It is that time of year again when our attention turns to the outdoors and the curb appeal of our homes. One easy way to give your front porch a quick face lift is to add or replace an outdoor stair rail.
A few things to keep in mind, along with design, have to do with observing city and county codes.
Residential properties generally have to have at least one handrail along a flight of stairs. The height of the handrail should be mounted somewhere between 34″ and 38″ above all of the stair nosing.
The grip-able area of the handrail should measure between 1 1/4″ and 2 1/4″.
If the handrail is to be hung along an existing wall, like the example in the photos, a 1 1/2″ clearance between any projection in the wall and the handrail should be observed. Sometimes this gets a bit tricky if the wall has an uneven surface like stone.

Tom built this handrail to fit a new home. The handrail needed to bolt to a stone faced wall at the top and also bolt to a stone faced concrete planter at the bottom of the stairs. Tom used a lag screw that fit into the metal railing bracket and sunk it through the stone and wall behind. The bottom bracket was fastened using a concrete anchor through the stone into the concrete planter underneath. Tom used 1 1/2″ .109 wall E.W. round tubing bent using a Shop Outfitters Universal Fabricator.

Here is a common tire question I received from Dave in Colorado:

“The guy at the tire place said he can’t plug this tire because the
bolt is too close to the side. Is that true?”

It looks like he should be able to plug the tire it is not that close to the sidewall… The tire should be plugged to keep rocks/sand from getting into the tread, but after plugging, to fix correctly, a patch should be used on the inside of the tire to keep tread from delaminating from casing. Before patching the plug will need to be sanded off, inside the tire. If only a plug is used it is possible that the plug seals the tire at the tread, not in the casing, then air pressure is allowed to work between casing and the tread forming a bubble rendering the tire trash. This is not as big of a problem with radial tires (such as yours), as it is with older bias-ply and re-capped tires. Wow TMI. Hope this helps!
Tom

Tom likes to keep a close eye on all of the surplus auctions and sales that occur near the shop. The University of Wyoming usually has several items either up for bid or on sale several times a year. Tom looks for items that he can either use right away or transform into something usefull. Last winter a simple electric conveyor was offered through the surplus website. The electric conveyor was located in the basement of one of the buildings and served as a transport for books and other items from the storage area in the basement up to the main level of the building.
Tom picked up the electric conveyor for less than fifteen dollars, with the stipulation that he would remove it from the basement. The conveyor had to be removed shortly after the sale. Needless to say, Tom removed the long elevator with a little help from family.
With a little ingenuity, Tom transformed the electric conveyor into a wood elevator for use outside his metal and welding shop.
The first thing Tom did was to weld angle iron up the sides of the conveyor so that the wood could travel up the rubber belt with out falling over the edge. Tom used one inch by two inch steel angle iron.

The conveyor came equipped with a 208 three phase motor that needed to be converted to 110 single phase. The first step was to remove the 208 motor from the gear box. The gear box had a spline shaft so Tom had to take the 208 motor with a dual shaft and fit a shaft coupling on the output end to add the 110 motor onto the electrical conveyor belt. The 110 motor now runs through the dead 208 motor into the gear box to run the electric log elevator.
One other unique feature to the log elevator is its ability to raise either end for easy access to difficult locations.
The new log elevator now comes in handy when Tom is splitting and piling fire wood.

Tom ordered floor anchor pots from Auto Body Tool Mart. Normally, an anchor pot is installed into an existing concrete floor. If that is the case, the concrete needs to be core drilled before installing the floor anchor pot. This article will describe how Tom poured floor anchor pots into the concrete slab he formed for his new building addition.
Tom began by welding rebar onto the anchor pot. Tom then placed the anchor pots so they were flush with the finished grade of the concrete floor. Wet concrete was poured around the anchor pots to secure them into the floor. Blue tape was used to cover the anchor pot. The tape served to protect the anchor pot as well as aid in finding the pots after the concrete floor was dry.
Anchor pots are used regularly for chaining cars to the floor to help do body work. They can also be used to help straighten axles.

Tom had the opportunity to work on a turbo piston several weeks ago. On this particular piston the compression ratio needed to be lowered. Pistons are a basic part to all types of machinery that employ a reciprocating engine and are designed to work in harmony with the other components of the engine. Pistons sit in a cylinder and operate by transferring force to the crankshaft. If you have ever wondered why the tops of the pistons have an elevated ring around them, here is the answer.
The outside area of a piston is called the quench area. When machining a piston you need to be careful not to take to much of that outside area out. When the piston is in motion and going up under compression the quench area comes very close to the head and transfers a small amount of the heat out of the piston into the head in a matter of a split second. If the quench area has been machined down too much, it can cause the piston to over heat. This could lead to detonation. Sometimes this is the cause of an engine that has over heated.

It’s that time of year again when the roads get a little snowy. What inevitably comes with snow are the plow & sand trucks. Small pebbles of sand and rock are sometimes left on the interstates and highways. Cars and trucks passing by often shoot those pebbles and rock onto windshields causing cracks that could lead to further windshield damage. If this happens the best thing to do is to stop the crack from splintering by either having it repaired or repairing it yourself. Tom had this happen a few weeks ago on his way back from Colorado. Rather than take his Dodge pickup into a repair shop and spend around sixty dollars, Tom thought he would try a windshield repair kit that can be picked up from any local auto parts store for around fifteen dollars. Tom started by isolating the small pit by incorporating a stop drill technique using a dremel tool. Small holes are drilled into the ends of the cracks to limit the spread of the damage. A small LCD light can be placed on the inside dashboard for better viewing. Tom then used a Permatex Windshield Repair Kit to seal up the crack and hopefully prevent continued damage. The kit comes with a small syringe and plunger, a tube of repair compound, an adhesive disk,pedestal, curling strip, push pin, razor blade, an alcohol towelette, and a set of instructions. The entire process takes about an hour. Allow for a little longer curing time if it happens to be a cloudy day. Watch our short video for the simple steps it takes to repair your windshield yourself.

Tom often gets interesting jobs into the shop. With the University of Wyoming close by the jobs are wide and varied.
One such job came in a couple of weeks ago from the Agriculture Department. They had a pig scalding vat, a large metal tank, that was in need of a new bottom.
A scalding vat is a large tank that is used to remove the hair off of a swine. If you have ever had a ham with the skin on, then it has been in some sort of large container to have its hair removed.
The tank that was brought in was a flat bottom metal tank that was not draining liquid very well. The drain sat to one end of the tank and in the process of welding on the original legs, the bottom warped and was not adequately draining. Over time, this caused rust to build up in the tank as well.
The first step was to remove the old metal tank bottom using a hypertherm powermax 1000 plasma cutter.
Tom used a piece of steel sheet metal, 11 gauge, to rebuild the bottom of the tank. He cut out the needed size and cut about a quarter of an inch wider at the drain end of the steel sheet.
Next, at the center point of the drain end, he used a break to create a fold from the center to the outside corner of the opposite end. This formed a “v” in the steel sheet for better drainage.
The new tank bottom will hold up better under warping conditions.
Tom modified the old legs for a better fit. The old design had an inch and a quarter drain. Tom installed a larger drain at two inches.
A tank like this one will be filled with liquid. The animal carcass will then be scalded. The liquid drained and the tank cleaned and dried for further use.

Tom removes legs on metal tank base.

Western EcoSystems Technology, a company out of Wyoming, decided to do a little remodeling on the outside of their building located in downtown Laramie Wyoming. The building is at least one hundred years old, if not a bit more. The decorative columns on the outside of the two story building needed to be repaired and repainted. Sheet metal cone shaped finials sat on top of each column and had fallen in disrepair over the years.
The metal finials had been soldered and over time it had oxidized and broken down the solder joint.
The first step in building duplicate roof finials was to remove a piece out of the old metal finial to use as a pattern for the new finials. Tom then took eighteen gauge cold rolled steel and had a sheet metal shop blank out eight square pieces per new finial. Then Tom took a hand sheer to form two radius on each metal piece to form the petal like shape.
Tom ordered hollow steel balls through Orleans Ornamental for the top of each finial. After welding the finials using a wire feed welder, Tom ground off each face of the octagon with a belt grinder to get the corners square and lined up. Then he took a flap wheel and rounded each corner just a little bit and blended in the welds on the balls.
The new finials fit on top of the new columns to give the old building a fresh look.
Here are photos of the final project on the Midwest Building in downtown Laramie.

New Shock Sleeve.

Tom got a bike in the machine shop with a broken upper shock mount. The owner of the mountain bike wasn’t able to get parts for the bike, so he brought the bike to Tom to see if there might be a way to fix it.
The bushing that was in the shock was wore out. Tom pushed out the bushing. He fabricated a new sleeve that would span the two suspension arms using O1 drill stock with a ground finish.
O1 drill stock is a oil harden drill stock and has a good rock well hardness.
Tom turned the OD and then drilled out the inside diameter to eight millimeters, so the eight millimeter bolt would fit through the two suspension arms. The metal sleeve is designed to span the distance between the space of the two arms and helps reinforce the bolt. The bolt fits into the middle of the sleeve. Tom fashioned two small snap ring grooves to keep the shock centered. The original design had two additional sleeves on the outside of the original sleeve. Tom eliminated the additional sleeves by using snap rings on each side of the shock. It should be a better fix than the factory sleeve which consisted of a thin sleeve over the bolt and aluminum outer sleeves.

Laramie Wyoming is a great place to mountain bike. There are several areas just a short drive from town. Fifteen minutes east on I-80 will land any mountain bike enthusiast in the Happy Jack Recreation Area where there are a variety of trails at several skill levels. The Vedauwoo Area is not much further and boasts beautiful rock scenery. Going west out of Laramie leads one to the Snowy Range. There are many trail heads for hiking and biking in the Medicine Bow National Forest. If you are looking for a more adventerous trip, you might try booking a luxury bike tour in France and Europe by visiting Bike Tours Europe.