TFS: Inexpensive DIY Fab Table

[Music] so while back I found this fab table next to a dumpster and yeah I mean it really sturdy build somebody put a lot of time and effort into it but the problem is this wood top on it absolutely sucks for somebody who you know who welds and fabricates all the time I mean it served me well but it's about time I really updated it so I'm basing this off of everything that I've ever really wanted to see and in a fab table some features I've never seen and some things that would make my life just a little bit easier so to start off I'm going to use some slots here and this is all 1 inch by 3 inch eighth inch wall or a 120 wall rectangle tube and I just gave the guy the steel shop to slice them all up for me you know couple extra bucks you know he took care of me really nice guy but they're all cut at 48 inches and based on measurements I need 20 of them to do the whole table so really easy it was only what four sticks of tube to get it done now the first few sections here are going to be a rigid mounted I know that already inside of my head you know I don't need a bit removable or anything like that and maybe later on I'll even add some other cross sections in there to kind of checker it for better clamping ability my spacing is all inch and a half and the reason why is it fits virtually every commercial off-the-shelf clamp that I have and it also at an inch and a half it reduces the total amount of Steel I need for the top of it so I'm gonna get these welded in and then I just haven't really figured out what I'm gonna do yet so I decided I'm gonna take a minute think about it maybe I'll come up with something screw this I already know what I need on the other side on the foot of the tables shuffle you know rather than sit there and think about it and waste a bunch of time I really want to weld here so I'm just gonna tack all of these up just temporarily and I'll get going on the foot side now the center sections I want to have some bundles of slots that are adjustable now this allows me to put a clamp in a different place or change the clamps or change the location where it needs to be clamped a really cool idea here now the foot section here I'm actually gonna add a kind of cool feature that I think most fab tables are welding tables should have on and I'll show you what that is in a minute but I had to reduce my tube size down to one by two an order to add this feature keep the table kind of balanced now these sections right here are my lateral stops they allow the slats to move for a nap or longitudal on the table forward and backward but they don't allow to move side-to-side and they're basically just pieces of angle iron cut and rest to allow them to slide along the base section of the table they're really easy to do just tack them off from underneath get a solid weld down on it flip over and do the other side I mean it's not a rocket science it's a little bit honest but very easy to do simple you know quick and easy day [Music] [Music] now each section of the table has to actually stay attached to the table but still slide and in order to do this I'm going to have to put some tabs on each one of the slides now I'm using this flat stock here that I just tacked up as our temporary placement jig and this will allow me to move each slide for and after certain amount of inches and then the pieces on the inside will allow the tab to be placed in the exact same spot so it's essentially just like a temporary placement jig built on the table so that I can get all of these tabs lined up in the exact spot that they need to be because I'm going to slide some cold rolled steel all the way across that section of table so the slots will be a lot of people I'll show you exactly what that looks like here in a second [Music] now we get all of these welded up here let's pop some holes in it now the foot of the table the center crossmember and the middle section or the mid section between the foot in the center needle holder over them so we can feed this cold roll rod through gonna feed it through every single one of the tabs and all three cross members now the front section at the center I actually threaded in the back section here I'm just gonna tack a washer on here just so that it doesn't fall out and then the the bar stock doesn't move around but simple easy de souza I got attacked up here I'm gonna add this additional feature now most people call this an Engel track or an angle tray and it basically allows you to put two pieces like when you but weld them up and you want them to go perfectly straight it allows you to do that it's just a cool feature but you know what one thing that I'm gonna do here is kind of dress these edges up a little bit and that's to keep it from stabbing things like going through a wall or stabbing a car or by leg you know something like that the Senate crossmember is gonna have one piece that's rigid mounted to it so four sections on each side of it at the foot of the end of the table will be adjustable the center section is is completely rigid mounted now the slats I can take out and put on one side or another or adjust them as I need accordingly so once I have it all set up there I'm just gonna get them all kind of set up and you know just in place and take a look at what I've done here I kind of really like this feature but the good news is I found out exactly what I was gonna do while I was working on the other end I decided you know what there are some things in this world that are very very difficult to weld in position comfortably and I can't even tell you how many times I've wanted to cut a big giant hole in my table so I could feed like an exhaust or something you know very dimensional piece through so rather than just cutting a permanent hole in this table I'm just gonna make a section of it removable so I'm gonna cut tax off of these other slats here get them nice and cleaned up and with that flat stock I just just working on a second ago I'll show you exactly how I'm gonna attach it to the table the spacing is gonna remain exactly the same throughout inch-and-a-half spacing through all each one of these pieces well as soon as I get them spaced out I'm gonna set the flat stock up to cover four separate pieces here and I'm gonna weld each one of them directly to the flat stock at the edge of the table [Music] now to be perfectly honest with you I wasn't sure if just an eight inch you know strap was gonna hold this very strong but you know as soon as I flipped it over I kind of gave it a little wiggle and realized it's actually extremely rigid I was prepared to put another piece down the center of it but surprisingly this is this will hold very very strong doesn't warp distort or anything so I'm gonna give this a go I don't want to carry bunch tools around so I'm just gonna pop some holes on the side here use a detent pin some people call it a quick-release pin just slide it in there now it holds in place snow clamps to the table now each one of the ends of these tubes I could have left them open but I actually want to cap them all off just to get a nice smooth edge you know dress them nicely and well and you know make it a little bit better in order to do that I have cut a bunch and I really mean a bunch of eighth inch flat stock the exact size of the tube that needs to be I'm just gonna put a tack on the top of it weld it out down the sides and just go all the way around the table and I can't even begin to describe how ridiculously monotonous this job is [Music] stick it scoot down stick it again scoot down again stick it again scoot down again stick it scoots tickets good stick it scoot trust me by the end of this I I don't ever want to do this again and just when I thought it was over I realized like to go back and grind every single one of those and this is not any fun just this clip alone right here just for fun here this clip was spent up 600 times the speed that it was that you still see how long it takes me to do each piece but I'm not gonna have you watch all of them instead I'm gonna has fast-forward here and go on to the point where the table is pretty much finished I'm gonna clean it up a little surface prep pad some acetone wipe it down really good and here is what I am now dubbing my ultimate fab table looks like an ordinary fab table [Music] nice sturdy sections easily workable easy to work on and has removable sections it has adjustable sections each one of those sections can be individually replaced each one of them can be cut on each one can be welded on the whole table was less than 300 dollars to build tubular structure means that it's very inexpensive to replace it is also lighter weight when compared to solid bar stock and I can't wait to show you some of the additional features that I'm going to build and add to it and that's gonna be coming up in one of the following videos very soon now that's just about wrap it up for this episode I want to thank you guys very much for watching as always don't forget to subscribe to the fabrication series make sure you check out some of our other videos and I will see you guys on the next episode [Music]

Channel: The Fabrication Series

Views: 592,150

Rating: 4.8864851 out of 5

Keywords: Fabr Table, fabrication, fabrication table, fabricators table, welding table, cheap fab table, diy fab table, diy, fab, fabricators, welding, welders, table, clamp table, jig table, fixture table, TFS, Season 3, the fabrication series, the fabricator series, the fabricator, merrill performance, mp merrill performance, #GetStrong

Id: YWOM0IApasY

Length: 9min 56sec (596 seconds)

Published: Mon Sep 18 2017