Bought a Hyster forklift - repair projects...

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I'm only a few weeks away from leasing a commercial space to get all of my tools and equipment over there to start working on hopefully starting a small business one of these days.  With that said I needed a forklift because I have a lot of heavy equipment like mills, lathes and shears which need to be installed and moved on occasion.  Also I needed a way to load 4x8 sheet stock up to 3/4" onto my CNC plasma table.So during the past week I bought a 2003 Hyster E50XM2 48 volt truck with 189" three stage mast with clear view and full free lift plus side shift.  The lift has 5k hours on it but everything works and it doesn't leak.  It needs a little TLC and I'll eventually paint it, but I ordered up some parts from the Hyster dealer this morning to fix some of the issues.  Thus far I have fixed a sloppy lift linkage, a weak e-brake spring and bent the rear light brackets back into shape because they looked like pretzels.When I bought it I didn't notice the rear cover was missing and simply replaced with some wire mesh.  Some places do this to cool the electrics in the back where the main controller is.  For me I didn't like it so I was going to order a cover from Hyster until I found out it's $1,100.  I decided to go out this morning and do some measurements to see what I could do.  After 15 minutes of getting some measurements I spent a half hour drawing up the parts in Bend Tech Pro SM and then did some work in Corel Draw X5.  I converted an image I found online of Hyster's logo into a .dxf so that I could make it look s OEM as possible.  I cut the parts from 20GA mild steel on my plasma table.  That included the main part of the cover, gussets and brackets. I still have to cut a back piece that will sit behind the lettering which will be painted yellow and the main panel will be painted black.  I'm doing this because I'm not going to paint the whole lift now but when I do I'll reverse the colors down the road.This part was kind of  a pain because it's trapezoid shaped with a tapering radius that's bigger on the bottom and smaller at the top.  On top of that the counter weight isn't exactly precision made so it took a little extra work with a flap disc and snips to get it to fit pretty well.  All told I'll have about $25 bucks into it and it will look quite a bit better and offer a little bit more protection for the contractors and electronic control system.Before: After:Last edited by unixadm; 01-08-2012 at 08:07 PM.
Reply:That looks like it's worth $1100 to me!! Good job and I doubt Hyster could build one any better!!                                                MikeOl' Stonebreaker  "Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes"Hobart G-213 portableMiller 175 migMiller thunderbolt ac/dc stick Victor O/A setupMakita chop saw
Reply:That is a nice cover BUT seeing that you want to do this for a living shouldn't it say YOUR companies logo? Why advertise them do they advertise for you? Just sayinMiller thunderbolt 250Decastar 135ERecovering tool-o-holic ESAB OAI have been interested or involved in Electrical, Fire Alarm, Auto, Marine, Welding, Electronics ETC to name a just a few. So YES you can own too many tools.
Reply:Very nice work.  Now you just have to watch out for Stick-Men coming around to "inspect" your work...at midnight...
Reply:nice work!Miller Synchrowave 180 SDLincoln PowerMig 255Hypertherm Powermax 45Torchmate 2x2Victor O/A
Reply:Thanks guys.  It was a fun project and I look forward to getting it finished up this week!
Reply:Gr8 "toy"!  189"!!!  Wish I had one of those - my back is getting old.   Nice job on the panel - definitely "worth" $1100.  It's fun to spend the extra time to do something custom that turns out well, although that last extra effort to get it really right can be frustrating.Dumb has a good point, here's the coolest one I've ever seen:http://weldingweb.com/vbb/showthread.php...light=forkliftA glance thru the pics tells me his quality of work and attention to detail is off the charts! If all your stuff that new customers see looks custom and cool, they'll remember you and call you first!
Reply:Originally Posted by Fabn4FunGr8 "toy"!  189"!!!  Wish I had one of those - my back is getting old.   Nice job on the panel - definitely "worth" $1100.  It's fun to spend the extra time to do something custom that turns out well, although that last extra effort to get it really right can be frustrating.Dumb has a good point, here's the coolest one I've ever seen:http://weldingweb.com/vbb/showthread.php...light=forkliftA glance thru the pics tells me his quality of work and attention to detail is off the charts! If all your stuff that new customers see looks custom and cool, they'll remember you and call you first!
Reply:Originally Posted by unixadmI'm only a few weeks away from leasing a commercial space to get all of my tools and equipment over there to start working on hopefully starting a small business one of these days.  With that said I needed forklift paint because I have a lot of heavy equipment like mills, lathes and shears which need to be installed and moved on occasion.  Also I needed a way to load 4x8 sheet stock up to 3/4" onto my CNC plasma table.So during the past week I bought a 2003 Hyster E50XM2 48 volt truck with 189" three stage mast with clear view and full free lift plus side shift.  The lift has 5k hours on it but everything works and it doesn't leak.  It needs a little TLC and I'll eventually paint it, but I ordered up some parts from the Hyster dealer this morning to fix some of the issues.  Thus far I have fixed a sloppy lift linkage, a weak e-brake spring and bent the rear light brackets back into shape because they looked like pretzels.
Reply:Originally Posted by flounderMy rear light brackets are all twisted up too, how did you bend them back?