best way to HOG aluminum.... by hand

A

alinwa

oft dis'd member
I'm whittling a stock out of a 2X4X36 hunk of aluminum. Much of the contouring is parallel and mild radius so my manual Bridgeport is fine but the pistol grip area is tacticooled out all A3 style so's my thumb clears the rear of the bolt. I've been hollowing it out using;
-mill
-bandsaw
-sawzall
-chainsaw
-circular pea grinder chainsaw
-diamond wheels and cutters with huge 1/4" "teeth" for grinding concrete
-7 different belt/rotary/hotrod sanders/die-grinders and right-angle grinders
-and a "double-cut" saw with dual counter-rotating blades.



The perfect thing would be a coarse 6-8-10" grinding "wheel" with cheese-grater teeth I could belly up to and free-bang all up in there.....

Ideas?

Anyone ever remove inches/pounds of AL by hand?
 
alinwa said:
I'm whittling a stock out of a 2X4X36 hunk of aluminum. Much of the contouring is parallel and mild radius so my manual Bridgeport is fine but the pistol grip area is tacticooled out all A3 style so's my thumb clears the rear of the bolt. I've been hollowing it out using;
-mill
-bandsaw
-sawzall
-chainsaw
-circular pea grinder chainsaw
-diamond wheels and cutters with huge 1/4" "teeth" for grinding concrete
-7 different belt/rotary/hotrod sanders/die-grinders and right-angle grinders
-and a "double-cut" saw with dual counter-rotating blades.



The perfect thing would be a coarse 6-8-10" grinding "wheel" with cheese-grater teeth I could belly up to and free-bang all up in there.....

Ideas?

Anyone ever remove inches/pounds of AL by hand?
Click to expand...

Bandsaw / hacksaw what you can, then course rasps and rifflers followed by progressively finer files. Vixen / Vixie files work well too, but I've only seen flat versions. Rasps come in all shapes.

GsT
 
Thank you for your suggestions, I'll use 'em all for cleaning up but I HADDA' post a pic of the tool I bought have just now been trying out. A "double-cut saw" with counter-rotating blades.

This thing eats aluminum like a bear in corn.....

IMG_20220518_153718219_HDR.jpg

It takes of just as much material as a chainsaw but I can run it up close and personal, "sweeping" the cuts.

freakin monster
 
Turns out my old double-cut saw was just wikkid dull...... it showed promise but didn't spew chips. When I went down to buy blades they only had whole saws so I brought home a new one. The difference was startling! Now I'll order some new blades at leisure for both saws
 
You're braver than I am, that looks downright dangerous. Are you handholding those tools? Evidently you are also a lot stronger than I am. I hope you succeed in your effort! Picture when it is all finished please.
 
lion said:
You're braver than I am, that looks downright dangerous. Are you handholding those tools? Evidently you are also a lot stronger than I am. I hope you succeed in your effort! Picture when it is all finished please.
Click to expand...

Took an hour and a selection of fairly esoteric tools to debone 'er but she's now wide open the the elements and carves 360 degrees. I'm VERY conversant with hand tools and can use it safely. I wouldn't hand it to my 14-yrold kid, and if I do it'll be with an hour of instructions thrown in gratis, but he has to ask permission to use the tractor or skidsteer too. My kids can't even walk to withine 50ft of a running machine on our property. They're trained to wave, call, drive thru my vision, fire a bottle rocket acros't the bow....

Yeahh, I guess you could say it's dangerous but no more so than a chainsaw...... I wouldn't recommend carving statuary and lawn furniture for the "normal" user either but I personally know 6 chainsaw artists and they all have all their parts :)

I'm a safety geek, but that doesn't mean I quit driving to Church Sunday morning.....

I will take a pic of both the tool and the final product...... I might even post an instructional vid on my youtube channel, because it's what I DO :) I've got a video of hand-inletting with a dremel coming out tomorrow matter-of-fact, might just tag this bad boy on in the next few weeks, it's that good!
 
antelopedundee said:
How many beer cans could be made from the "shavings" from this project?
Click to expand...

I've swept up 5 5-gallon buckets so far..... 25-ish gallons

I texted my pyro kid..... "I just took the skidsteer over and flung 25lb of AL shavings on the burnpile" and he texted back "OUCH!! Are you OK??...Do you need help?"

To which I replied "nope. thanks to you I DID NOT just wobble over and dump the shavings into a fire. I now know better.... your pyrotechnics may have saved my life!!"
 
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