An anniversary project for the Mrs.

[nateo]

I'm not entirely convinced I have any right to post in this subforum with the quality of work you guys do, but I'm pretty proud of how this project turned out and I wanted to show it off a little.

Please go easy on the embarrassing welds, it's the first time in 15 years that I've done any welding and I wasn't any good at it back then either!

Backstory: This year was our 11th anniversary and the traditional gift is steel. As usual I left the planning portion way too late and decided with a week and a half left to go that it wasn't worth ordering from Amazon so I'd better make something myself. Obviously my calculations were deeply flawed but I did manage to get it done in time.

Anyway, enter a rusty old grounding plate (which I had literally pulled out of the ground this summer), a welder that I hadn't had a chance to use yet, and the idea that our garden could use a sundial!

I did a bit of looking around online and realized that the geometry is actually pretty basic, especially if you have access to CAD. I drew up the sundial for my latitude and went to work cutting the plate. Not having access to a torch or plasma I ended up burning through a handful of cutting discs for the angle grinder. Yeah, it kinda looks like a gerbil gnawed the disc out but it's close enough to round for me!

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Most of the flakiest rust was on one side and banged off the plate with the strategic application of ball pein hammer. That left me with this.

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Next up was welder op #1, plugging the holes. It went well enough, first globbed over one side and then used that as backer to weld it shut from the other side.

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I had to abuse my poor bench grinder to clean up the gerbil tooth marks and get closer to an actual circle. Then I went to the stationary sander to square up the edge (bench grinder left a bit of an off 90° hollow).

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This is about half way through the edge cleanup. You can still see the grinder marks which are slowly being erased by the sander. You can also see I cut a bit to close to the line with the angle grinder here, we'll call that character.

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Since this post is already waaaay too long with too many pictures I'll leave it here, with a dry fit of the gnomon (that's what the pointy bit of a sundial is apparently called). No pictures of shaping the gnomon, pretty much the same process of cutoff disc, bench grinder, belt sander.

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[nateo]

On to part 2!

After hitting the parts with a wire wheel to get as much rust off as possible, I needed a way to mark out the hour lines. I printed a full sized layout from my CAD drawing and stuck it to the disc with magnets, then marked the ends of the hour lines with a hacksaw. I used a piece of angle iron for a fence and clamped a bit of MDF across the guard of my angle grinder to give me something to register against it. I left the cut-off disc poking past the MDF by about 1/16" and ran the whole works along the fence to get a nice straight line. It took a bit of finesse to get the fence offset the correct amount get the line where I wanted it, but it worked pretty well in the end. I had to keep adjusting the MDF between cuts to keep the depth of cut relatively constant as the cut-off disc wore down.

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Which left me with this.

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Then it was time for some more embarrassing welds to stick the gnomon to the disc.

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I hit the welds with the grinder to take down the worst of the bird poop and then rubbed the works down with BLO. I was surprised how much the BLO deepened the colour and really made it pop.

Here's the final result as unwrapped on our anniversary. Now I just need to come up with a way to mount it when the snow melts in spring!

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[XJSuperman]

When I saw this in the other thread, I was curious as to how you cut the lines. Now I have my answer. Clever thinking sir. Well done.

 

[royce]

Handsome design
Great texture and finish
What a a cool project
Well done

Royce

 

[joel63]

Nice job. Beer

Should make the Mrs. very happy.

 

[larry4406]

Very well done. Hope the Mrs agrees.

Time Loves a Hero - Little Feet Tune

 

[pb57]

very nice job with the tools you have. your wife is lucky to have you

 

[PelicanPines]

You my friend... have officially won the December 2020 Nifty award. Be proud... few get one...

That is freaking great.

 

[Bodj Built]

Man that looks cool! Agreed, the color and texture looks awesome.

 

[Hack Fabrication]

Now I just need to come up with a way to mount it when the snow melts in spring!

Really nice patina there! You'd pay extra for that look!

Weld a bolt (or two) under it, bolt it to somethin'. I'm think a well used piece of 4" pipe might be the ticket. Weld a crossbar to the top, with a couple of holes to bolt through (recess the crossbar so it all sits flush). Either bury the pipe or fab up some sort of base for it. Maybe another piece of plate steel welded to the bottom of the pipe, add a couple triangle braces (for looks). Let it all rust away!

 

[Hammer1963]

Very nice! I know another Mrs. that would love to have one. Great inspiration for many of us.

 

[matt_i]

Great job there!

I was thinking 4x4 steel tube into a concrete foundation or else pour a concrete column. You could weld on a short piece of rebar to the underside and then epoxy that into a drilled hole in the top of the column. Concrete will probably get rust stained over time but that may be desirable

 

[PugetDude]

Awesome little project- really like the patina on the rusty steel; it adds a lot of character to the piece. It wouldn't have looked nearly as cool with a new piece of plate, IMO
Well done. ( I may steal this idea.)

 

[nateo]

Wow, thanks for all the kind words everyone.

I have to say though, when I saw that Royce had replied to my thread about a metalworking and "welding" project my stomach gave a little flip!

 

[Ign]

Opinions don't matter, but if they did...I think it's cool!

 

[Mmaxed]

While your path to the destination may have been rougher than some, the end result is not. Well done.

 

[mv213]

Man, that came out great! I’m so tempted to make one for my wife now!

 

[Bears Fan]

Cool project

 

[BD1]

Awesome job !! Using angle grinder for the lines is really slick. I have a Milwaukee metal cutting circular saw that would have made that easier.
As for the welding, since it's just setting there, plug welding would have looked cleaner.
Drill holes in bottom of plate and weld the piece to the plate through the holes.

 

[nateo]

Awesome job !! Using angle grinder for the lines is really slick. I have a Milwaukee metal cutting circular saw that would have made that easier.
As for the welding, since it's just setting there, plug welding would have looked cleaner.
Drill holes in bottom of plate and weld the piece to the plate through the holes.

I did consider plugs or even screws from the backside. In the end I decided to weld from the top because I didn't want to leave any seams where water might work it's way in and cause problems faster than I'd like. Plus I need the practice.

I'm hoping that a wipe down with BLO annually during the warmer months will keep this thing solid for a long time.

 

[BD1]

Ah got it. Here's one of my favorite tools for my welded artwork and basic welding. A Dynabrade Electric 1/2"x18" belt sander. The tool is amazing ! I bought the 1/4" beveled contact arm and use with 1/4" belts. I was skeptical about these narrow belts but it proved me wrong. This is great for tight corners on my artwork. It does a fantastic job. I've found the Norton Belts to be the best.

 

[Jayman17]

Like others have mentioned, the texture and patina are fantastic on your project.
Well done! I might have to " borrow" your method for straight lines with an angle grinder.

Jay

 

[captain14]

Good project. And a lot better tab buying something from Amazon at the last minute.

After you get it mounted outside, post a photo of the new location.