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Welding Platen - ie Acorn Tables

AlxJ64

AlxJ64

Rust is Paint
Joined
Feb 3, 2021
Member Number
3436
Messages
730
Loc
Richmond / Cville - VA
I decided that since I had some more shop space that I needed to fill it up way too fast, and with something stupid heavy too, because isn't that what we all do? I know these old things, and this one in particular, have been around since the dawn of time in the fabrication world, but I decided to start a thread on one anyways. I'm building a stand for this beast of burden and will put some leveling feet under the corners and also I went ahead and put fork skids under it. How often do I plan on moving it? Not often... How often will I find myself having to move it, probably more often than I planned, thats for sure. I'm daydreaming of building my own set of casters too out of some random bearings and material I have floating around. That may never happen.

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Obviously it is upside down in the second photo.
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Nice. Been drooling over those for a while now. They don't come up for sale around here very often and when they do they are $$$ What did you have to give for that?
 
billybob_81067 said:
Nice. Been drooling over those for a while now. They don't come up for sale around here very often and when they do they are $$$ What did you have to give for that?
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Yea, Jhama78 sent me pics of his after he caught me pricing out just 1" steel plate that I was going to tap holes in. I went to visit my brother in Columbus and whenever I'm on the road, before I leave I hit up local FB Marketplace and Craigslist, and behold, this thing AND a pallet of Uni-punch frames and box of various tooling for them. I paid $1,100 for this platen when the math breaks down. So, still a chunk of money but the cheapest ones I see are over twice that for this same size.
 
I paid 900 hundred for mine with a stand on wheels. I would like to make it taller with leveling legs. has anyone had any luck finding used accessories. Tables are easy to find but the parts not so much.

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cj3a said:
I paid 900 hundred for mine with a stand on wheels. I would like to make it taller with leveling legs. has anyone had any luck finding used accessories. Tables are easy to find but the parts not so much.
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Yours looks like a 13 Grid so its a 4x4x4"? Explains why the engine crane can lift it too, as mine was lifted by a machine with loader scales and it was just under 3k lbs.

As for accessories, the Blacksmith artist guys pay big bucks for the clamps at auctions, estate sales, etc. I am planning on bending up some of my own gooseneck clamps and making some strong hand clamps similar to like what jamscal referenced in his post.

I have a ton of old heavy vintage tools in my shop, so as much as there are nicer newer tables, this fits my "Hipster Fabricator" style and decor, WW2 Dodge and all. I'll end up building some form of chassis table anyways, when the time comes. I figured for the price, considering what I've been seeing them at, this wasn't a bad deal. The Uni-Punch stuff I bought as part of the deal really kinda made it all worth it anyways.
 
AlxJ64 said:
Yours looks like a 13 Grid so its a 4x4x4"? Explains why the engine crane can lift it too, as mine was lifted by a machine with loader scales and it was just under 3k lbs.

As for accessories, the Blacksmith artist guys pay big bucks for the clamps at auctions, estate sales, etc. I am planning on bending up some of my own gooseneck clamps and making some strong hand clamps similar to like what jamscal referenced in his post.

I have a ton of old heavy vintage tools in my shop, so as much as there are nicer newer tables, this fits my "Hipster Fabricator" style and decor, WW2 Dodge and all. I'll end up building some form of chassis table anyways, when the time comes. I figured for the price, considering what I've been seeing them at, this wasn't a bad deal. The Uni-Punch stuff I bought as part of the deal really kinda made it all worth it anyways.
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What is the plan for the unipunch stuff? What did you get?
 
https://www.weldsale.com/product-category/weldsale-platens-stands/

^^^ this will give you guys an idea of price on the new ones. Acorn and WeldSale are the two traditional brands of these.

There are also accessories, clamps and angles at that site.

_____

I was going to be bidding on a bunch of these at auction soon but went to see them yesterday.

A. They were all made in China or India. Yes they were Weldsale and Acorn Brand

B. They are currently going for crazy high prices (IMO)

C. They were used for production welding ...so the welders arced their wire off constantly to the point where one of the square holes on the corners was full up with wire and ground down....nasty.
 
Dethmachinefab said:
What is the plan for the unipunch stuff? What did you get?
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I need to clean it up but I have 29 frames in tota; a bunch of small 1-1/2A frames, a few 2" frames, and a few other larger sizes, with about a 1,000 lbs of highspeed and cobalt punch tooling. Some is wasted and blown out, but some is new in wax. I have a tool grinder that I am going to get up and running so I can grind fine pilot points on a lot of it and then list most of it for sale but keep a few sets for myself. The sizes vary with a lot of multiples in what appear to be "powder clearance" sizes.
I'll post it up on here when I start getting into selling it and will cut a deal here compared to the eBay prices I am seeing it go for (I'll be selling it there too).
I have some 8A 2-1/2 frames that I use already for stuff. Maybe I'll start a post in here about it. I use it in a 50 ton press and it works pretty good.
 
AlxJ64 said:
I need to clean it up but I have 29 frames in tota; a bunch of small 1-1/2A frames, a few 2" frames, and a few other larger sizes, with about a 1,000 lbs of highspeed and cobalt punch tooling. Some is wasted and blown out, but some is new in wax. I have a tool grinder that I am going to get up and running so I can grind fine pilot points on a lot of it and then list most of it for sale but keep a few sets for myself. The sizes vary with a lot of multiples in what appear to be "powder clearance" sizes.
I'll post it up on here when I start getting into selling it and will cut a deal here compared to the eBay prices I am seeing it go for (I'll be selling it there too).
I have some 8A 2-1/2 frames that I use already for stuff. Maybe I'll start a post in here about it. I use it in a 50 ton press and it works pretty good.
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Cool. I've got some 2 1/2 frames and corner notcher I use on a press brake. I'd be interested when your ready to list. I never have enough unitized tooling. I was looking for some to set up for punching caster bolt patterns last week.
 
AlxJ64 said:
I need to clean it up but I have 29 frames in tota; a bunch of small 1-1/2A frames, a few 2" frames, and a few other larger sizes, with about a 1,000 lbs of highspeed and cobalt punch tooling. Some is wasted and blown out, but some is new in wax. I have a tool grinder that I am going to get up and running so I can grind fine pilot points on a lot of it and then list most of it for sale but keep a few sets for myself. The sizes vary with a lot of multiples in what appear to be "powder clearance" sizes.
I'll post it up on here when I start getting into selling it and will cut a deal here compared to the eBay prices I am seeing it go for (I'll be selling it there too).
I have some 8A 2-1/2 frames that I use already for stuff. Maybe I'll start a post in here about it. I use it in a 50 ton press and it works pretty good.
Click to expand...

I'm kicking myself for not picking up several pallets of punch frames along with a bunch of press brake dies and random stuff from a woman who was cleaning out her dead husband's old shop last year. Pretty sure it went in to the scrap dumpster. My truck was in the shop getting a heart transplant and I had no way to move or store the stuff at the time. :mad3:
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jamscal said:
https://www.weldsale.com/product-category/weldsale-platens-stands/

^^^ this will give you guys an idea of price on the new ones. Acorn and WeldSale are the two traditional brands of these.

There are also accessories, clamps and angles at that site.

_____

I was going to be bidding on a bunch of these at auction soon but went to see them yesterday.

A. They were all made in China or India. Yes they were Weldsale and Acorn Brand

B. They are currently going for crazy high prices (IMO)

C. They were used for production welding ...so the welders arced their wire off constantly to the point where one of the square holes on the corners was full up with wire and ground down....nasty.
Click to expand...

So what you are saying is if you can find a REALLY old one, you are doing pretty good. Some more research on mine and it is still an Acorn brand, but it is '30s era and is from their Canadian casting facility across the lake. Theres an artist / blacksmith on IG that has one, along with a few of his other local friends and that's the history they supposedly know on them.

Anyways, I know that putting the fork skids will cut me short of dropping a long neck old school style clamp down in there but I have some work arounds planned. Do I plan on moving this thing that often, No... don't want to. Will I end up moving it more than I want to? Yes, always, thats how things end up. So the fork skids will make it a little less sketchy because my T-190, despite how stout it is for the size, still does not like carrying this around.

Also picked up some hardware to make some leveling feet for it. Eventually I want to make some Vintage style looking casters out of some extra bearings and DOM I have floating around but all my machines still need to be wired from moving. One thing at a time, but they are all out of order.

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Got mine set into the stand, and leveled up.
Started bending up some gooseneck clamps out of some 1-1/2" solid bar. So far so good. I think I am going to drill through some and add some Threaded toggles and use more of those feet things to make my own adjustable clamps. The goose tends to only want to point load along the round edge of the bar, and the various banged up edges of the square holes make the goose settle in at different slopes each time. They are pretty damn cool though.

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bgaidan said:
I'm kicking myself for not picking up several pallets of punch frames along with a bunch of press brake dies and random stuff from a woman who was cleaning out her dead husband's old shop last year. Pretty sure it went in to the scrap dumpster. My truck was in the shop getting a heart transplant and I had no way to move or store the stuff at the time. :mad3:
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after watching indians on dirt floors punching bolt holes in angle iron with a punch held in their toes backed up by a nut set on a rock I've been thinking about making something like those punch frames, but with looser crappier clearances, to be driven with a 4lb hammer. Maybe a hammer-driven rebar shear as well.
 
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