Thread: Excavator

Originally Posted by Crunchie

This build is looking good from my armchair view.
Is there any reason you are cutting out the tracks from one piece and not fabricating the thing from 3 pieces?

I have cut the links out of one piece as it is not that difficult being quite large, there are still three more pieces for each link to be added to them. There is no reason why they can't be fabricated from three pieces

No progress more of a couple of steps back. I was not happy with the links that I had done so have scrapped them and have now started again on the tracks. As soon as I get some progress I will post again.

No I have not forgotten this build but yet again side tracked a bit like the Rob Roy which I will get back to once this is finished.

I have however managed to cut a small piece of steel which is 8 1/2" X 8 1/2" X 2 3/8" I did resort to a petrol disc cutter for the first cut and that was in half one half was then cut using a small metal bandsaw a Scheppach MBS1100 which I was very pleased with it's performance. Would not have even considered trying this with a hand hacksaw as I would still be cutting it well into the new year

One quarter of this was to make a replacement back-plate for my ER32 collet holder as the previous one was just made from Ali this was achieved with a mix of cutting off corners before turning it into a round round.
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Then yesterday I collected a metal draw unit for the right price this will serve me as a soldering and welding stand as all of my other benches are wood and naked flames do not mix.The trolley it is sitting on is just temporary I will be buying some more casters which will lower this unit so I can move it about easily. I was told it came from an engineering firm and looks like they made it mainly from 1/8" thick plate so very heavy

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I have however managed to cut the blanks for the excavator links so not all is lost

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Tough going cutting steel like that I bet the timber blanks were easier.

Originally Posted by Peter White

Tough going cutting steel like that I bet the timber blanks were easier.

They certainly were I cut those with a hand mitre saw. I did ruin a pair of trousers when I cut the metal in half to start with especially where the sparks from the cutter hit them and melted around the bottom of the leg on one side, forgot they were a nylon type material

Been a hectic week end so very little done on the build. What with the sad passing of the Queen she will be sadly missed. We also had a weekend at a woodfest everything wood came away with a little spending money after selling some of my woodturning. I now need to get some more pieces turned but luckily I have some time to do that in.

Anyway with that and other things going on the last week I have managed to remake the links and today spent the day sanding each one so they interlink correctly by rounding off the faces where they join. The picture shows 3/4 of them done but I have actually managed to complete all of them after taking the photo the pins are just there temporarily for the moment just need to cut 58 tread pieces and 58 guide pieces before gluing in the pins.

Things should soon speed up as the tracks always seem to drag on especially as I had to make the links twice.



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They look to be very accurate links should work well.

Originally Posted by Peter White

They look to be very accurate links should work well.

Thank you Peter yes they all bend freely so should have no problems when I put them on

After shopping this morning well I have to eat a day of sticking the tread bars onto the links.

It was easier to make them over long and then sand them back once the glue had dried that way I only had to worry about getting the square to the link

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After all the sanding done


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Next up was to cut and sand all the guide pieces ready to glue tomorrow had to stop as back started to play up blinkin arthritis in the spine sometimes play hell


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They are certainly fiddly things to make by the look's of it, you are going great.

First job this morning was to glue all of the guide blocks to the underside of the links


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A quick photo of both sides of the links now with the pins glued in which was this afternoons job as the blocks were dry enough to hand the links. Tomorrow I will remove the excess off of the pins before giving them a coat of sealer. Still need to add the final joining pin when I fit them to the machine


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Great job.

Cleaned up the track pins and had to sand a few of the guide pieces.

This was followed by using my piece of wood with holes in it to get the correct distance for the front and rear wheels as a jig to line up the frames of each undercarriage.


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Once that was dry enough to handle I did a mock up of one of the undercarriage while the second one was in the jig. The track pin that is still sticking out is the last one to be put in once all of this is completed

Starting to see how big this is going to be. Still plenty to do but most of that is the small pieces which will start to bring it all together but that will be after the undercarriage is complete



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Looking fantastic.