What welding projects are you working on? Are you proud of something you built?
How about posting some pics so other welders can get some ideas?
TraditionalToolworks
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I've been envious over these Fornious pedals, they look the shizzle...
fronious foot pedal view of arm
fronious foot pedal view of arm
fronious-foot-pedal.jpg (32.31 KiB) Viewed 4116 times
EDIT: Adding pics of the pedal

This is the bottom of the pedal expanded:
ssc style pedal of bottom when expanded
ssc style pedal of bottom when expanded
ssc-pedal-bottom-expanded.jpg (130.31 KiB) Viewed 4124 times
This is the bottom of the pedal depressed:
ssc style pedal of bottom when depresed
ssc style pedal of bottom when depresed
ssc-pedal-bottom-depressed.jpg (143.23 KiB) Viewed 4125 times
This is the left side with the pedal depressed:
ssc style pedal of left side when depressed
ssc style pedal of left side when depressed
ssc-pedal-side-depressed.jpg (36.18 KiB) Viewed 4125 times
This is the right side with pedal depressed:
ssc style pedal of right side depressed
ssc style pedal of right side depressed
ssc-pedal-right-side-depressed.jpg (43.66 KiB) Viewed 4122 times
I use an SSC type pedal and it seems I'm usually kicking it farther under the table as I fab and/or grind between welding. With that arm you can just use your foot to lift the pedal back to it's rightful position. I mean, this is not a huge problem, but it just seems that Fronious came up with a good idea there.

That's such a good idea to have that arm over the top, but I haven't come to a good solution how to adapt something like that to an SSC style pedal. Seems it needs to be light, so plastic might be a good choice. Actually it seems like a good candidate for a 3D printer, but I don't have one let alone know how to use one.

For lightness aluminum seems a good choice, but I don't think aluminum bends very well.

Curious if anyone has any ideas on how they would make an arm such as that for an SSC style pedal? Seems using screws to the existing inside box towards the front of the pedal might work ok, giving enough space to allow the pedal portion to move freely.

Any ideas?

Alan
Last edited by TraditionalToolworks on Thu Mar 26, 2020 4:57 am, edited 4 times in total.
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Alan
tweake
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does the scc type have feet on the bottom?
if so that should give some clearance so you can run a bracket underneath, or if you don't mind a bit of height increase is to mount the bracket via the feet screw holes.
aluminium would be fine.
tweak it until it breaks
TraditionalToolworks
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tweake,

No feet, I added pics to the OP.

You can see there's not a lot of room, but I *MIGHT* be able to rivet the side of the top with the head on the inside. However it's pretty tight. :roll:

I think I need another pic of the side with the cable. There might be room to use small screws there.

Alan
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tweake
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whats the foot part made of?
maybe glue it straight to that. that might be better as when you lift it, it turns it off.
tweak it until it breaks
TraditionalToolworks
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tweake wrote:whats the foot part made of?
maybe glue it straight to that. that might be better as when you lift it, it turns it off.
It's metal, but with it attached to the top portion you are correct that it would turn off when lifted.

Alan
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TraditionalToolworks
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Admins/Moderators

I apologize for posting this to the wrong forum, if one of you could be so kind as to move it to the Project Ideas forum, I would appreciate that. I'll send a PM to Mike.

Alan
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Alan
cj737
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Glue some neoprene strips to the bottom. Still moves when you kick it intentionally, but is a great deal more anti-slip if your floor is broom finish concrete.
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I would slice an arc onto the side of the top of the foot pedal assembly that moves down. That way the foot-hook can be fastened to the bottom part, while not interfering with the moving top. I could easily print one of those hooks at the 3D printers at work. Now if only my work wasn't shut down at the moment, lol.
Image
TraditionalToolworks
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cj737 wrote:Glue some neoprene strips to the bottom. Still moves when you kick it intentionally, but is a great deal more anti-slip if your floor is broom finish concrete.
That might not be a bad idea. I do have a smooth concrete floor in my shop.
Oscar wrote:I could easily print one of those hooks at the 3D printers at work. Now if only my work wasn't shut down at the moment, lol.
Might be a good product to design, I think others would buy it. Not exactly sure if it's a solution to a problem that doesn't exist, but it's been an annoyance to me so for me it's a problem. I end up crawling on the floor to get the pedal, or yanking on the cord... :D
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TraditionalToolworks wrote:
cj737 wrote:Glue some neoprene strips to the bottom. Still moves when you kick it intentionally, but is a great deal more anti-slip if your floor is broom finish concrete.
That might not be a bad idea. I do have a smooth concrete floor in my shop.
Oscar wrote:I could easily print one of those hooks at the 3D printers at work. Now if only my work wasn't shut down at the moment, lol.
Might be a good product to design, I think others would buy it. Not exactly sure if it's a solution to a problem that doesn't exist, but it's been an annoyance to me so for me it's a problem. I end up crawling on the floor to get the pedal, or yanking on the cord... :D
The problem is that it wouldn't be plug-n-play.
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TraditionalToolworks
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Oscar wrote:The problem is that it wouldn't be plug-n-play.
If you could make it clip on the top, it could be. There is not a lot of room to work with between the top/bottom, but it might be possible to have a small ledge that would clip on top/bottom of each side and will allow the pedal to operate smoothly.
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clavius
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As was suggested already, You could simply make a rectangle of aluminum sheet metal a bit wider than the pedal (wide enough to not rub the sides of the top) and tall enough to form the hook for your foot. Slide the pedal into it and just secure it to the bottom with a couple of sheet metal screws or pop rivets. You could fasten some rubber to the bottom as has already been suggested so it won't slide as readily.

For that matter, you could just fasten it to the top. It will move as you step on the pedal but that has no effect on anything. A simple upside-down "U" shape fastened to the top part of the pedal would get you there. If you made it out of steel, a couple of small tack welds to the side of the pedal would hold it just fine and solve the issue of clearance that screws might have.

As for not being able to bend aluminum, if it's thin sheet it should bend readily, and this does not need to be super strong. It's not holding up anything but itself. If you want to make it out of thicker material, you could just make it out of 4 separate parts and try to find some guy with a welder who could weld them together. If you ask around, I'm sure you could find someone....
:)

Overall, this is actually a good idea. I may do something like this with mine.
TraditionalToolworks
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clavius wrote:As was suggested already, You could simply make a rectangle of aluminum sheet metal a bit wider than the pedal (wide enough to not rub the sides of the top) and tall enough to form the hook for your foot. Slide the pedal into it and just secure it to the bottom with a couple of sheet metal screws or pop rivets. You could fasten some rubber to the bottom as has already been suggested so it won't slide as readily.
Yeah, I think this would work actually. I didn't see it suggested, so going to give you credit! :D
clavius wrote:For that matter, you could just fasten it to the top. It will move as you step on the pedal but that has no effect on anything.
I hadn't thought about it too much, but after tweake mentioned not having an effect on the pedal when you lift it, I thought about that and wasn't sure if there could be a problem if the pedal is expanded you lift it with your foot and it causes the top portion to activate and turn the argon on...that would suck. :roll:
clavius wrote:Overall, this is actually a good idea. I may do something like this with mine.
Clever whoever thought of it. I think there's more people than me that have tried to reach their foot under the welding table to get the pedal back to no avail...
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Alan
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