Todays Project - What did you do today?

[stevec]

Some bottle jacks don't work upside down.

[DaveH]

(08-25-2013, 08:21 PM)Rickabilly Wrote: Well... today I finished... sort of... a job I started with my late father 9 years ago.

I think your Dad would be happy how it has turned out

DaveH

[Rickabilly]

Thanks Dave,

Incidentally the correct answer and the imaginary $64,000 goes to Steve, the bottle jack does not work upside down. In fact the most common design for bottle jacks has the oil reservoir being the "bottle" shaped jacket around the central core / hydraulic cylinder, the oil supply to the pump is usually a hole drilled in the base plate usually at the back of the reservoir(the opposite side to the release valve), as a result bottle jacks usually work only in the upright position or lying down in such a way as results in the pump handle being vertical.

In this case I need the press for a metal forming job for which the dies need to mount to the underside of a flat plate, so the base of the bottle jack will work fine.

The 6" ram has a 2" shaft that will be able to take adapters as suggested.

Incidentally there are ways to make a bottle jack work upside down, one method is to simply tap the oil feed port in the back of the base plate and screw in a tube that extends right up to the top of the reservoir, when inverted the top becomes the bottom, while this does work it is unreliable as the pump can easily lose it's "prime".
A second more reliable method is to add a second reservoir to the system that is located above the base plate and holds enough oil to feed the pump throughout the lift cycle.

We used to use both methods on various pressing and pulling jigs we used at the steelworks when I was an Apprentice.

Regards
Rick

[stevec]

Thanks Rick, please deposit my imaginary 64 Grand into my imaginery completed projects account. Maybe it'll spur me on to projects like this.

Shop press.

   

I'm waiting for some suitable channel iron to come my way to continue.

I'm curious to try the air hydraulic pump.
I have plenty of air (mine is hot the shop's is compressed).


Patience will be met with progress reports. I hope to complete this project soon, at least before the $64,000.m gets here.

[Rickabilly]

Hello Steve,
The Air/Hydraulic pumps are really good compared to the tennis elbow you get from long pump handles and having to go through 500 strokes just to get to the start position, the problem is however that you do lose feel as the air is either on or off, I have used air pressure regulators to limit the pressure in the past and they do work but it's not the same as feeling the direct feedback through the handle, another option is to tee into the hose and fit a hand pump for when you need the feel (or feel the need?).

The air powered bottle jacks have the hand pump integral with the base so are a good compromise. I have a very expensive "Enerpac" Pneumatic/Hydraulic pump that I picked up cheaply NOS, it suffers from the "lack of feel" problem and is also the pump for the 6" ram, so, no feel and 125 tons of force is a bit of a worry, an old employee suggested using a truck air brake treadle valve which is a progressive pressure control valve so might be a bit like having some feel back, right now I'm not sure.

Another option is to cannibalize a pneumatic/hydraulic bottle jack and convert it into a porta power pump (really quite simple) so I will have both the Air and Hand power options available, but it will cost me money when I've already got the Enerpac unit, I suppose I could fit a quick connect hose fitting into the Enerpac- Ram circuit and connect my hand pump when required.

Sorry, i think I've just been brainstorming while typing here, anyhow That last one is my answer.

Best Regards
Rick

[stevec]

Rick, regarding "feel" the only times I have experienced "feel" when using hydraulic presses is when things went wrong and parts or pieces went flying.

[oldgoaly]

It is hard to get a feel for a press, but this little arbor has a gauge which helps! plus it is just the right size for most of what I've do.

   

   

traded for it a a small rivet press and it cost about 100$ to get the hydraulics rebuilt. They still are being made here in the USA!

[Rickabilly]

When I say "feel" I should probably note that I used to do a LOT of shaft straightening, when you are going for a straightness of 0.003" over 24" you need to be able to gauge what you are doing very sensitively, with a manual press handle, you can just touch the shaft or twist it out of all sensibility, Pneumatic pumps are either all or nothing.

This press was intended to be able to do everything from drawing of sheet metal to straightening shafts, even straightening fabrications, I suppose I could just use one of my fly presses for straightening work, but I'd like the press to fulfill all of the original design intentions.

One of those design intentions was always to fit a gauge, once again, very handy on any press, but if you've never had one, I guess you'd never miss it.

Rick

[f350ca]

Chinese Junk
Check the fastener to the left.



Pretty cool it has no helix, they rolled rings instead of a thread

[TomG]

The guy who reverse engineered it probably got ahead of himself and didn't notice the helix.
I wonder if they actually made tooling to produce it like that?