate how your BBQ smoker should be configured. So I went to that forum titled smokingmeatforums.com, read a few threads regarding the su...

Well it was a slow week. The steel supplier didn't return my email inquiry for the 1/4" plate for a couple of days. So I sent it to another supplier who replied approximately that slow also. I finally heard back from both of them on Thursday. Too late in the week for a pickup, as they usually n...

Do you have a picture of your smoker Oscar? Did you build it? Curious to know its dimensions, etc.

Thanks!

I would need to employ a couple of car dollies in order to prevent the two feet on the lower side from banging into and then dragging along the asphalt as the table was flipped. That plan worked out well. Those dollies are designed to hold a considerable amount of weight. They were reinforced for ad...

I managed to begin the build today. Well sorta. I decided that I wanted to use the new welding table to do at least some of the work. Therefore I decided to put it into position closer to the outbuilding. At 1200+ pounds, that would be no small feat. But again, I built a gantry. :D It needed to be m...

Feldon's calculator has some issues, particularly with reverse flow smokers. The calculators at Smoking Meat Forums I linked to above will nearly always work well, especially for reverse flow smokers. And you'll find a lot of knowledgeable pit builders who can answer questions or double check your ...

Thank you for the input Jay, I appreciate it. Yeah, kinda funny, but this is much the same idea that I had in mind! The one you've shown is quite the looker, no doubt! I'll have to take a closer peek at this at some point. That said, I don't want to study it too much, as I'd prefer to create my own ...

The main chamber: Then the burn chamber and the smoke stack:

Alright, so here is last night's haul viewed in the light of day. First, the table: My table 2.jpg The already-existing holders can be seen there on the side. 'Saves me a step dontchaknow. The other side doesn't have much in that regard. However this table overall had better joins between the c-chan...

I think you will have a hell of a time getting a chamber to temp or lowering the temp when it gets too hot with that wall thickness. Good thought. This did cross my mind. However, given the price of this tubing versus what the steel supplier wanted for the equivalent in 1/4" (which was the ori...