It’s getting ever harder to get up!

Today I set my welding work on the ground and set to, welding. I only paused when my welder cut out due to it reaching the cooldown threshold when it cuts off to cool down. It has a limited duty cycle but It’s an economy model which means it has more limitations than the Fancy Nancy models out there. For my purposes though it’s slow, it does the job and I have no complaints. Well, maybe just one. After I retrieved it from where it was stored, I tried my Lincoln Electric 1/16th rods and just could not strike and maintain an arc. I switched to my Harbor Freight 3/32 rods and hey presto. I had an arc. Go figure!

It’s getting ever harder to get up from my knees after working on the ground. Today I had to find something to lean on in order to lift myself up. I think it’s called getting old and to be quite honest I don’t like it one little bit! It makes me wish I was one of the Shape-Shifters from Sci-Fi. I could transform myself into a busty, blue-eyed blonde and get any number of men to drool and do the work for me, for nothing. Sadly, that’s not possible so I have to get on with it myself or pay somebody money to do it for me.

After some procrastination during which I declared the angle steel I was going to use to be way too heavy for my intended purpose, I got on with the task. Cutting the steel angle was a breeze. I used my trusty Harbor Freight angle grinder and its 4.5” cutting disks. Heaven knows how many packs of cutting disks I’ve used! I’d decided overnight to cut and weld to hold just one battery. I don’t have much generating capacity and though I can now limit power usage by cutting the extraction fans on and off at set times, I can probably still use more power than I generate if I’m not careful.

I’d been puzzling over how to keep the work square before spotting in the yard my old main breaker housing that I’d painstakingly welded together. That was pretty flat on the back which proved idea. I simply placed everything on that while I tack welded it. Once it was cool from tack welding I tried the battery in place and as designed there’s about an inch or so on the sides spare space. That means that if the next Harbor Freight 35AH UL1 battery is oversized, it’ll fit. It’ll fit even if the current battery is undersized.

So, I spent a couple of hours today doing nothing but cutting steel and welding. The fun thing will be when I have to weld the brackets to the box section ribs. I’ll have to go over them quickly and lightly in order not to create too much heat. The rubber coating on the underside of the bus certainly burns well. It self-extinguishes but it’s certainly flammable. More than that, I don’t know if the hillbillies managed to drill through the box sections to insert their self-drilling screws and I’m also aware the floor above is rubber coated. Keeping heat down is therefore a priority. Fortunately I don’t have to weld directly to the floor. As heat rises, it’s worth keeping it to a minimum. This is why in this respect, arc welding is better even though it splatters badly.

In my box of Harbor Freight 3/32 rods I found a 1/16th rod that I’d partially used and tried that. Oh Boy did that rod work well on the 70A setting. That was very fast welding. Next time I’m in Harbor Freight I’ll have to see if I can pick up more of their 1/16th rods. Today has been almost exclusively 3/32 as with the amount of paint on my steel angle, I figured I’d be best using a penetrating 6011 rod rather than my usual 7014. Given the thickness of the steel I’ve been double-welding too. That’s welding from both sides.

I think my mount is nice and flat. I’ll probably go over some of my welds with an angle grinder to smooth them out but they don’t need to look professional so I’ll just do some of them. Anyway, after a couple of hours working in 56 degrees Fahrenheit (which was cool but not unpleasant) I’d had enough. I need to crawl under the bus next in order to measure properly for the struts that will fit under the bus and from which my battery holder will hang. I’ll have to build the top struts (same ladder design), clamp them in place and mark where I need to drill my mounting holes and where I need to mount my 4 hanging brackets. When that’s done, I’ll bolt my 4 hanging brackets onto my cross members, clamp the cross members into place using some G clamps. Then I’ll weld the brackets into place. Finally I’ll release the clamps to see where the cross members move to and then reclamp and drill my bolt holes in the C section members. When that’s done, I’ll take my top mount down and weld vertical support struts to hold my battery base into place. The final thing to be done (aside from sand blasting and painting) will be to put attachments that can be used to clamp the battery into place. I’m going to say that my mount when it’s complete will probably weigh more than the battery it’s designed to hold! On the other hand, I’m using steel that I already have and that I don’t have to buy.

I stopped work for today after finishing the base welding for several reasons. It wasn’t that I was getting particularly cold. It was more that I’d finished the task I’d planned to do and usually I find when I stretch onto the next task is when things begin to go awry. It was also threatening to rain and rain does not go well with arc welding or freshly welded steel. I’ve not put an “after” photo of my battery base because it looks very similar to the “before” photo. I could have put a photo of my 4 pieces of cut steel angle but didn’t really see the point. Though I like to do blow by blow photos at times, this wasn’t one of those times. That’s probably more because my phone is on charge and not in my pocket.

I had intended to head to North Carolina to take photos of the autumn colors this weekend but looking at the state park webcams the leaves were all still green. They say that there’s less chance of a red autum but more of a yellow autum due to the unseasonal weather we’ve had. Perhaps next weekend will be the weekend I’ll head up there. It surely can’t be any later than the weekend after that! So, failing a trip to North Carolina and having a dry day, I might be underneath the bus, putting the final attachments on my underbus conduit then extending the wires that didn’t stretch far enough while also measuring for the top part of my battery holder. If I have time then I might also cut my steel for the top and mark it ready for drilling and mounting.