Tack Welding the Frame Tubes

Today I moved the welding jig out to the garage in prep for tack welding. Ironically all the work that went into the jig culminated in about 30 seconds of welding. Every fiber of my being wanted to just keep on welding and have it finished but I knew inside that the hardest thing to undo is something welded in the wrong place, even it only slightly wrong. In fact the entire bike will be tack welded until all the alignments can be verified and then the welding will be finished.

In my humble opinion this is the sexiest piece of metal I have had any part of making. How could you not drool over this?

Finishing the Welding Jig

Ok, today we finish the welding jig we started yesterday, we left off with the cross tube part of the jig finished:

Cut a hole for the main tube to fit through. Obviously not a precise hole.

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Now screw 2 pieces of melamine together to square the piece the main tube will be attached to.

Butt the cross tub jig up.

Position the cross tube so it is centered on the main tube. Since the cross tube is now level, you just have to make sure the main tube sits down evenly in its notch. hmmm that reminds me I am not sure I checked that the notch is square to the main tubes bend, will have to check before welding...

Screw the cross tube jig to the piece the main tube is attached to.

We can now remove the piece used to as a square

Now we screw a square piece in the corner to square it that way (such precise words)

Now we fine tune where the main tube is sitting, this part should be level

Whoops! The table isn't level! The jig has to be moved to the garage for welding, so I will re-level everything there.

The jig is done! I feel like I should be doing a whole bunch of measuring to check everything, but that was the whole problem in the first place, no places to precisly measure from...

Starting the Jig for Aligning the Frame Tubes

Here is the start of the jig I will use to align the 2 frame tubes for welding. Today we deal with the cross tube.


Install a bolt in each end plate as a reference point.




Drill some temporary mounting holes


Screw on a 2x2 to the end plate.




Align the tube even with the bottom of a piece of melamine. the hole saw in the middle approximates where the next jig piece goes so it will line up with the pre-drilled holes

Nail the 2x2s in place.




The cross tube is now flat and level to the bottom edge of the melamine. Part one of the jig is now finished!