[dieselshadow]

I'm posting this to show other members what's involved in properly welding some hooks to your bucket. The procedure is the same for most projects.

We'll need to gather some stuff before starting this little project. You'll need your welder, I'm using a MIG welder, but a stick or TIG machine would work here too. Some safety gear is needed such as a fire extinguisher :fire: and some good welding leathers, hood, and welding gloves. I don't need to mention the miscellaneous hand tools you'll want. Then you'll need to find a cold beer...

First, let's get the bucket at a comfortable working height. Make sure to block it up to prevent it falling down during your work.

Let's decide where to put our hooks.

A little layout is in order. I drew out center lines and traced out the reinforcement plates I'm using.

We need to clean off all off the paint where the plates and welds will be. I used a flap wheel on a grinder. Then redraw your center lines to help re-alignment of the plates.

While the grinder is out, make sure to clean off a spot for your ground clamp!

Here's our ground clamp.

Tack the reinforcement plates where you want them. Thanks goes to Kenny for supplying these plates:drinks:

I plug welded all of the bolt holes for a stronger bond directly below the hook.

We need to level the welds to the top of the plate.

Perimeter weld the plates. Don't do it all at once on a plate. Weld a bead on one plate, go to a different plate and weld a bead and so forth. This will allow the metal to cool and minimize any warping of your bucket. That's right warping. Anytime you weld any metal, it shrinks when you weld it. More on this later.

Close up of one of the perimeter welds.

Let's weld on the hooks. We need to grind or sand off the bottom of the hooks where the weld will be first. This gets rid of any crap that can contaminate your weld. Remember to tack first. This way you can check it's alignment before you make it permanent.

You'll notice a lot of grinding marks after welding the hooks and plates. My welding wire is over 3 years old and was exposed to high levels of humidity. I'm almost out and was being too cheap to go ahead and replace it. The quality of your welding supplies has a huge effect on the quality of your welds. This is a great example, I had a lot of spatter, hence all the grinding for clean-up. I had a good welder friend who told me once that he's never met a weld a grinder couldn't fix.:lol: He would also tell you that your boss pays you to weld, not grind.:laugh:


Continued....

 

[dieselshadow]

continued

Now that the hooks are welded on, we can finish our project with a little paint!

I think we did a pretty good job:thumbup1gif:

Don't forget to paint where the ground clamp was!

A little advice, do not use water or anything to cool your hot welds. It can over stress the metal and crack unexpectedly. It's never a good idea to cool any weld unless the procedure calls for it.:thumbup1gif:




Where did I put that beer I opened up a few hours ago?:unknown:

Feel free to add your advice and tips! :drinks:

 

[has15]

Great post Jason!:thumbup1gif: Maybe SOME DAY I to will have a welder to play(OOPS)I mean WORK with....:laugh::drinks:

 

[ralphtt]

Congratulations on a job well done. And thanks for the tutorial!

What size hooks did you use?

 

[dieselshadow]

Congratulations on a job well done. And thanks for the tutorial!

What size hooks did you use?

Thanks Ralph.:hi: I was trying to expose whats involved to anybody who might want to take on something similar on their own.:drinks:

I used 5/16 grab hooks from Grainer. $5 each. My setup is very close to Kenny's hooks only welded on instead of bolt-on. The reinforcement plates I used are from him and I think these are the exact same hooks he uses:good2:

 

[Kennyd]

A++ Jason, Hats off to you! :good2:

 

[Tomfive]

Jason, First Class Job :thumbup1gif:

 

[RandyM]

Very professional. :good2:

 

[robpm]

Jason, Very nice job. i like the 3 hooks. I want to put some on my bucket, I would like 3/8 or 1/2". I would have used Kenny's however I have a heavy duty bucket with a double wall and again I would like a larger hook than 5/16.

Now here is my question. I have never welded before. I did some brazing with a torch when I was in HS but that goes back about 34 years. I sweat pipes when I need to with my acetylene torch. If one wanted to start out welding what would you recommend for equipment and for training. It seems to me welding is a learned art and that you get better with practice and having knowledge is important as well. What type of welding would you recommend someone start out with, stick, mig or tig? I don't have the cash right now to go into this. I do have a friend who has a mig welder and I would be able to use it if I desired.

I look forward to your input.

Thanks

Rob

 

[dieselshadow]

Jason, Very nice job. i like the 3 hooks. I want to put some on my bucket, I would like 3/8 or 1/2". I would have used Kenny's however I have a heavy duty bucket with a double wall and again I would like a larger hook than 5/16.

Now here is my question. I have never welded before. I did some brazing with a torch when I was in HS but that goes back about 34 years. I sweat pipes when I need to with my acetylene torch. If one wanted to start out welding what would you recommend for equipment and for training. It seems to me welding is a learned art and that you get better with practice and having knowledge is important as well. What type of welding would you recommend someone start out with, stick, mig or tig? I don't have the cash right now to go into this. I do have a friend who has a mig welder and I would be able to use it if I desired.

I look forward to your input.

Thanks

Rob

Rob, I think MIG welding is probably the easiest for beginners. Set the voltage and wire speed for the thickness of metal you're working with, then "point and shoot". It's not quite that easy but it sorta is. MIG welding with gas is much better but adds to the expense and can only be done indoors or outdoors on a calm day. Stick welding is cheaper and more versatile. You can weld anywhere, indoors or out. Stick requires more practice and skill however. TIG is not really a beginner's best choice. It is the most labor intensive and requires the most skill. It's also the most expensive. So you have to ask yourself. What's my budget? Where am I going to weld? What do I want to weld?

We've got a lot of good welders on this forum. I'm sure you can get a ton more advice. There is some good reading in this section "Metalworking & Fabrication". When you get ready to buy a welder, start a thread. I'm sure we can help you choose the best one for you:thumbup1gif:

 

[robpm]

Jason, thanks! I hope to do it but it will be a little down the road. I have lots of ideas for projects to be done especially now that I have the tractor. I will look at your references when I get ready. and maybe I will use my friends MIG to get started at some point just to get the feel before I really decide to run out and buy something.

Rob

 

[dieselshadow]

Rob, the best piece of advice I can give you is talk to one of your friends who welds. They can teach you more in five minutes than anybody can in an hour in a forum. I call tell you a lot of stuff, but it helps to see it right in front of you. Welding is a form of art in my opinion. The technical side of it can be researched and learned relatively easily. It's the skill of how to do it and make it look good that comes with time and patience. A good teacher looking over your shoulder can really make a big difference in a hurry.:drinks:

 

[Fran_K]

mig is kind of a misused term. I think it is a shortened version of gmaw, gas metal arc welding. That is a solid wire with shielding gas. There is fcaw flux core arc welding which is what the lowest cost machines do with a self shielding wire, no gas. The fcaw has both self shielded and gas shielded sides with different polarities and different lettering (pretty sure) on the wire spools. So if you say my firiend has a mig he really might not have the gmaw set up. Before the internet folks went to the library.

A 5/16 weld on hook will work with 3/8 chain and 1/4 chain. For what most of the posts on here pertain to for tractor size a high grade of 1/4 inch chain probably would be plenty. I have yet to break a 70 grade 5/16 chain with my 5000 series tractor. Yes I have broken some old unknown grade 5/16 links. Even then it was probably rigged wrong or got frustrated and started yanking instead of a steady pull. Why us a heavier chain than necessary unless you need to piece together everything in sight to get the length needed.

As to commenting on the project at the start of this thread. I see those holes for plug welding in other things like spring hangers for trailers and now know what they are for. Depending on how you end up using the hooks whether you like this suggestion. cut off the hook in the center and put a piece of metal with a hole in it perhaps an inch and a quarter in diameter. Then you can put a shackle with about an inch and an eighth pin in it or make something with a gab hook to bolt in. you could then put the bucket on the ground attach chains to the two end hooks and lay them out straight. Pile on whatever you have brush logs fence posts etc. Run the chains through the shackles pull as tight as you can and hook the chain to itself. You also will find that size shackle I described has just enough room where it goes from round to flattened to get a 3/8 slipper hook on it but it will only come off at that spot not where it would normally be. I occaionallywork with a guy with a wheel loader a cat 950 perhaps and it has in the center of the bucket something like I describe but it has a ring with both a grab and slipper hook of course much larger than what I typed above.


Fran

 

[robpm]

Fran,

Thanks for the input. My friend has what you call a gmaw. It has gas but you can change the polarity and use wire with flux as well so it will do both.

Interesting info on setting up hooks etc on your bucket. I like the info.

Thanks

Rob

 

[pwt]

Excellent post. Really Appriciated.

 

[DBCSteve]

Got my new 3046R last week. While the tractor was back in the shop to fix some hydraulics I decided to weld hooks on the bucket. Thanks to Ken for the steel plates -- I already had the hooks. Done this before -- both bolt-on and weld-on for various tractors over the years (blue, yellow, orange and now green).

 

[Old Machinist]

MEH!

Cut one leg off a piece of 4"X4"x1/4" angle iron leaving about 3/4" for the front. Weld on top of bucket to reinforce. Use pieces of the leg you cut off to reinforce the sides. Cut the bottom eye off some HF forged 3/8" chain hooks. Weld em on to the top. Picks up anything MY loader has the strength for.

 

[PW1986]

Okay, so I have a question. I am going to weld on some hooks and a clevis mount to the bucket on my 1025r. Being that the lift capacity is so low on the tractor why would it be necessary to first weld the hook to a backing plate then the backing plate to the loader? I understand the concept and if I were welding on hooks to a full size tractor loader or skid loader I agree with the backing plate. Has anyone welded hooks straight to the bucket with problems?

 

[Gizmo2]

PW1986, I'd use a plate. The steel on these small buckets is petty thin. I'd be concerned about the heat on the thin steel. I'd hate to see you rip the bucket steel.

 

[Kbar]

I welded some shackles early on and ahem, cough, warped the top of my bucket a little doing some heavy lifting, tugging, wrangling of some quite large logs. Luckily I got it straightened out and I immediately ordered the bolt on hooks, Clovis combo from Kenny. They come with backing plates and sandwich the bucket between them reinforcing it generously. After some more “givin her all she’s got Captain!” No molestation occurred to the bucket. Use backing plates. You don’t want to do any more weight addition like the 4’ piece of flat stock someone above did. Just a couple inches like Jason shows in the OP and it will be strong like bull