Fire and Steel

One of the more 'fun' toys I've picked up over the last 5 years has been a 'stick' welder or 'buzz box' as some call them, as well as a wire feed welder.  The adjoining photo is of my older son learning the basics once he overcame his initial intimidation.   The wire feed or 'big red' is just visible in the background...  That table he is working at was built using a combination of the stick welder and a wire feed unit borrowed from a neighbor prior to my obtaining the one I now have.  The table is made of salvaged steel from the local scrap yard.  The top is a piece of 'catwalk' grate.  It's basically a bunch of parallel strips of flat stock set on edge and held in place with 1/4 in rods on the bottom side.  The rods keep the strips on edge, and the strips provide a relatively light weight but very rigid platform.   The thing I like about it is that I can cut steel, drill, weld, etc., with minimum damage or alteration of the table serface. You can beat the hell out of it and it just takes it. The junk piled up on the bottom are miscellaneous GoKart parts...(that's for another time).  The second photo is of the pipe sections my son was practicing with.

This shot (sorry for the poor quality...it was taken using the camera in my cell phone ) also shows the grate or strips on edge that make up the welding table's top.  I mounted casters (wheels) to the bottom of the table so that it could be moved around as needed.  If you do much welding sooner or later you'll want a platform to get your work up off the ground.  It's a real lower back saver...!  Sorry I don't have better pictures of everything.  Maybe I'll add them as time goes on(?).