|
Post by SpekJones on Aug 20, 2010 11:07:34 GMT -5
Can anyone tell me what grade of steel trap frames and jaws (the stamped ones, not cast) are commonly made of?
|
|
|
Post by jayirvinh on Aug 20, 2010 12:10:20 GMT -5
I believe there is no common grade but all grades. I have found the older victors and Newhouse to be a better grade steel than newewer traps ive worked on.
|
|
|
Post by SpekJones on Aug 20, 2010 13:18:20 GMT -5
Thanks Jayirvinh. Just from what I can tell from filing and hacksawing most seemed like pretty soft steel but wasn't sure. I'm in the process of making a home built and was thinking of using something like 4340 steel but that may be overkill. Have to make some 90 degree bends and not sure how well that grade would bend or how well it welds. I can buy a piece and see I guess. Could probably heat it and bend it but that would take the temper out of it. Thanks again for the reply, appreicate it.
|
|
|
Post by rlmcoyote on Aug 20, 2010 19:49:33 GMT -5
i think when you get steel with a number like that its stainless steel [tool steel] when you put a grinder to it the sparks shooting away from the grinder should be white not yellow with a little orange staying on the wheel. look at your hunting knives some times they will have a number stamp on them like 440 or 440c about the same steel. i am not positive on this just my 2 cents.
|
|
|
Post by SpekJones on Aug 21, 2010 13:10:13 GMT -5
I don't believe so rlmcoyote, but I don't know much about steel. Pretty sure though that 4340 steel is used in aircraft tubing and is a molybendum /iron alloy. Pretty sure all the steels has a number depending on the type of alloy and carbon content and theres a wide range of them. I just don't know which grade is best for trap making.
|
|
|
Post by SpekJones on Apr 15, 2011 23:00:13 GMT -5
Thought I'd drag this old thread up out of the mud. I ended up making four traps out of hot rolled mild steel. They are wolf traps, with a 9 inch jaw spread, hinged jaw's and 4 coiled with spring's I made from .180 music wire. The steel worked OK, but I'm in the process of building myself another 2 doz and will be making them out of cold rolled steel. It's a little better quality steel and does not have the black coating on it . Here is one set: All four, not quite finished when the pic was taken.
|
|
|
Post by jtdaniel on Apr 16, 2011 7:07:59 GMT -5
That is dedication to make them from scratch. Very cool. Can I ask if the man hours required to build them makes it worth it? I mean in the end is it feasible to do to save money? Or is it a you enjoy it and therefore you do it for the satisfaction type thing?
|
|
|
Post by catman50plus on Apr 16, 2011 7:41:16 GMT -5
Remember, it you make them from cold rolled, if you do any hardening, you can only case harden them (.003-.005 deep).
|
|
|
Post by bigtwinhd on Apr 16, 2011 9:28:09 GMT -5
Speck that is really neat! I've thought of making one myself but haven't yet. Too many irons in the fire for me to tinker right now.
How did you make the springs?
|
|
Forrest
Administrator
Trapper
Posts: 1,000,271
|
Post by Forrest on Apr 16, 2011 9:54:52 GMT -5
Very cool! I wish I was handy enough to build a coilspring trap! Thanks for sharing those..
|
|
|
Post by SpekJones on Apr 16, 2011 12:38:01 GMT -5
JtDaniel, there were multipile reason's why I built these. First, in spite of a multitude of wolf traps on the market, IMO they all are lacking in one aspect or another. There is two that are above the rest, but the cost of them put's them out of range for me when it comes to buying them by the doz. So these four were a prototype. There was many hour's of work went into them, building jigs, fitting part's by hand with a file and hacksaw and making mistakes and having to redo part's. Every part on them was hand made except the screw's. Laborwise, for just four trap's it would not have been worth the effort, but I learned way's to cut a huge amount of time off the next ones and simplify the process. A friend of mine is a computer whiz and has taken my templates and put them on a computer file. Another friend has a computer controlled plasma cutter and can automatically cut out all the part's for several doz in just a few minutes. We are in the process now of refineing this so the part's are all precision and fit together properly. Hopefully we can get this down so that basically all that is required is to bend a few pieces in the press and assemble them. I eventually want four dozen myself and I have some friends that need at least that many. So that's roughly $12,000 worth of trap's that will only cost us the price of the steel plus our time in assembling them. So I guess the reason's behind this is the need for a good trap, the need for more trap's, to save money in the long run, and the fun and satisfaction of making them. Catman50, thank's for the info. None of the parts will have to be tempered. The jaw's are 1/4" steel and pinned rather than hooked at the jaw post, so they are very strong. I don't think a wolf will ever bend them. There will be some welding to be done though, so do you think the weld's will cause case hardening and need to be annealed? Not sure it would be good to have brittle steel at the welds. Bigtwinhd, figureing out the building of the spring's took some doing for me. I ended up building a tool for winding them from information I got off the web on building torsion springs. I bought the music wire in coil's, then wind it around an arbor to the right number of wraps. The spring then has to be stress relieved by putting in an oven at 500 degrees for an hour. The stress relieving changes the angle on the end of the springs, so it took some experimenting to figure out where to stop coiling the wire so that the end's were in the proper position after stress relieving. Once you get that all figured out they go pretty fast. Thank's Forrest. Maybe by the time the wolves from yellowstone invade SW Ohio I'll be too old to trap anymore and I can send these down there to you.
|
|
|
Post by minnesotascott on Apr 16, 2011 14:01:22 GMT -5
I agree with going with cold rolled of hot rooled steel. Catman is 100% correct with the tempering of the steel.
|
|
|
Post by bushdog on Apr 22, 2011 6:20:51 GMT -5
Awesome work Speck. I like the name you chose also - Wolf Creek. Keep up the great work and let us know if you make different sizes.
|
|