Attachments for press ram on HF 20 ton shop press.

Thanks for reading this. I have recently been using my HF 20 ton press to push the steel that is inside of transformer windings. I have a pneumatic jack in it, and it's much easier doing it this way.

Anyway, I've only been able to do this when the space inside of the windings is over 1-1/2 inches in width as the press ram is this diameter. I've thought about just using 1" steel rods placed under the ram, but don't really want the thing shooting out if something gets stuck.

My thoughts have been an attachment that would basically be a cup that goes over the press ram, with a 1" rod on the underside. A couple torx screws on the side of the cup to keep it attached. I'm not someone with metal fabrication skills...all I can do is cut things.

Does anyone have any suggestions on what to use? I'm thinking a few sizes would be good to have 1", 3/4", 1/2". Also, not looking to break the bank here, if it costs a lot then it's not worth it in the end.



Ryan

You could see what a farm supply store has for "trailer" hitch pins in the sizes that interest you and cut & shape and have them welded to a pieces of strong pipe that will fit over your ram.

Find yourself a buddy who has a metal lathe. Get some short pieces of round stock, 2" in diameter x 6" or whatever length you figure you need.

Have him bore a hole in one end to make a nice close fit on the press ram and machine the OD of the other end down to the diameters you want.

Its a fair bit of machining, time-wise, but dead simple, so your buddy needs a couple of boxes of beer for his efforts.

The great thing about doing it on a lathe is that the ends you make will be absolutely dead in line with the ram (If the fit onto the ram is good) and this will reduce the danger of pressing something off-center and having a sideways crash.

Jon.

Thank you for both of those suggestions, and they are both things I have considered. Unfortunately, the only friend that I had that has the equipment and skills to do that moved away some time ago. I'll be investigating a couple small fabrication shops here soon and see what I can come up with.

Ryan,

One more thing to check: Does Harbor Freight offer any of these kinds of accessories for the press? Maybe even check with other places that sell other brands of presses...maybe they have some "tooling" that might fit your press. eBay?

Jon.

From what I've found so far, there have been similar attachments that would work, but these go into the hundreds of dollars which amazes me.

Seems that there might be a market for these adapters at a reasonable price.

Strong pipe to fit over the ram and round stock for the different sized adapters seems the least expensive for many reasons.

There are plenty of sources of strong materials from scrap items for the round stock as the pins don't need to be very long.

For fitting & welding the different sized "pins" to the pipe collar. A person could do that a few different ways to fill the space between the parts before welding.

Some cutting, grinding, welding. Drill a few holes and tap, or weld nuts on for bolts to hold the adapter to the ram. Clean it up and give it a shot of pant and $ELL them at a reasonable profit.

Machining from larger bar stock would be far more expensive, BUT if a person already has the metal lathe and cutters and can get the bar stock at a reasonable value. They could see if it was cost effective to manufacture when the prices of other such adapters for sale are factored in. A person could still use pipe for the ram collar and then use smaller bar stock that fits the pipe tightly and machine the different sizes.

Just some ideas for a possible adventure for someone that has the tools and experience and is looking for something that they can make that may sell well enough to make it a good biz depending on demand.

Have you got photos of your press setup? Its hard for me to picture how you are doing it. Wether you are pulling the Copper out, or pushing it out.

I use a hook, hammer and bench vise. The hooks actually a cable tightener, I dunno its name.
The hook/cable tightener is the sort thats like a 'spanish windlass' (sp?) Normally they have a eye at each end and one has a right hand thread and the other a left hand thread. Only this ones got a hook on one end.

I think that if you google 'wire rope tightener' you will find a pic of one quickly.

With some forthought I think it would be possible to make a Copper wire puller using some sort of jig to hold the Iron core and after hooking the hook thru the Copper wire loop, then using a drill to tighten the bolt on the other end, pulling the Copper wire out.

But, thats not what this threads about.....

Got any pics of your setup?

Seems he has a Harbor Freight 20 ton shop press. Just Google it and you can see plenty of pictures and videos of them.

Look around for a 1-1/2" set screw shaft coupler. You can fasten the coupler to the press ram then use it to attach stepped down press rods. The harder (spendy) part will be coming up with the stepped down rods in the appropriate size, but if you look around they aren't too hard to find / adapt.

I often find stuff like like this at SurplusCenter.com on the internet. A cursory search turns up a 1-1/2" coupler (item# 1-1563-I) for a pretty good price. You may be able to find it even cheaper as used surplus somewhere else. As for the press rods, they have a surplus stepped shaft where the largest step is 1-1/2 inches (item# 1-1960-C). If you got one, cut it off at the 1-1/2" step and chucked it into the other end of the coupler, you'd have a multi size press rod. At $3.95 each you could get a few and cut them to different steps to get different sizes.

Note: I am not affiliated with Surplus Center. This stuff is available in many places. These were just convenient examples.

eesakiwi - This is what I am using, this is the best example I could find real quick.

FineThanksForAsking - Thank you very much for that info, and I appreciate the reply being your first post. This has moved me in a direction I hadn't thought of yet, and I think it will work out.

Finethanks:

Looks like a good suggestion! I spend a lot of time looking in the Surplus Center on-line store but you must have it memorized!!

Are there other good on-line stores that sell stuff similiar to Surplus Center that you would care to share?


Thanks!
Jon.

I brace the coils on the pieces of 1/2" metal spacer braces that come with the press and then press the steel harness out from the copper coils. You scrap man, find a piece of metal that is small enough and use it between the ram and the coil harness. It is all made of layered pieces and is not solid anyway, the chances of a failure is remote as the layers of steel or the wires will separate and most likely result in a slow motion crush failure before a dangerous failure that would eject pieces at a bullistic rate of speed. I have done what you are doing and as yet have not experienced any close calls or points where I am worried about an ejection problem. Just be careful, man.

I don't know if this helps, I have used large socket wrenches with extensions to achieve what your trying here. You just need a socket just big enough with a flat well inside so it doesn't tip off the ram. If you have access to 1/2 and 3/4 sockets and extensions you can have a lot of options.

Totally forgot to revisit this thread. I found someone to make something for me that was already selling similar items. I just needed a longer shaft. Started out with this one to see how it works (works well), and will get other sizes as I need them.

Shaft is 5" long by 3/4" dia. Cost $35.