Planing Thick-Wall Aluminum

[MrForbes]

you could, and it would not affect the strength much in the front-back direction, which is where it needs to be strong. What about cutting a bunch of 1.25ish diameter holes in the web instead?

And you probably could get away with more reduction at the top, than at the bottom, which coincidentally would help with the CG location

[AdamHeard]

Why not use 1/16" wall and skip this whole rodeo?

[JesseK]

Originally Posted by AdamHeard

Why not use 1/16" wall and skip this whole rodeo?

2x1"x1/16" 606x doesn't exist locally within a 2 hour drive. We buy our aluminum in bulk each year for all of the teams we support, with specialty aluminum as-needed for FRC (like a 1x1" angle rail of 7075 recently), so online ordering isn't sustainable for everything we do.

The VEX rail costs would have been fine in hindsight (we wound up having to cut our 74" rails in half this weekend so they'd fit in a crate), but at this point they're a 5-day lead time plus we'd rather not re-make them. At first it didn't seem like they'd work since they're only 60" segments, but yea... about that hindsight...

[Cory]

Originally Posted by JesseK

2x1"x1/16" 606x doesn't exist locally within a 2 hour drive. We buy our aluminum in bulk each year for all of the teams we support, with specialty aluminum as-needed for FRC (like a 1x1" angle rail of 7075 recently), so online ordering isn't sustainable for everything we do.

Obviously you've looked into this more than I have, but it's hard to believe that you can't find someone who either has it, or can get it next day.

We have a reasonably large, but not enormous metal supplier near us we buy from. They have almost anything in stock for next day delivery.

Anything that's not completely oddball they can get within 24-48 hrs from Southern California or AZ.

Does there really not exist any supplier like that in VA? 1x2x.063 is not at all a niche product.

[AdamHeard]

Originally Posted by Cory

Obviously you've looked into this more than I have, but it's hard to believe that you can't find someone who either has it, or can get it next day.

We have a reasonably large, but not enormous metal supplier near us we buy from. They have almost anything in stock for next day delivery.

Anything that's not completely oddball they can get within 24-48 hrs from Southern California or AZ.

Does there really not exist any supplier like that in VA? 1x2x.063 is not at all a niche product.

This same supplier has got items for us from the East coast on a few days notice as well. So I imagine it goes both ways.

[JesseK]

Originally Posted by Cory

Obviously you've looked into this more than I have, but it's hard to believe that you can't find someone who either has it, or can get it next day.

...

Does there really not exist any supplier like that in VA? 1x2x.063 is not at all a niche product.

Potomac Metals, Winchester Metals & BMG all have massive warehouses, each with 6063-T5, 2x1"x0.125 as their 2x1 tubing. I never thought to ask if they would get something specific in for us, so I just called BMG and Potomac Metals. They said for anything outside of their normal stock would require a minimum order size.

I'll talk to my non-profit and a couple of other teams in the area; we may front a bulk-buy for next year depending on interest.

(edit - just noticed post # 3,000 )

[Jared]

If you weaken the outer facing wall too much, your elevator will be able to bow in and out in the middle so that the width between the two uprights can change, which, depending on how you lift your carriage, may allow it to twist sideways and pry apart the elevator uprights. We're seeing this on our 1" x 2" x .125" elevator right now, but the elevator uprights are 75.5" tall and are only supported on the very bottom.

[JesseK]

Originally Posted by MrForbes

you could, and it would not affect the strength much in the front-back direction, which is where it needs to be strong. What about cutting a bunch of 1.25ish diameter holes in the web instead?

We'd have to do 0.75" cheese holes due to the positioning of a few cross rails, guide rails and other items on the lift. We could do it since we have the right drill bit already, but it'd take a bit of time since there's not a set pattern we could do all the way down the rail.