I'm gonna start my ch***is soon. I'll be making a lot of cuts, and doing a lot of math to make sure that I get some smooth contours without having dramatic angle changes or Z'ing. I'll try to remember to take pics.
Nice Jamal! Get cooking on that frame, and if you need a hand, let me know. I'll pack my grinder and sawzall up, and head over! Ben
At least somebody has vision. I'm splay cutting it in front of, and behind the cab. Leaving one easy wall in tact. Then I'm tensioning and re-welding, giving the rails and kick up a nice smooth bent contour. (I HATE it when frames have a single pie cut to angle.) Then I'm doing the same, but upside down, at the front to give it the horn. The same will go on the rear. The area below the cab will be 6", then it will taper as the rails go forward to a hair under 4" just behind the radiator, and then taper to a nice horn from there. Same with the rear. I would just bend and not splay cut, but nobody bends 2x6 tube around here... especially the hard way. I'm gonna make some custom motor mounts and stuff with the leftover tubing, and I may crossdrill and sleeve the horns and kick. I'm not sure yet. The center crossmember is going to be round tube, with a round tube transmission loop setup. The front and rear crossmembers will also be tubed. I just need to do the math, and figure out how much 1/8" kerf cut from the tube will be in degree of bend. I'm guesstimating 1/8" cut will be about 1 degree. But I could be off. It's a 1/8" cut over about 5.75". The angle should be the same as a 1" cut over 46", so every cut should give my upper tube wall .66* of bend. Now I just need to decide how much bend, and how far apart to put the cuts so that the radius of the bend is appealing. I'm already sick of math. ***And before I get the welding nazi's in here, yes, I do know how to weld. I'm a welder by trade. I work on heavy machinery for the railroad for a living. I am aware that splay cuts, if done improperly, are not optimal. I'm also aware that heat warps metal.
More than welcome to give a lending hand whenever. I'm looking at buying an Esab Multimaster off this guy, so we can TIG the ch***is.
heh, kinda ****s. I got accepted to the school. I got everything ready. And then I didn't get one crucial thing: A cosigner for my loans. Looks like I'm gonna have to build here and pay you guys a visit out there.
Bummer man, was looking for you out here! Good luck on the frame, I cut the Touring frame outta 2x5 just like you are, it is a ton of work but worth it! I actually made all my small cuts with a metal blade in an old Circular saw! Works well, makes a stinky mess though.
MPLS, you've got a good plan, esp. by starting w/ 2 x 6 tube. I used 2 x 4 for the A's frame, and simply laid the stock tube down to form a front crossmember, it gave some room for the shell and radiator. Use your buddy's sawzall and the front frame horns are a piece of cake, leave the frame's top portion intact and then heat it, to bend it downward and cap the horn. You won't tell it from an original horn that's been cleaned up.
i used a 2x4 with carboard on the outside made the cuts different width circular blade easy determine how made cuts and where... no math
You need to make friends with a math teacher, active or retired - retired might be better - I'll bet there is one around the area who would love to get involved and lend you a hand. He could even help you calculate weight transfer, etc....
Not trying to step on Garys toes.......... But for the piecuts, it is more about the look. You will know if the rail needs to have another cut here or there when you get into it. With the touring, I had the luxury of flipping the body upside down to rough-in the first rail. You can also do layout lines on the floor, a couple sheets of plywood, your jig if you have one etc........... Build one rail to suit you then copy it for the other side. The touring rails only had about 8-10 cuts per side, that include the releif cuts to curve the rails and the pie cut at the cowl to get the 32ish dip.
This frame is sounding very interesting.Tman you have any pics of the one you made during the build?I would like to see some of the one being spoke about when it starts.
Actually, mathematics, physics, and engineering are things I've always been into. The math and engineering dept. is covered here. Also, working in the welding/engineering field has taught me a few useful skills.... calculating optimum radius, determining proper CLR for bends, load points in a frame, stress points and levels, centers of gravity, corner balance, dispersion of weight under load (speed accelerating/decelerating at rates), etc. All stuff I've dealt with at work and learned to engineer into my plans.
Yuppers. I believe it was KIRK! that had a writeup on this awhile back. It's a great idea, and it's why I bought excess tube. I'll taper it to the front crossmember tubings size, and then effectively "wrap" the 2" walls around the tube... weld it up, grind it, and smooth it. Voila! As for the sawzall, I'm not a fan. They're not precise enough for me, and they are bulky. I prefer thin cut discs and my 4.5" angle grinder. I can mark out a line and make a nice straight cut 8' long with one of those, so that's what I'll use for the taper cuts. The vertical splay cuts will be done on a chop saw with a depth setting higher than the thickness of the material. Make one sides cut, turn the tube, and match cut, leaving the bottom 2" wall. That way the cuts are straight, even, and calculable. Like I said, I've got this all planned out, and I'll be SURE to take a LOT of pictures of the work, the plans, the sketches, my whiteboard, etc.
man... you must be reading my mind,,, i'm just getting ready to do something REAL similar for my 27 rpu project... maybe we can compare notes (read: i'm gonna wait til you do it and copy you.) what i'm planning on doing is having kinkos blow up a set of wescotts plans to life size and use that as a template. at 75 cents a square foot, it saves a whole mess of math.
Not a bad idea at all. Definitely something to work from. I'm not sure exactly how I'm gonna go about it. Then again, I wasn't sure how I was gonna cram a GSXR750 engine into a Kawasaki KZ, so I just went for it and got it done. haha I guess I'm kinda more for shooting from the hip when the time comes to start cuttin'.
There are pics on the board. Do an Advanced search under Tman as user and Touring.I dont think I shot detail pics of each cut.
I belive this has the makings of a tech article with plenty of photos required. I have a friend who built a nifty little 27T highboy roadster on a similar frame and have always wanted to do something similar with the 29 pieces I have out here.
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