Suggestions for joining 2 steel rods?

Probably not much help but for that volume, why not buy 8' rods?

A bandsaw welder won't have the power to do 1/4" rods. Other factors that need to factor into the equation: this there a strength requirement, appearance, do they have to be perfectly round

There are special soluti>Had this post in rec.crafts.metalworking. It's turning into a welding

joining for why? what are they used for.

They are plant support rods. Manually pushed into the ground a foot or so, then a sapling tree or whatever is tied to them for support. Need to have a solid joint, but it's not a high precision thing. Got a quantity update yesterday--there are around 300,000 of the 4 ft rods, which need to be joined into 150,000 8 ft rods. At 2 per minute, that's 1,250 hrs!

Bill: This is a loser. Scrap the old rods, buy new. It will be cheaper.120 rods a hour (for any process) is extremely optimistic. Do the math, scrap value minus cost of new.

-Mike

"Bill Marrs" wrote: They are plant support rods. Manually pushed into the ground a foot or so, then a sapling tree or whatever is tied to them for support. (clip) ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Bill, you need to get outdoors more. A quarter-inch dia rod, pushed 1 ft into the ground and sticking 7 ft into the air will barely hold itself up, much less a tree that tall. More likely the tree will support the rod. :-)

Hmmm- Guess maybe I had better start calling the hombres "sir". They push the rods into the ground to the required depth by hand. No driver, no hammer, not even a pair of pliers to grab it with. Odd that we use tens of thousands of them every year if they don't work.

"Bill Marrs" wrote: Hmmm- Guess maybe I had better start calling the hombres "sir". They push the rods into the ground to the required depth by hand. No driver, no hammer, not even a pair of pliers to grab it with. Odd that we use tens of thousands of them every year if they don't work. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Every year? Tens of thousands? But this year, somehow, you have them in four-foot lengths instead of eight? Did I say anything about the difficulty of pushing them into the ground? You responded to a question that wasn't asked, since you have no answer to the question I DID ask.

TROLL ALERT.

Leo, Look at your own previous post. You never ASKED a question. You made a couple of statements, based on the information available to you at the time. Yes indeed we do currently use tens of thousands of 8 ft rods. The darned things are currently sitting on pallets in the nursery yard, as bare root tree digging season is just over with. The company bought another nursery business--bag and baggage. They grew short trees, probably in pots. They used 4 ft rods. Part of the "baggage" is approx.

300,000 4 ft rods. We do not currently, and have no intention to in the future, use 4 ft rods, hence the desire to turn the 4 footers into something useful to the current operation---8 ft rods.

You really need to get some different exercise. Jumping to conclusions and running off at the mouth doesn't seem to be doing it for you.

I had a couple of thoughts...

Could you use a crimp on connector? I'm thinking of something similar to those crimped cable connectors. It'd be cheap and fast.

Do the rods have to be butt welded? Could you overlap a couple of inches and MIG weld them? This'd likely be stronger than using a band saw welder that may not get full penetration.

Have you found out how much you could get if you sold them? The money saved may not equal the cost associated with joining them.

"Bill Marrs" wrote: Leo, Look at your own previous post. You never ASKED a question. (clip) ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Okay, then, let me phrase it in the form of a question. How can a 1/4" steel rod, sticking up 7 feet out of the ground be expected to support a tree, since it can hardly support itself? And, another question, if you care to continue this discussion: Why did you respond to this point in my previous post with a statement that does not apply?

I am posting this for the others in the discussion to consider. I don't expect a cogent answer from you.

Steel rod is to heavy for a sapling.

You want a tube. You want a wood rod - two or three of them.

The whole point is to limit the action of the tree - not hold it tight.

The tree is learning what to grow - and will grow roots to help it against the wind. So keep it from moving more than a few inches in a direction. Thus three - create a triangle.

The tree will protect itself - you are protecting your investment.

Martin

Martin Eastburn @ home at Lions' Lair with our computer lionslair at consolidated dot net NRA LOH & Endowment Member NRA Second Amendment Task Force Charter Founder

Leo Lichtman wrote:

If you really want to try welding them up, and you don't care what they look like, just set up a 'gob' weld fixture. Fixture should hold about

50 pairs of rods approximately 1/8" to 3/16" apart. Set the fixture at an angle so that the upper rod will butt soldily into the lower rod. Run your MIG welder across the whole set, pausing at each joint just long enough to get a puddle started. Don't trigger the gun, the rods are close enough together so the arc will jump from one pair to the next. Flip the fixture over, hit the back side, dump them out.

You should be able to do all 50 rods (it's > Leo, Look at your own previous post. You never ASKED a question. You made > a couple

And 500 hours later, you're done. POC!

No shit...!

Actually, only 250 hours since the count if for 150,000 finished rods. Just think, 10 hours a day, 6 days a week and you can be done in a month.

I still th>>You should be able to do all 50 rods (it's only 16" of weld!!) in about a

I hate it when I have to weld together two short pieces of anything to get what I want. Although for most uses, it is just fine, I prefer one uninterrupted length unless I am out of full sticks and have to make due. That weld always stands out to me although others say they don't notice it. Or you can take more time and weld it flush and it looks a little better. Just me.

Steve

Ahem... yes... well... you're right there.

I think the answer might depend on what tools you have on hand.

My first suggestion would be to consider that the business that was bought has customers for shorter trees or plants, and maybe you should expand into growing shorter trees and use the rods as 4 foot rods. I also suspect you have already considered that and ruled it out.

A bandsaw blade type welder is a good idea, but they are not typically designed for continuous production.

Since you say the rods are on pallets, you might try to get quotes from local shops. But if the idea is to provide some steady employment for your own workers then forget that.

I think that Peter Gray had one of the better ideas. Making a short overlap and mig welding. That kind of assumes you have a mig welder or that you would have some use for a mig welder after you have done these rods. If I were doing it, I would make a jig out of angle iron that would hold the rods and have stops so the rods could be pushed against the stops to get the overlap you want. I would run a test of some sort to see if welding on one side is adequate. I would have the work at a height so it can be done sitting down. Two pallets of rods across from the jig so rods don't have to be moved except a few inches. Preferably slight slope so the rods roll toward the jig. And then a section of roller conveyor so the completed rod can be easily slid off say to the right onto the rollers and then it would drop off onto a pallet. I would also not have anyone work more than half a day doing this, as I suspect the repeditive motion could easily lead to some sort of carpel tunnel or similar problems. Maybe you could arrange some sort of counter which might lead to some competition between workers.

Dan