Redneck impact testing gone wrong!!!!

Well lets say I had a plan for this weekend... I need to do a 10,000 impact cycle at about 1000 pounds.... Think about this 1000lbs per inch... 10,000 times... Should be doable but doing it by hand would take forever sooooo

I called a local equipment rental place and they rold me they had a rammer that was 1215 pounds... Little more than I wanted but 600 impacts a minute means I'll be done in under 20 minutes if I can figure out how to control the impact....

I go pick up the until and it's loaded in my truck... I load it up and drive home... I pull it out last night after lawn duty and that sucker drags me all the way across the driveway.....

Today I build a bounding box and used my front steps as an anchor so I could hold it in place will worry about suspending it and stabilizing after I see what I am really fighting...

Start a trial test and 10 minutes in I notice the sidewalk is starting to spiderweb under my feet!!!!

I stop the test and look and wow... 1215 lbs should not have broken 2000psi concrete but my sidewalk will never be the same....

I then start looking for the tip... First test had me trying to epoxy it in place but that didn't work... It got rolled and smashed around but it hadn't shattered it had pancacked... I hadn't been able to control the impacts to be direct so can understand a little.. Have had 4 tons on the material in testing and it held up so was a little confused but OK...

I then looked at the model of the rammer I was using and went looking for specs... I had never seen one before so it wasn't like a had a clue....

They had not loaded the one I asked for.... They had loaded an MTR60 instead of the 40.... not 1215.. 3060... No Way I am going to get that bad boy suspended, lined up and dialed on....

So on today's episode of redneck engineering we learned always double check you equipment... Otherwise your Girlfriend will ahev you repouring a sidewalk the next weekend you have a free day......

bes said:

For a 13mm tip, 1000psi will happen at about 205lbs. And that if if the tip is flat and 100% of it contacts whatever it is pushing against. IF the tip is rounded, the middle will be loaded to 1000psi even sooner.

bes

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Very true as the contat point was considerable smaller than an inch..... I never got past step 1... But I kept all fingers and toes sooo it's a draw LOL

Idea was to supsend it after I saw how much the fight was and use a stress gage on a piece of steel to tune it to the proper impact for the tip... Too much beast to attmpt it with... Smaller unit is wayyyy lighter with a small foot so turning it into a mini pile driver should be feasable...

Albatross Cues said:

Chris,

This is just awesome, maybe do a video if you get a chance, see if we can get it to go viral.

This sounds just like some of my "hill billy" engineering. Keep up the good work.

how about trying it on an air hammer, although I am not sure pounds per square inch would be for one of these. You could at least run it off a standard air compressor. But if you took one of the air hammer attachments you may be able to turn it down and put a ferrule on it, but I don't know if that would hold up either. But it least your sidewalk may be safe.

Good luck with your R&D.

Aloha

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HAhah I like that idea too... All the pneumatic stuff is at my dads shop he has way more space than me... but that would save my sidewalk =D... just glad that I didn't do it inside on the garage floor LOL

Thanks for the hilly billy thought process... Let's me know I am not alone out here =D

Chris

spktur said:

I'm curious, just exactly what are you trying to do with this piece of equipment? Are you trying to compact something or break something up?

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10,000 breaks at 30mph.... Going the pneumatic route Wednesday... Somedays you are smarter than others... And some days you hear from guys that may be smarter than you everyday LOL

Just heard from a friend and he suggested cycling a solenoids... I don't have one strong enough for that but I do have one strong enough to pull a trigger and I can make a contact wheel for a switch....

3kushn said:

If you went with a pneumatic hammer the small rivet hammers should be plenty strong enough. There's generally 2 basic size shanks .401 and .498" of course the larger one hits harder. There is a sq shank but those are straight rather than pistol grip tools. And of course there's the large rivet busters but you don't need that.

With pneumatics you can dial down the pressure if you have too much tool. Just need a regulator.

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Thanks for the input =) I really should have went the air route to start with but I outsmarted myself.... Will breakdown and tell you all my flintstone approach at some point that I was thinking about even before this fiasco....