Restoring an old gold mine cart

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My ode to rock, a project to restore an old mining cart to its original glory for display, and fill it full of rockMy mom runs a museum, that are adding an exibit for the gold mining done in that area. She mentioned that they got an old assayer office building they are going to restore, but will need to locate it about 100 yds from the main site. I had a friend that had some interesting 'scrap metal' he called me to haul off for him.. Talk about timing, i couldnt beleive my luck So here we are.. My task is to fabricate a replication of a mining cart used in some of the local mines to add some 'flair' to the trail back to the building. I can wait to see how this is going to look once i aquire some nice quartz rock from an abandon mine. This is the project for this week (im off work). My next steps are to fab a bracket to mount the bucket on the swivel/dumper and figure how the hell to put rivets all over this thing to make it look old school (i dramatically designed this thing so that there are no 'exposed' welds). I figure to pick up some big *** rivets from mcmastercarr and drill holes, but tack them in, instead of trying to actually buck them. Heh, i just dont have the rig or the helper to do them right.-------->Link to ongoing project page for The Rock cart<-------Last edited by joehobart; 01-13-2004 at 12:49 AM.
Reply:nice project keep us posted
Reply:Just a couple thoughts I had on this, first, it's an ideal project for electrolosys.Second idea, instead of rivets, a bunch of balls from old ball bearings will save you having to drill the rivets all the way thru.Drill a shallow hole the size of the ball, set the ball in the hole, and MIG around the ball.  While it's still red hot, peen it with a rivet punch in a Parker 401 hammer.  Rivets are gettin hard to come by, unless you can get Boilerman to send you a box of rivet heads he cut out.Appreciation Gains You Recognition-
Reply:depends on what size he is looking for ....don't usually have to cut them ...already broke I'm alittle jealous he got that cart....i live just outside of Rouges Holler and been looking for an old coal cart for years ....just haven't really built up the balls to try and get into some of the old mines ...most have been dynomited shut in the last 20 years but i know of a few air shafts and opening that aren't to blocked...more than likely all i'll fined is waterLast edited by boilerman; 01-13-2004 at 07:51 PM.
Reply:Originally posted by boilerman depends on what size he is looking for ....don't usually have to cut them ...already broke I'm alittle jealous he got that cart....i live just outside of Rouges Holler and been looking for an old coal cart for years ....just haven't really built up the balls to try and get into some of the old mines ...most have been dynomited shut in the last 20 years but i know of a few air shafts and opening that aren't to blocked...more than likely all i'll fined is water
Reply:I thought of it that you could first drill holes all the way through and then whether you use, ball bearings or whatever you use for fake rivets, you could weld them from the back side so they look more real because the weld wouldn't show.Welder- Miller Thunderbolt AC 225-DC 150 Plasma cutter, Miller Spectrum 300O/P torch- Victor 100
Reply:Well I've been told on numerous occasions that I'm not right , but then again who has more fun than crazy people.  but like i said i ain't built the balls to go in one ....yetI like your sneak-a-peek there ....only one i can use is only 8 feet long ...one of them fiber optic things.can't  type to well cuz i went and fried my fingers today. Had a pto shaft that some jackass was trying to take off of the front pulley on a massey w/perkins diesel. Well this idiot in his infinite wisdom couldn't figure out left hand threads so dicided he was got to cut it of with a torch. Well half way thur someone stop the dumbass. needless to say this is part of the boom mower i'm retro fitting. So I clean it up and weld it back, helper picks it up and grinds it alitte and goes to the lathe to finish it up nice. In the mean time I gots my brain on fixin the goose poop weld that (more than likely the same moron) someone did on the boom. The helper holler for help in getting the shaft true in the lathe ....so i go over and look at his set up and with out thinking reach out to roll the lathe over by hand ....yep you guessed it ...i grabbed the damn thing right where i just welded not even 3 minutes ago. I laugh about it now but buddy let me tell you thank god for snow.
Reply:I'm still pondering the rivet idea. the old ball bearing in a hole with a mallet trick might work, but with a 35 pack of 3/8 shank dia, 1/2 inch long, 3/4" headed rivets going for $4.55 from the store, i am still thinking about going that route, i dont have a cheap source of ball bearings, so its about the same for me. 10 bucks worth of rivets will go a long way toward being more realistic.. Current phase is fabbing an axle bracket that matches the cast parts by skinning my brackets with some sheetmetal. Looking pretty good so far, ill have pics tomorrow when i finish boxing it in.
Reply:If you're buyin rivets for that kind of money locally I'd go with the rivets.  I can't find a rivet around here for love or money, fact, I can't even find a counter man who knows anything other than pop rivets.Now, if you really want to class it up,http://www.nationalboard.org/boiler_rivets1.htmlBoilerman will probably be more than willing to consult on rivet beatin too.Appreciation Gains You Recognition-
Reply:Well, this is finished. i ran out of free time to do the rivets, or rivet-shaped-objects as a detail. I almost did a gigantic tackweld with proper grinding, i was getting it to look fairly realistic, but it was gonna take me too long. Oh well, they loved it as is, so i guess thats what counts.The link above has my time-lapse photos if you are interested. I did have once nice detail in fabbing the axle bracket to match the cast iron parts on the chassis. I'll never tell how i did it, but its hollow insideHeh, i just saw the foreground in that pic, thats my tank transport rack, for going to the gas store for more argon. I didnt like the 'roll it up in the bed mat and strap it down' trick, after seeing some post from someone showing a tank that was blown a 1/4 mile from a car accident, so i wasted some angle iron to bulletproof a rack. Kind of an interesting design, one super beefy frame to hold 150+ size cyls, and 2 little bent hoops of 5/8 round that are off to the side for the OA tanks.Last edited by joehobart; 01-16-2004 at 01:11 AM.