Old Goat's corner, DW truck conversion project

phoenix2013 · April 26

Things have moved significantly forward yesterday. They have moved from this (a congenial meeting)

to visiting the machine shop and checking on a pile of steel tubing dedicated to a bed project.

Also, checking on a Jeep to go on a bed

Check out the $12,000 paint job on the Jeep

I also got to visit Camping World where the rig which will be pulled by this truck is getting all kinds of upgrades like solar and these lithium batteries under the bed (more on that later).

I was also told that the jeep on the bed will have a companion in the fifth's garage.

Since the truck needs to proudly showcase this triple offspring, it will be heading to the shop for a coat of black Imron.

Interesting, isn't it? So interesting in fact that Old Goat got himself a project, I believe it's a failed retirement number six. He's going away to New Hampshire at the end of May so anything that requires hands or eyes on must be completed in four weeks. First milestone, start welding the bed in two weeks, shop has a window. Therefore, concept, project plan, bed design, material list and cut list needs to happen in the next two weeks, beyond then it's execution. Should be a good time race. I gave this project it's own thread so you can follow the race. I know, I know, if you guys are typical race fans you want to see what happens. The Old Goat has the pole position at the moment, you want to see how long he can maintain it, or how far back he slips and I know few of you are just waiting for the crash and burn moment.

Edited April 26 by phoenix2013

mike5511 · April 27

Looking forward to seeing the finished product!

phoenix2013 · May 10

Project is proceeding, lists are generated, almost $3 grands of deck plate has been ordered, basic design and dimensioning has been created.

It's gonna be a long sucker on account of the 153" you see. the grandpa WW2 Willis is being replaced with this grandson at 153" long.

Now the real fun begins, how to make this pretty, there will be surprises and innovations.

phoenix2013 · May 11

Visited the shop and the truck today. They prepped the bed tubing per my drawings, will start welding Monday. Wow that's inspiring.

Puts an onus on me to design the back end over the weekend. Also, both of these (left and right) are coming off.

It would a shame just to junk them, design ideas how to "re-purpose" at least one are banging around my head. "Fold out", "slide out", hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm??????????????????????

rickeieio · May 12

Henry, you gave me an idea. I have 2, 4' by 12" by 3", un-used "tunnels" under my smart wheel tracks where a folding, slide -out ladder could live, and I have a bunch of that same walk tread laying about. Hmmmmm indeed.

phoenix2013 · May 14

It's official, the DW truck made it to the Old Goat's driveway and joined the bevy of other HDTs to grace the said concrete.

The latest development, the ET had to be relocated further back (again) to make the Jeep carrying possible.

The Old Goat was able to mark the locations of the (new) mounting holes FROM MEMORY. We pulled Matylda (the mag drill) from long term storage, it took us 5 minutes to figure how to turn it on. The on-off switch is hidden under the overhang next to the magnet.

Next we did some "serious" engineering. It's a test to all you guys with engineering diplomas or better still commensurate and superior life experience. What the hell is the Old Goat up to now?

rickeieio · May 14

Duh, Mocking up for tool boxes. Checking overhang clearance too. Better now than after it drags.

phoenix2013 · May 15

Playing with the back corners, want to put 45 degrees for about 8 inches from the outside down tube to the lateral tube going towards the ET. Tube slopes down 7.06 degrees (hence the 82.94).

Solid Works says "no problem". Create another plane at 7.06 degrees, offset the end of the tube by 8 inches, draw 45 degrees on the side that you need (left and right), project the cut downward and here you go, beautiful compound cuts.

I'm gonna show it to the welder tomorrow for the "shits and giggles", but I fully expect him to tell me three things:

"How do you propose we get it done on that band saw"? "I think you got too much time on your hand"! And then. "Lets clamp the two pieces together, torch them off, if it don't fit just right put a bigger weld on it"!

mike5511 · May 15

Laser cutter

phoenix2013 · May 15

They make parts for Siemens and nuclear power generation plants and have old EDM machines still in use. Not sure I want to enlarge a circle of folks having a belly laugh at my expense. I went through this exercise just to revive my dormant Solid Works skills. A torch and a grinder aught to get it done. In the meantime few more ideas "germinated".

GeorgiaHybrid · May 15

Use solid works to create a wrap around template to the long point of the tube. Tape it on, mark it or hit it with a little spray paint and you can follow the bevel easily on a tube.

phoenix2013 · May 16

Good to see this,

turning into this.

Welder says by Thursday he wants to do the frame fit on the truck, more pictures will follow.

phoenix2013 · May 19

First fit on the truck, the frame has some "challenges".

Work in progress ideas for the rear end.

mike5511 · May 20

23 hours ago, phoenix2013 said:

First fit on the truck, the frame has some "challenges".

Work in progress ideas for the rear end.

Such as?

phoenix2013 · May 20

Frames having "challenges" is a pretty common reality. On one of the trucks I converted the left and right rails were off by almost an inch, we guessed probably from the truck being in an accident. We got into the bed build quite a ways before we "discovered it" and had to resize the tool boxes on one side. Language was bad for a few days. The other problem, which affected this truck (under discussion), is how the frame reacts to modifications. The most common being removing the lateral brace in the back (with the bobtail lights), to mount and slide the hitch in. It depends on how the frame is held together via the suspension elements. Volvos are totally immune to removal of that brace and the rails stay true and square. Other brands not so. I remember taking this brace out on the Freightliner, holy shit. The ET with it's massive mounting plate re-squares and re-braces that area of the truck, but on that Freightliner we had to use two forklifts pushing against each other to bring the rails back together and re-bolt them square with an ET.

On this truck the customer did a long frame extensions before I got "invited" to be the project manager. He removed the rear brace to do it and was telling me what they went through to re-bolt it. Frame rails are typically 32 1/2 on the inside, 33 on the outside, the word typically is important. I measured this truck (IN ONE SPOT) it was 33 1/4 outside to outside and started the design and drawings. I mentioned to the welder that I used to do all the initial tacking of the frames ON THE TRUCKS. He said he can set it up precisely on his bench, you can see it in the pictures. They also build and weld big assemblies for the nuclear power industry, very precise work. I saw the tack and asked him, "so you didn't tack it on the frame", "no". "Let's grab couple of squares and tape measures and check the frame". It turned out that the area where I got the 33 1/4 frame width (in the most most stable suspension area, between two axles) was the narrowest. Most of the frame is 33 1/2 and there is a "pregnancy bulge" of 33 7/8 in one spot. Good thing, he only had few tacks to break, we went with 33 1/2 and ignored the pregnancy bulge. Also the areas where we planned to put the anchoring plates were at 33 1/2.

The tacked frame went onto a truck, which produced "discovery" number two. It's a single hump dromedary. It has a hump over the axles and then drops down a 1/4 inch at the back of the cab and almost 1/2 an inch at the hitch end. So the $300 of the 50 feet of UHMW 1/8 x 2 tape is not going to do squat, except in the hump area. We have a plan how to fix that.

Edited May 20 by phoenix2013

rickeieio · May 20

And reading posts like yours helped push me to building our bed in sections. No worries about oak slats or UHMW strips, etc. Let it flex as the frame was intended.

That said. if I were to build another bed, I'd do many things differently. I'm very thankful that people like you posted their own builds so I didn't have to invent the wheel.

phoenix2013 · May 20

I built one sectional bed, much easier and like you said "let it flex".

The front section had to be pretty stiff though, on account that it had the motorcycle garage.

The motorcycle lift basically picked up a platform on which the motorcycle was secured. The fold-down railing was also the first. The idea being that while watching Sturgis bike races with semi-naked passengers on the back of bikes, the beer drinkers who managed to make it to the roof (13 feet from the ground) needed to be secured up there.

I got a whole file on how that drom was engineered and built starting with this

If there is an interest I can start another thread on it. I don't want to commingle it with this project.

Edited May 20 by phoenix2013

phoenix2013 · May 25

Working on couple of ideas. Essentially, what to do to help the bed with Jeep climbing over its back and to give the bumper more "resistance" when someone tries to test its prowess.

There are more parts in there, I have them suppressed in order to work on the stuff.

Edited May 25 by phoenix2013

Wrknrvr · May 26

So Henry I have been looking at your work. Trying to figure out the problem you say you are having. I think it may be clearance problem getting over your hitch.

I may be wrong. If I am you can correct me.

When I built my bed things went fairly good. Until I tried to load our Jeep on the ramps where it rides. The spare tire wanted to hit the 3” high cross clamp for my sliding hitch. So now I cannot get the Jeep loaded as I planed.... Now what. I backed the Jeep up 2’ and put some short pieces of 2 x4 down. So that got the Jeep up where it sits. Pain in the rear, but it worked.

I finally decided to put 16” tires on the Jeep.

That gave me enough clearance to not need those shims under the rear tires for clearance.

Just trying to help? If that is your concern.

phoenix2013 · May 26

13 hours ago, Wrknrvr said:

So Henry I have been looking at your work. Trying to figure out the problem you say you are having. I think it may be clearance problem getting over your hitch.

I may be wrong. If I am you can correct me.

When I built my bed things went fairly good. Until I tried to load our Jeep on the ramps where it rides. The spare tire wanted to hit the 3” high cross clamp for my sliding hitch. So now I cannot get the Jeep loaded as I planed.... Now what. I backed the Jeep up 2’ and put some short pieces of 2 x4 down. So that got the Jeep up where it sits. Pain in the rear, but it worked.

I finally decided to put 16” tires on the Jeep.

That gave me enough clearance to not need those shims under the rear tires for clearance.

Just trying to help? If that is your concern.

Absolutely! When I was at the padawan stage of bed designs I had to "implement" similar spacer under the ramps "solution" when I didn't pay sufficient attention to the car ground clearance and a breakover angle. Having achieved the light saber status I did pay attention.

See the 47.20" number, that's the height with truck suspension aired up and ET aired up to factory settings. The 10.00" number is the clearance needed over the ET in the breakover area and the deck to be at 172.94 degrees. His Jeep does have big tires and the clearance under the front and rear differentials is 11.5". The ramps will be extra long (more than 8 feet)

When I started this design I had the old WW2 Willis on it.

The ground clearance on that one was only 8 inches, but Daniel said, "I got big ass tires" and we measured 11.5. It's also much longer, 153 inches, which required FRAME EXTENTION NUMBER 2. Another 22 inches.

Edited May 26 by phoenix2013

mike5511 · May 26

This is all way out of my wheel house, but I'd love to be the "tool fetcher" on this job and watch it all come together. The education would be priceless!

Sculptor · Monday at 11:05 AM

On 5/26/2023 at 4:54 PM, mike5511 said:

This is all way out of my wheel house, but I'd love to be the "tool fetcher" on this job and watch it all come together. The education would be priceless!

X2! Would sure like to get my eyes on this project over time. Henry I haven’t touched my cad software in a year, BUT, if you have something small consider me for help.

phoenix2013 · Tuesday at 12:33 PM

On 5/29/2023 at 7:05 AM, Sculptor said:

X2! Would sure like to get my eyes on this project over time. Henry I haven’t touched my cad software in a year, BUT, if you have something small consider me for help.

Are you using SolidWorks, if yes what edition. Mine's 2019

Sculptor · Tuesday at 03:22 PM

2 hours ago, phoenix2013 said:

Are you using SolidWorks, if yes what edition. Mine's 2019

Not using Solidworks. I was very familiar with translation from my b-spline software into NX (UG) but that was a few years ago. I would need to experiment a bit to get a STEP or IGES translation into Solidworks.