OT plastic kit car

[Eneto-55]

That caustic soda tank sounds like what we used in the plating shop to remove grease.  Heated by steam pipes, to a bit below boiling temp, I suppose.  Anyways there was always steam rising off of it.  It had a powered rocking arm, and then we'd hang the parts on that, so it was constantly agitating it.  Ran a lot of stuff through there after hours.  Then finally I bought a bunch of the chemicals from them, and set up my own system at home.  Galvanized cattle tank, bent some steel conduit to circulate hot water through, hot water heater, 5 gallon bucket, sump pump, and a 15 minute interval timer.  I couldn't get it as hot as at work, but it did the job to strip all of the several layers of paint off of my doors, wheels, what have you.  Then had a heavy wall plastic tank with phosphoric acid in it.  I don't suppose a person would be allowed to buy that stuff now, although maybe even back then the shop was not supposed to sell it to me - I didn't ask....

[Ulu]

I bought a gallon of phosphoric acid solution at the local swimming pool supply store.

 

Our hot tank had an electric heating element in the bottom of it, and it also had bubble pipes for agitation with an air compressor.

 

When I worked at the Kawneer company, we had giant tanks to etch 20 foot long aluminum extrusions.

They would collect the aluminum hydroxide sludge from the bottoms & haul it off in railroad cars. That’s how much we were making. Most of it went to the cosmetics companies.

 

(Check the ingredients on common types of under arm deodorant.)

 

[Ulu]

I finally got the front bumper brackets to match, and I capped the open tubes on the top of the rears. Here’s the whole pile, and you can see the edges are not filed yet.

 

From the factory, nothing was filed smoothly, and everything was as it came from the shear and notcher. I sanded all the edges & filed them.

 

After another hour or two of cleaning, it was all nice. It all got acid etched and washed with a blowout and a rubdown.

Finally, I shot it all with self etching black paint.

Edited October 29, 2023 by Ulu

[Plymouthy Adams]

you staying busy and making good progress...that is always a plus.  It is the attention to little details that pay off in looks in the big picture.  

 

After a few days off with a sore knee, am back at it this weekend and making good gains also...I am miserable when I can't be goofing off in the yard or shop.  

[SteveR]

On 10/26/2023 at 10:55 PM, Eneto-55 said:

That caustic soda tank

I nearly lost my leg due to a caustic soda burn. It took 6 months for skin to grow back on my leg. That stuff is wicked.

[Eneto-55]

21 hours ago, SteveR said:

I nearly lost my leg due to a caustic soda burn. It took 6 months for skin to grow back on my leg. That stuff is wicked.

I never got a caustic soda burn, but did get some minor acid burns over the years I worked there.  There was one guy who could stick his bare hands right down into the cyanide (cadmium plating tank) to readjust parts on the rack w/o any burns.  Then to neutralize it, he would stick his hands down into the muriatic acid tank.

 

Another guy got some sort of acid burn, either muriatic or nitric, and just put a bandage over it, and didn't tell the boss.  Acid forms a sort of oil layer over the burn, and keeps on eating flesh underneath.  You cannot wash it off with water and normal soap.  By the time the boss found out the acid had eaten its way out from under the bandage, and he was kept off the line until it could heal.  You can guess that the boss was not thrilled. So if I thought I had an acid burn, I would scrub it hard with a brush or that really gritty soap.  That didn't feel to0 good, either, but it stopped the acid burn progress.  I suppose it's just like a lot of other things that require a healthy respect.

Edited October 31, 2023 by Eneto-55
spelling error

[Ulu]

If I’m working with acid I keep a bucket of diluted washing soda. That will neutralize it quickly. But I wear rubber gloves, so mostly it’s not about getting it on me. It’s about getting it on the concrete, which will disappear if you put acid on it.

[SteveR]

What I was told at the Queen Elizabeth Burns Hospital here in England is Acid will dilute itself but Caustic Soda does not and will continue to burn. I spent several hours flushing this caustic soda from my leg. On a ph scale, my leg registered 10. 7 is neutral and normal skin ph is 6-6.5

After 1/2 hour of flushing, it was 9-9.5. There was no pain as it killed my nerve endings. 5 years later I still have no feeling there and a lovely scar. When I was discharged from the hospital after 6 months of waiting for my skin to grow back 2 doctors, one a plastic surgeon and the other a burns doctor said, " You are very lucky. We have seen amputations with a burn like that".

 

The lesson here is to be careful of caustic Soda.

 

As for me, I was given no PPE when I had this accident and I took out a claim. With my award, I bought our 1937 Plymouth. So there was a bright side to this.

[Ulu]

That is a damn painful way to get into the hobby bro!

[SteveR]

2 hours ago, Ulu said:

That is a damn painful way to get into the hobby bro!

Nope I had no pain at all. The caustic soda quickly burnt the nerves. The only complications I have is a scar and I have to keep it out of direct sunlight as I am susceptible to skin cancer in that area.

[Ulu]

I have been building a full frame jig to hold the frame while I cut it in half.

 

This jig is all built from donated or salvaged materials. Some bed rails, office furniture, rails from a broken wood lathe, and bits of a power lift chair, an electricians spool rack, old gate posts and door posts and rails from a security door.

 

Every clamp I own was brought into service for this plus I went to Harbor freight and bought 8 more.

 

I needed 10.

 

Anyhow, I got over half of the jig weld it up last night, and recovered about 30 clamps in the process.

 

Sorry about the tiny pictures. I don’t have any more server space here, and I had to delete some things, even to show these.

[Ulu]

I finished welding up the jig tonight, and I got the chassis welded right down to the jig. Now it’s finally time to cut this car in half.

 

I have to do a little more cleanup on the parts that I welded before I can get them to fit up perfectly, but it’s getting pretty close.

[Ulu]

I did a little more straightening up on the crossframe today, and I got the main frame cut in half with the sawzall.

 

[Ulu]

[Plymouthy Adams]

that is an elaborate jig but I also know 100% what it takes sometimes to achieve an end goal....keep at it, you are whittling it down a bit a time.  So many sit back and talk about what it takes and never get started....you way into the game.

[Ulu]

I didn’t really want it to be so elaborate, but I built it out of junk that I already had.

 

Anyhow, my wife is still out of action until her arm heals up from surgery, so I spend a lot of time doing household things instead of working on my car.

[oldodge41]

9 hours ago, Ulu said:

I didn’t really want it to be so elaborate, but I built it out of junk that I already had.

 

Anyhow, my wife is still out of action until her arm heals up from surgery, so I spend a lot of time doing household things instead of working on my car.

I can relate. I have become very domestic since my wife broke her femur. I cook, clean and nurse around the clock. Not complaining, she would do it all for me too.

[Plymouthy Adams]

till death do we part, don't push your luck...!!!

[Plymouthy Adams]

You did good and when finished, knock it down and have the metal for the next project.  I have a metal recycling place near me and they first sell as many parts off a car they take in before crushing it.  I make out well not only in car parts but recycled metal like angle iron and such for my projects for pennies on the dollar as compared to other place, often on the metal the picking is limited...but have made off with some excellent deals.  

[Ulu]

All of the steel I used on the jig was free. I just had to take my truck and go collect it.

 

And I will probably scrap most of it out in the end, because I’m not planning to do anymore frame building of cars. I will keep enough for building bikes, and a future hybrid trike project.

 

Before I get back to the Plymouth, I have an easy restoration to do on the International Scout. Nice solid, and not rusty, unlike the floor of the P 15.

 

Eventually I am gonna cut the P15 up and make a full custom out of it. It is just not Original enough to bother with a restoration. 1947 body, ‘48 door, ‘49 trans, ‘50 diff, ‘53 engine….It’s just not all ‘47.  Plus I trashed the stock seats.

 

Maybe I will live long enough for all this, but I am saving the hard part for last.

[Ulu]

As it turns out, the inner rails of my jig interfered with the crossmember assembly. I redesigned it a bit and removed them.

 

I also redesigned the crossmember itself. It needed to provide a body mount for the upper cowl, plus support the steering column, provide tunnel access, and mount the master cylinder and reservoir.

 

I cut the big holes with a flycutter.

 

That plate came from some folding RV steps.

 

These access hole covers were cut, bent and flanged from a desk drawer divider.

Four little bits of conduit made the clamps. I welded all the corners after stripping paint.

The bent 1” tubing came from an electric powered chair. The straight 1.25” tube came from the Brian Wind Trainer.

Red flanged plates came from a Harbor Freight welding cart. I made the tunnel closure plates to also clamp the fuel and brake lines. 

My welding table was once the shelf for a massive 1930s typewriter. 

Everything gets TIG welded.

 

The electro-seam-welded tubing had some weak seam welding, and popped open here. I ended up re-welding all the seams. It was either that or scrap the whole weldment.

 

You can see it clearly where it is clamped, and here I have started the seam welding.

 

Here it is on the chassis. The seams aren’t all done yet. I need to square up the tunnel a bit more and tack this on, so I can start fitting the rails.

 

 

 

[Ulu]

I finally got the new frame rails cut, notched, bent, and clamped up in approximate position.

 

Tomorrow I can clean it up a bit more, square it up, and tack it together.

 

 

 

[Plymouthy Adams]

good to see you still prodding along on this project.....your determination to build this right will pay big dividends in the long run.  Congrats on your making yet another mile marker.

[Ulu]

I am plodding along alright. I decided that with 3 vehicles running I had no reason to rush.

 

BUT, this season has been the wettest in 50 years since I moved here. Lots of rain days, and it just started again as I sit here typing...

 

This global warming/cooling/changing Is making us less a desert and more tropical. Things are rusting faster ;-(

 

Anyhow, the metal is cut and there’s no going back now.

[Ulu]

The rain finally stopped, and wind blew everything dry. I had been hiding in the garage for days, building a small rocket stove from some old junk.

 

Last night I fired it off and tried to burn off whatever paint I hadn’t wirebrushed off already.

 

This started life as two boat seat pedestals.

 

 

 

 

I was easily able to boil water over the chimney with a little grate. The sooty teapot got its soot elsewhere. This stove is smokeless. Once you get it going, it has a constant chimney burn.