I started a new thread to start of the actual tours.

If you go to my web site, you will see that I "borrowed" the flag at half mast in memory of the people in my company that were lost in the attack. Then enter my page, go to "Shop Tour" and you will see a floor plan of my shop. Click on the room you are interested in. The grinder room is empty (No pictures) and will be completed later. The hot room has the forging stuff and the clean room has the stuff for assembling knives and working different materials.

When you see a picture with a tool in it, try pointing at the tool. If there is a link to more information your pointer will turn to a hand and you can click to see more. For example, when you enter the "HOT" room, you will see my press, anvil, small forge, and post vise in a picture. Point at any one of those items and click to go to that tool for a close up. All pictures can be clicked on for a larger view.

Let me know what you think and make suggestions on how to improve the tour.

All press pictures were taken by my 11 year old son Kevin.

Yes, I have safety glasses but they are damaged and I am impatient with a new toy.

Also, as FAT as I look, I already lost 45 pounds since finding out I am a diabetic. The fat will go away with time (I hope).

To spare everyone the reading of Terry Primos' guiding me through the repair of my site, I deleted the posts. Thanks Terry for your assistance.

Now, on to the Shop Tour.

Bob
Very nice shop nice lay out and very neat just like I like it
I like soda to the beer is no good for you.
thanks for showing us your part of the world

Mr Warner, thanks for sharing your site and shop tour. I also enjoyed the shop tips and looking at the knives. You have given me several new ideas for tools and shop layout. Thanks for taking the time and sharing.
KEN (WWJD)

Hey Ken,

Mr. Warner is my father, everyone here can just call me Bob.

Not a problem at all. Hopefully this weekend I will get the grinding room added in. Have been working on adding pages for the three coworkers we lost in the attack. That is done now so I can look towards completing the tour. I hope others will post their shop tours also, I am not done (is anyone ever done) so I am looking forward to seeing what else I can build.

I have been told that people can't find the press information because they don't think to look for a hyperlink in a real picture; Is anyone here not looking for the link in the picture of the hot room? Do I not explain it well enough above the picture? Do I need to change this to make it more easily detectable?

Hi Bob,
I think it is a pleasure to tour your shop. Lots of information with nice pictures. I had no problem finding the hyperlinks in the picture. Now I do have some questions with regards of the parts of your Hydraulic Press. But before I start I just wanted to tell you that I am situated in Germany and I do have to import those parts. I have got a catalouge from SURPLUS CENTER but I am lacking the technical language.
1. There is a 2 Stage hyd. pump ,16GPM at 3600 RPM,
it has to go with a 8 HP engine. It is a log splitter pump for faster cycles. Is that o.k.?
2.What sort of engine do I have to get?
3. I want to use a double acting cylinder with 3

3. I want to use a double acting cylinder with 3" bore and 10" stroke.O:K:?
4.What else do I need? Valves ,what kind of hose etc.?
Probably there is another supplier who sells good stuff. It is still cheaper to get the stuff in the U:S: than in Germany.I do hope that I am not asking too much but anyboby who has an idea is welcome.
By the way Bob, I am 39 years old and diabetic since 30 years. If you have questions you can contact me under: cyrus@allesklar.de
Cyrus ABS apprentice smith

Cyrus,

Thanks for visiting my shop tour. Hopefully I can help you out a little. Remember this, everyone has different opinions about things. The press I built meets the need I had. Others with different needs would do it different.



1. There is a 2 Stage hyd. pump ,16GPM at 3600 RPM, it has to go with a 8 HP engine. It is a log splitter pump for faster cycles. Is that o.k.?

My pump is a 2-stage 11 GPM at 3450RPM and is plenty fast for my needs. One thing to think about here is that when you press the steel, you are not going to lift the push rod back to the fully retracted state. Just lift it high enough to do whatever you need to with the steel and smash it again. So far the only full stroke I take is the very first one to get the rod down to the steel. I fully retract it when I am done to protect the rod from rusting. I am happy with 11GPM, so I would guess that you will be happy with 16GPM.

One difference between the 11GPM and the 16GPM (according to everyone I talked to) is that 16GPM is too big to run with a 5HP ELECTRIC motor. I wanted electric and not a gas engine. Personally, I think the pump is loud enough, I would not want the sound of an engine on top of it.

The two stage pump is quite a good idea. There are two parts, one for speed and the other for power. When you make it move, it will move fast until it starts to feel resistance and then it kicks into the other mode that puts out more force. Now, FAST is not really that fast. My cylinder has a 12" stroke and from top to bottom with NO resistance takes about 5 or 6 seconds. If I am at the top of the stroke and put a piece of steel in there to weld it, the steel will be cold by the time the press can get down to it. So, fast is a relative term, it's fast compared to the second stage but a lot slower than a hammer in your hand. If my steel is 2" thick, I have my press at about 2.5" so as soon as I put the steel in, I am smashing it. No waiting for the cylinder to get there.

2.What sort of engine do I have to get?

If it were me and I was making another press knowing what I know from building this press, I would get an electric motor. I'm not sure about the power in Germany, or if getting three phase power is a problem or not for you, but you can get a 10HP, 3 phase motor and run your 16GPM pump. If your power is like it is here, I would reduce the pump to 11GPM and get a 5HP 220V motor. You can get these from Surplus Supply in the magazine you have. You can do anything you want, but bigger motors, pumps and all cost a lot more.

3. I want to use a double acting cylinder with 3" bore and 10" stroke.O:K:?

The answer to this depends on what you want to accomplish. My cylinder is a 5" bore and delivers 49,079 pounds of pressure, 24.5 tons. That is a lot of pressure and can really smash stuff. I looked in my copy of the Surplus Supply catalog and found a Prince cycinder with 3" bore X 10" stroke on page 52. This cylinder delivers 17,600 pounds of pressure on the down stroke. That is just short of 9 tons. This will probably work just fine but I would guess that you are pushing a lot more fluid than necessary with the 16GPM pump. If it were me, I would reduce the engine and pump size a little to save cash and spend the extra cash on a bigger cylinder. I investigated all of this while designing my press and decided I wanted as much cylinder pressure as I could get so I bought the BIGGEST stuff I could get for the money I had to spend. You can get a 4" cylinder with an 8" stroke for $139.95 or your 3" cylinder with a 10" stroke for $102.95. for the extra 37 dollars you get to bump your output pressure from 9 tons to almost 16 tons. For an extra $100 you can get up to 24.5 tons.

4.What else do I need? Valves ,what kind of hose etc.?

You will need the hoses to match the output ports on your equipment. You will also need fittings for at least one end of each hose. The hoses have male ends on them, you can screw them into the port on one end but not the other without unscrewing the first. You need to screw the hose in and then use an adapter fitting on the other end that lets you connect it. One thing about the adapters, not all 3/4" or 1/2" stuff will match up with the other 3/4" or 1/2" stuff. The threads are different on some. you will have to be sure you get the right ones for your stuff. I had to go to the store three times to get mine right. Even the people at the store did not know the threads are different. Since you are ordering from another country, I would ask the place you are buying your stuff from to assemble it to check everything before charging you and shipping. From that far away, it would take forever to get the press running if you had to ship stuff back and forth a few times to get it right.

You will also need a valve. I used a log splitter valve and am happy with it. It is also one of the cheapest ones you can get.

You will also need a filter for filtering your hydraulic fluid. Make sure it is 10 micron and can handle the GPM of your pump. this goes on the RETURN side of the valve.

AND you will need a strong magnet to place in the bottom of your hydraulic fluid tank. This will attract any metal filings that are in the fluid and hold them so they don't go through the system.


CONFUSED?

I recommend getting the biggest and best you can afford so you will not have to upgrade later.

Pick out the biggest cylinder you would consider (how strong is your press frame?).
Find a pump that will deliver enough GPM to do the job for the cylinder.
Find a motor or engine that will drive the pump.
Find a filter.
Find a valve.
Find hoses and fittings.
Determine the amount of money you can affors to spend.
Do you have enough to cover your "dream" press including the hydraulic fluid, shippinig, etc....?

If so, GREAT, order the stuff and wait patiently for it to arrive.

If you are like a lot of us, you don't have enough money. So you start looking for a little smaller cylinder (less force or shorter stroke) and a smaller pump (less GPM and speed) and a smaller motor or engine (be sure it is big enough to drive the pump). When you get down to your cash limit, your done, order your parts. OR, wait a little while and save up more money.


Have you looked hard in your local area for the parts? Do you know where ther is a fork lift, bull dozer or garbage truck that is in the junk yard? They all have hydraulics in them. If you can get it cheap enough, your in. Most of this type of equipment has fairly large cylinders. You may be able to get everything except the motor for one price. Gene Osborn has a hydraulic press that started out as a hydraulic pipe bender. It is three presses in one. He modified one for damascus, one for Mokume and does not use the third at this time. Maybe you can find something like that.

Good luck and come back with questions. Hopefully you will have learned something in all of this that will help.

The shop looks great, Bob.
It looks soooooo clean.
Mine looks like a tornado hit it.
hehehehehehehe

Dear Bob,
a big thank you for giving me all the information, now I can overlook the subjekt much better. I made a slight mistake about the cylinder, actually I was looking at the 5" bore from Prince. That would be my choice. But I am still about 10% confused!!
The engine should have 10 HP but which one should I get from all those engines? High Torqe, low RPM, high RPM etc.
We in Germany use 380/400 Volt on industrial machines with 3 phase. We do not have 1 phase.( Even my squirrel cage blower runs on 380 V.)
The frame will be a sturdy H-frame build from one of my friends or a frame produced in Korea for $ 230.
It is also a good idea to check scrapyards for parts, I will do it next week.
Again thank you
Cyrus

If you have three phase available, I would get an 8 or 10 horse power electric motor, wire it up and your done. If you were looking at the 5" cylinder you did a good job of matching up what you need. Keep us all posted on your progress.