Grinder Pedestal Becomes Obsession

Today I succumbed to perfectionism. I welded metal caps over the ends of the tubes in the foot of my new grinder pedestal, and I faired the new metal in so it would look original.

I made the pedestal over the weekend. I thought I was done with the metalworking last night, but I kept thinking about the raggedy ends on tubes. I couldn’t take it. I had to do something. This was AFTER I had already welded plates inside the ends of the tubes.

At first I planned to grind the ends of the tubes flush with the plates I had already welded inside them, but I saw that the tubes were too short to permit this. The casters attach with bolts, and the bolt holes are close to the ends of the tubes. If I had ground the tubes shorter, the washers under the bolt heads would have protruded past the tubes. That wouldn’t do.

I cut 4 pieces of 1″ x 1/8″ bar. I used tiny magnets to hold each one on the end of a tube. I welded them in place, and then I ground everything down with an angle grinder and an amazing Walter flap disk. These disks are wonderful. They eat metal like crazy, they leave a good finish, and you can trim them to get more life out of them.

This little project illustrates something I love about metal. It was the world’s first plastic. You can nail and screw wood together, but you can’t cast or mold wood, and you can’t put wood back once you cut it off. When you work metal, you can do just about anything. Cast, mold, bend, and weld. If you cut something too short, you can make it long again, as long as the type of metal permits it.

When you look at these tubes from outside, it looks like they began life as solid bars. You can’t tell the metal on the ends was added to them. It looks like it was always there.

If you opened them up, you would find two layers of welded-in plate, plus some nasty-looking weld beads. Doesn’t matter. No one is going to open them up.

Now I have peace. I don’t have to worry about bugs crawling in and out of my grinder stand. They have no way in. I should also note that the column is hermetically sealed with weld. If archaeologists ever want to find out how my workshop smelled in 2019, all they’ll have to do is open the column. It’s full of captive 2019 air.

I should have done this before welding the bottom of the pedestal together. It would have been a lot easier.

Tomorrow, I plan to throw a coat or two of primer on the steel. If that goes well, I can get started on paint.

I’m bummed out now because I’m out of welding projects. I think I need to get to work on an arbor press stand. My arbor press is on the workshop floor, in the way. That has to change.

Yesterday I was excited because I was able to see what I was welding. I’ve been taking vitamin A, and it appears that I can see weld puddles better now. Today was frustrating, because I had trouble seeing again. It was so humid in the shop, my glasses and helmet fogged up as soon as I put them on. Can you believe that? I finally get to where I can see what I’m doing, and the weather steps in to take away my joy.

Guess I’ll design an arbor press stand and get to work.