Tom Tom doesn't want to nerd out and tell us all about stress loads, moment arms, and buckling loads. But that's what he's actually calculating when he's building things that will hold the truck up in a super stressful environment. Mechanical engineering at it's finest without beating us over the head with it!
I loved the "you've got to get back to work" send off, I hope that becomes a permanent one. A big part of watching this channel for me is getting a bite sized portion of that 'working in the shop' feeling on the days that I cant make it to the shop myself. Keep up the good work Tom!
I've missed the last couple of episodes, so maybe I'm late to the post on this: your editing on this one was great! Did a great job telling the story of the build without showing too much. Good tempo and rhythm on the cuts. I know it just be a lot of extra work to set up the cameras to be able to do that, so good job. Keep up the great work! Also the build looks great, I'm excited to see how the AR400 works out. I haven't heard it used in other builds and have always wondered why.
I'm digging that hoodie Tom.. I don’t usually buy youtuber merch, but I’m gonna order one of these in the new year.. it looks comfy, great for those eastern Canadian winters!!
Since we’re talking alignment, a few times I’ve noticed that when you lift the truck and droop the suspension the tires turn to the left. That’s bump steer. Also noticed in some shots the track bar and steering arm off the pitman arm are not the same angle. This causes bump steer as well. Might be something to look at.
Tom Tom, try using 3m Cubitron II Pro 36 grit fibre discs. You won't believe how long they last and they are much cheaper. I use it for hardened steel refurbishing axes. VS anything else it's up to 5-10x more durable. 100% of people who tried them stayed with them, a lot of car and heavy machinery mechanics included
Love ruff stuff great products, quick service, affordable well made. Held my Cherokee together for years, also used their steering, absolutely fantastic
I’ll be honest, I really loved you on Matt’s channel but I wasn’t really into Tom Tom’s shop. However, today I found myself excited to see you dropped a new video on Dig-Dug. You’re growing on me Tom. Keep up the amazing fabrication
You should always spray welding primer on metal your welding together, especially when seam sealing where you’ve stitch welded. Rust will build up in between.
I used to spin the wheels and make a chalk mark around the circumference of the tires. Then use the marks to measure on the front and rear of the tires to set up initial tow-in.
I wonder what will be finished first, the spud truck or dig dug 😂, It would be good to see a test between dig dug and the banana (when the banana is working again)
Tom Tom, just some advise, when welding AR to mild steel you should preheat to at least 200 degrees, weld slowly and with a low hydrogen electrons stick weld or wire. Double check for cracking at the weld joints of the dissimilar materials when it has cooled completely. Thanks for your videos they are much appreciated. Merry Christmas! 🎄
Aircraft manufacturer - all our planes are super safe and strong and built with quality parts and multiple redundant systems and . . . Tom Tom - hold my beer.
Tom your bolts on fittings like that panhard bar should be facing to the rear. In the unlikely event of a nut coming off the bolt would not fall or rattle out. This is standard practice in working on aircraft where failure is not an option.
Reminds me of Chuck Yeagers story about being a test pilot and bailing out when the controls locked up. Several pilots had already died in the same type of aircraft, Chuck survived to explain what happened. Turns out a bolt was installed upside down from the design with the head on top. The guy who installed the bolt said, "I've been working on planes my whole life, I know which way to install a bolt". Except the engineer had specified the bolt be put in head down for clearance. Installed "normally" the bolt would bind when the wing was under inverted load causing the control surfaces to lock up and send the bird into a spin. Best practice is not always the best practice it turns out. Maybe TomTom should safety wire his nuts? My older brother was Airframe/powerplant certified and it drove him nuts working with us backyard mechanics, good enough was not really good enough for him. We raced cars together for a few years and I have to say. When you're doing over a hundred approaching a tight corner you really do start thinking about whether things will stay together. I never got into flying though it was always on the list.
I rebuilt a backhoe bucket where the back and bottom panels were ar 500, had to cut the old material off the quick connect coupler brackets. Say that stuff is just as bad as cutting ss. Was using cut off wheels all day, 10x tougher than cutting mild steel, trailing arm should beef up nice! Hey and be sure to not burn your phone camera up, think the frequency of the welder or light sensitivity may be off.
If watching Kurtis from Cutting Edge Engineering has taught me anything, it is that the right tool to cut material off excavator buckets is "air arc gouging". Basically like a stick welder with a carbon rod electrode and air blowing through it. Just eats any steel away. Gouge our all the welds and the plates just fall off.
Tom nice video! But metric and standard = metric and metric! Metric is the standard in most parts of the world as you know. In the end it does not matter what measuring unit you use as long as you are accurate in and consistent. You should come to Ireland, here we use both imperial and metric all mixed up. The result is tubes with imperial outer and metric inner dimentions 😂
The USA was supposed to be metric years ago. WE are not! It's an embarrassment for those who understand it. There is a reason most of the world is metric. It's far superior.
Tom, love the fabrication. Worried though once Dig-Dug is finished your fab days will be done. Hope that's not the case. Great how you beefed up the arms especially reinforcing the weak areas. Easy to forget you worked on the Heavy Wrecker and this isn't your first rodeo!
Hey Tom! Are you hoping to use Dig Dug for recoveries and rock-crawling any more? Or just going for a baja style runner? Whatever your goals, it is looking great!
Use the round stock between the shock holes...drill a hole thru for round stock center way between centerline of shock holes, put round stock in hole, plus 1/4 sticking out on each side...weld it up......stiffener for the load at shock connection
a faster speed will help with the dross on the plasma table, also the best tool I have found to remove dross the best is a multi tool or oscillating tool with a metal blade, use momentum and the pieces will fly off so use safety glasses!
Tom! I like your sweatshirt! Nice details :) I realize you are quite an educated engineer, so please take this with that in mind: I highly recommend that you remove those drawstrings on the hoodie if you are going to wear it while working in the shop around rotating work. Be safe & keep these great videos coming!!!! Happy Holidays!
Hey mate, if you want an easier time cleaning the slag off, go get yourself a masonry grinding disc. They're silicone carbide and far more effective agaist the slag. Then once you've ripped most of it off, go back over with the flap disc to tidy up. Will take you half the time and save you a heap of money on flap discs.
Tom Tom, i love your videos they just have to be longer. I would love to see you put out 45 min to 1 hr videos. I just get really hooked watching you, and the video is done. I think you do the best fab work of all the videos I watch. That's why I need longer videos. Have Angela come out and do the grinding and cleaning up the parts so you can keep welding and all the other stuff. Thank you very much for sharing the videos, and God bless you both. You're the best.
Shortening the front bottom control arms will make it more likely to do a death wobble. Lengthening arms will make it track straighter at speed, but increase steering effort-push into corners. Think motorcycle with a long raked out front end goes great on highway, not so much in a low speed.
I rally race, but I'm just an amateur. I invested in a portable wheel alignment kit. It's pretty handy and universal. As far as tools go, it wasn't all that expensive. If you had one in your shop you could do wheel alignments. They're really only good at making sure all four of your wheels align (and some basic adjustments for things like toe) but they're 'good enough' to align your wheels between especially rough stages or after you've had an incident.
Since we're both engineers of one sort or another I'm curious about your opinion of Watts links as opposed to track bars. I know their a lot more complicated but they track really well over most terrain. As for the rear track links, I'd scab quarter inch flat bar along the sides and drill holes to accommodate the shocks and struts. That said I don't hate your solution at all. I think it's a perfectly viable option.
Tom, I'm sure there is a simple answer to this, but why did you not build brackets of the top of the trailing arms for the shocks? That way it would look, be stronger and not full with mud and sand.
I love your content! It is great that you have a plasma table to cut things with. Do you think the arcdroid would be able to cut the ar400 plate? I just don’t have the space for a full size plasma table.
Also, good thinking on not welding the bottom material on entirely. It should be considered sacrificial material and relatively easy to change in the future.
Tom Tom doesn't want to nerd out and tell us all about stress loads, moment arms, and buckling loads.
But that's what he's actually calculating when he's building things that will hold the truck up in a super stressful environment. Mechanical engineering at it's finest without beating us over the head with it!
I loved the "you've got to get back to work" send off, I hope that becomes a permanent one. A big part of watching this channel for me is getting a bite sized portion of that 'working in the shop' feeling on the days that I cant make it to the shop myself. Keep up the good work Tom!
Oh yes bullet proof suspension..it's going to be fun to see this baby in action
I want to see a collab between Tom Tom and LT. Watching them out perfection each other would be a hoot!
yeah, that would be great!
Would be like watching paint dry.
@@whatnow5313 Extremely well done paint, applied after a great deal of surface preparation. I'd love it.
The detail work man is great. Looking great
Wow, you gained some subscribers. I love your videos ❤. Entertaining and educational ❤❤❤ Let's go TOMTOM!!!!
Drainage holes.
I was just about to comment that you needed them, lol
Great job Tom.
Excellent engineering of those trailing arms, they’re definitely 11.5% beefier than before 👍🇺🇸
Tom your the guy I want to use you for my consultant when I build.
All those 11% improvements are adding up and looking good.
Always makes me smile when a cat pops up in the middle of someones video :)
Thanks for sharing mate
Merry Christmas tom tom and family.
Nice work Tom Tom
I've missed the last couple of episodes, so maybe I'm late to the post on this: your editing on this one was great! Did a great job telling the story of the build without showing too much. Good tempo and rhythm on the cuts. I know it just be a lot of extra work to set up the cameras to be able to do that, so good job. Keep up the great work!
Also the build looks great, I'm excited to see how the AR400 works out. I haven't heard it used in other builds and have always wondered why.
Excellent craftsmanship as expected on your channel! Mega Kudos!
Tom Tom and Rory , Shawn , and Mike are the BEST 👍🏻🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸
Nice clean work Tom Tom,
_Brutal heavy-duty craftsmanship!_
Looking good, Tom. Don’t forget to recheck the dampening in those shocks, after adding all that extra unsprung weight!
Looks amazing
I'm digging that hoodie Tom.. I don’t usually buy youtuber merch, but I’m gonna order one of these in the new year.. it looks comfy, great for those eastern Canadian winters!!
Tom Tom, you are king of the fabricators. Love it!
King?
Really enjoying your new channel always one of the first I watch.
Since we’re talking alignment, a few times I’ve noticed that when you lift the truck and droop the suspension the tires turn to the left. That’s bump steer. Also noticed in some shots the track bar and steering arm off the pitman arm are not the same angle. This causes bump steer as well. Might be something to look at.
It is called the drag link. But you are correct, they need to be on the same angle.
@ yeah I got tired of going back and editing the post so I gave up lol
@@MODFARMER i get that. You knew enough that it had to be a brain fart.
He is a nuclear engineer, I think he has it covered.
The death wobble proved your point😂
Always interesting! Even the mundane things are interesting. When new episodes drop from the various creators, l always look for Tomtom’s first!
great as always great content very entertaining good job
Tom Tom, try using 3m Cubitron II Pro 36 grit fibre discs. You won't believe how long they last and they are much cheaper. I use it for hardened steel refurbishing axes. VS anything else it's up to 5-10x more durable. 100% of people who tried them stayed with them, a lot of car and heavy machinery mechanics included
Cant wait to see dig dug on the trail. Tom your meticulous approach to everything will pay off in performance and durability.
5:25 Bet you're glad you built the exhaust with clamps vice welding it all together. 👍
Love ruff stuff great products, quick service, affordable well made. Held my Cherokee together for years, also used their steering, absolutely fantastic
Good video.
@ 10:57 I ❤ that you brought the 11% over from Matt's Off Road !!!!! 🎉🎉🎉🎉
Going to be pretty awesome tomtom
Hope you and your family have a wonderful holiday!!
That trailing arms looks like they can take on a tank!
Good job
I’ll be honest, I really loved you on Matt’s channel but I wasn’t really into Tom Tom’s shop. However, today I found myself excited to see you dropped a new video on Dig-Dug. You’re growing on me Tom. Keep up the amazing fabrication
I always used to Jack it up. Get the tire spinning and scribe a line around both tires. Then just measure by the lines. Free and it works great.
Also I've found that straight axles generally end up with death rattles. A steering damper helps a lot.
You should always spray welding primer on metal your welding together, especially when seam sealing where you’ve stitch welded. Rust will build up in between.
Those arms came out great. Definitely more than 7% better
Thanks Tom Tom!!!
Good morning Tom!
You should tru the 3M Qubitron disc. They work well. Oh and I 11% approve this video over the normal 100%
I'll bet Barnes will want you to work for them. Good video.
I used to spin the wheels and make a chalk mark around the circumference of the tires. Then use the marks to measure on the front and rear of the tires to set up initial tow-in.
Got to love tomtom's work!
awesome build, really enjoying watching your process
Thank you
Your channel improves every time I watch it! Your ability to work on your own never ceases to amaze me Tom. Joy to watch your skills.
12:48 that's exactly my sense of humor.. not really puns, but vocabularic wit none the less.
I wonder what will be finished first, the spud truck or dig dug 😂,
It would be good to see a test between dig dug and the banana (when the banana is working again)
Get yourself some Walter excavator grinding disks, especially for material like AR plate.
Looking good Tom !!!
Tom Tom, just some advise, when welding AR to mild steel you should preheat to at least 200 degrees, weld slowly and with a low hydrogen electrons stick weld or wire. Double check for cracking at the weld joints of the dissimilar materials when it has cooled completely. Thanks for your videos they are much appreciated. Merry Christmas! 🎄
Tom's Engineer is showing.
Man, you really created a lot of extra welding for yourself with the way you cut all of your pieces and parts.
Beefier than a Beefy 5 layer burrito. 🔥🔥
I'm glad you built up those arms. I was concerned with that cut out.
Aircraft manufacturer - all our planes are super safe and strong and built with quality parts and multiple redundant systems and . . . Tom Tom - hold my beer.
You could also do hardfacing on those trailing arms, but I know the RUclips fabmasters shun stick welding!
If it works on buckets.. not a bad idea
Tom Tom On The Scene, nice!
TOM TOM starting to look like a WIZARDS 4X4 fit for SANTA and his CREW. Make sure you have a good tow hook for the reindeers
Always a sweet bead.
Tom your bolts on fittings like that panhard bar should be facing to the rear. In the unlikely event of a nut coming off the bolt would not fall or rattle out. This is standard practice in working on aircraft where failure is not an option.
Reminds me of Chuck Yeagers story about being a test pilot and bailing out when the controls locked up.
Several pilots had already died in the same type of aircraft, Chuck survived to explain what happened.
Turns out a bolt was installed upside down from the design with the head on top.
The guy who installed the bolt said, "I've been working on planes my whole life, I know which way to install a bolt".
Except the engineer had specified the bolt be put in head down for clearance. Installed "normally" the bolt would bind when the wing was under inverted load causing the control surfaces to lock up and send the bird into a spin.
Best practice is not always the best practice it turns out.
Maybe TomTom should safety wire his nuts?
My older brother was Airframe/powerplant certified and it drove him nuts working with us backyard mechanics, good enough was not really good enough for him.
We raced cars together for a few years and I have to say. When you're doing over a hundred approaching a tight corner you really do start thinking about whether things will stay together. I never got into flying though it was always on the list.
I rebuilt a backhoe bucket where the back and bottom panels were ar 500, had to cut the old material off the quick connect coupler brackets. Say that stuff is just as bad as cutting ss. Was using cut off wheels all day, 10x tougher than cutting mild steel, trailing arm should beef up nice! Hey and be sure to not burn your phone camera up, think the frequency of the welder or light sensitivity may be off.
If watching Kurtis from Cutting Edge Engineering has taught me anything, it is that the right tool to cut material off excavator buckets is "air arc gouging". Basically like a stick welder with a carbon rod electrode and air blowing through it. Just eats any steel away. Gouge our all the welds and the plates just fall off.
@@rlaxton666 Kurtis is a surgeon with a torch, some of his free handed work is art.
Loved your closing joke Tom!
Metric is far superior to imperial! Love to see you have embraced metric!
Tom nice video! But metric and standard = metric and metric! Metric is the standard in most parts of the world as you know. In the end it does not matter what measuring unit you use as long as you are accurate in and consistent. You should come to Ireland, here we use both imperial and metric all mixed up. The result is tubes with imperial outer and metric inner dimentions 😂
Great! Makes for lore. We need more lore.
I like how thorough you are, no halfway mods. Teaching an old guy new tricks, always interesting Tom
The USA was supposed to be metric years ago. WE are not! It's an embarrassment for those who understand it. There is a reason most of the world is metric. It's far superior.
Glad to see I am not the only person that makes mistakes.
In case you didn't know, Bleeping Jeep sells and makes that exact alignment tool. 🎉🎉🎉🎉😊😊😊
Tom, love the fabrication. Worried though once Dig-Dug is finished your fab days will be done. Hope that's not the case. Great how you beefed up the arms especially reinforcing the weak areas. Easy to forget you worked on the Heavy Wrecker and this isn't your first rodeo!
Hey Tom! Are you hoping to use Dig Dug for recoveries and rock-crawling any more? Or just going for a baja style runner? Whatever your goals, it is looking great!
Tom, maybe you should buy a fixture table with all that manufacturing.
In our manufacturing facility, we typically use a brick chisel to knock off slag from plasma or torch cuts - and also for scraping weld bb’s.
I've used a tape measure a lot. I need one of those
Nice work Tom..
Dirt and in trailing arms will be ongoing and will lead to rust. Maybe not a big problem in Utah.
Use the round stock between the shock holes...drill a hole thru for round stock center way between centerline of shock holes, put round stock in hole, plus 1/4 sticking out on each side...weld it up......stiffener for the load at shock connection
a faster speed will help with the dross on the plasma table, also the best tool I have found to remove dross the best is a multi tool or oscillating tool with a metal blade, use momentum and the pieces will fly off so use safety glasses!
Tom! I like your sweatshirt! Nice details :) I realize you are quite an educated engineer, so please take this with that in mind: I highly recommend that you remove those drawstrings on the hoodie if you are going to wear it while working in the shop around rotating work. Be safe & keep these great videos coming!!!! Happy Holidays!
Used AR400 for steel mill plate for hot metal scrap chutes. That’s going to be very tough!
1:25 .. I've done this by bolting on just empty rims, and measuring the space between them .. but this set up seems much more accurate!
Hey mate, if you want an easier time cleaning the slag off, go get yourself a masonry grinding disc.
They're silicone carbide and far more effective agaist the slag. Then once you've ripped most of it off, go back over with the flap disc to tidy up. Will take you half the time and save you a heap of money on flap discs.
Stay safe and we'll see you next time.
Great content.
Tom Tom, i love your videos they just have to be longer. I would love to see you put out 45 min to 1 hr videos. I just get really hooked watching you, and the video is done. I think you do the best fab work of all the videos I watch. That's why I need longer videos. Have Angela come out and do the grinding and cleaning up the parts so you can keep welding and all the other stuff. Thank you very much for sharing the videos, and God bless you both. You're the best.
Shortening the front bottom control arms will make it more likely to do a death wobble. Lengthening arms will make it track straighter at speed, but increase steering effort-push into corners. Think motorcycle with a long raked out front end goes great on highway, not so much in a low speed.
Wire wheel works great to take the slag off a plasma cut part. And they last a long time
I rally race, but I'm just an amateur. I invested in a portable wheel alignment kit. It's pretty handy and universal. As far as tools go, it wasn't all that expensive.
If you had one in your shop you could do wheel alignments. They're really only good at making sure all four of your wheels align (and some basic adjustments for things like toe) but they're 'good enough' to align your wheels between especially rough stages or after you've had an incident.
But will it now interfere with the muffler?
Since we're both engineers of one sort or another I'm curious about your opinion of Watts links as opposed to track bars. I know their a lot more complicated but they track really well over most terrain. As for the rear track links, I'd scab quarter inch flat bar along the sides and drill holes to accommodate the shocks and struts. That said I don't hate your solution at all. I think it's a perfectly viable option.
9:27 i clean them with a air chisel and they clean good
Tom, I'm sure there is a simple answer to this, but why did you not build brackets of the top of the trailing arms for the shocks? That way it would look, be stronger and not full with mud and sand.
It puts a ton of rotational torque on the trailing arm. Trophy trucks attach the shock at the bottom and leave the top and bottom open to avoid that
I love your content! It is great that you have a plasma table to cut things with. Do you think the arcdroid would be able to cut the ar400 plate? I just don’t have the space for a full size plasma table.
Those rear trailing arms are beautiful, have you considered production for them?
Hey Tom, wouldn’t it have been easier to cut the bolt off at 5:30 then to cut the muffler off and have to weld it back together?
Awesome 🤘
10:02 What is that angle grinder holder? Did you fab that or can you buy it? Great video thanks for sharing.
Also, good thinking on not welding the bottom material on entirely. It should be considered sacrificial material and relatively easy to change in the future.