What has 104 parts, 592 welds and takes 2 guys all weekend to make?

[Sberry]

It is a nice job and don't mean to lose sight of that but since this is a discussion forum of ideas this is a good project to give some slight critique to. A couple of slight design and bracing changes would have allowed for ease of construction and allowed to double the storage capacity. I wish I was a draftsman, this post design is basically very good in principle.

[Bert]

Sberry,
ok, now that you got me and I'm sure others wondering, I'm sure it could be BRACED differently (though I have no clue how, some of those "branches" might not hold, depending on how much more metal he adds on top), how would he double the capacity???More branches?

[tasslehawf]

Sberry,
ok, now that you got me and I'm sure others wondering, I'm sure it could be BRACED differently (though I have no clue how, some of those "branches" might not hold, depending on how much more metal he adds on top), how would he double the capacity???More branches?

The way I tend to design my pieces, I would have simply ran several sq. tubing pieces between the uprights. I could see there could be some concern with the "spindly" cross braces.

[Bert]

The way I tend to design my pieces, I would have simply ran several sq. tubing pieces between the uprights. I could see there could be some concern with the "spindly" cross braces.

well, if you ran "several", makes me think you would run them horizontally to fit them in, but that would let it sway. He went diagonally, which is a better way. or am I wrong?

[tasslehawf]

well, if you ran "several", makes me think you would run them horizontally to fit them in, but that would let it sway. He went diagonally, which is a better way. or am I wrong?

I made a larger rack (8') with no diagonal bracing and one long span instead of a support in the middle. In fact, I use angle iron instead of sq. tubing to attach the two ends together and there was no sway.

[Bert]

IronHead: YOU HAVING FUN WITH YOUR CRAYONS???!!!!
I agree with you though....I'm sure he's got welds in the middle "X"

Tasslehawf: I'm kinda shocked you have no sway with no diagonals!!!

What my main concern was, is the "branches" are just held up at one point/end. Should he fill that sucker up with metal, I would think it would crack/bend. I just wanted to see how SBerry would do it. ALWAYS looking for new ways to make things better

[monte55]

Been looking at the rack. Nice job. Idea.......how about bending the end angles on all the horizontal pieces? You will save a lot of cutting and welding.
That small of an angle would be easy even without a bender.

[Sberry]

generally I might have made the arms almost horizontal with a little keeper to keep material and rounds from rolling off, took about one set out to give a little more space and added the bracing horizontal to make cross rack for shorts, could even use expanded metal on one set to make a good place for small drops. With this design one could basically add as many shelves between as desired.

[Sberry]

Sberry,
ok, now that you got me and I'm sure others wondering, I'm sure it could be BRACED differently (though I have no clue how, some of those "branches" might not hold, depending on how much more metal he adds on top), how would he double the capacity???More branches?

Remember, each branch and brace here holds only the weight applied to it, not the total of the whole rack, plus its divided by 3.
Now you could weld some pieces of rod to the posts to rack shorts across. As Ironhead said, this thing is strong and then some.

[Sberry]

The only weld that is doing any substantial amount of "work" on the branches is the top one. A failure would never occur from pulling this weld off under this type of load, it would come from compressing on the underside, either the bottom of the branch or in the column, take a tremendous amount of load and there is another tube opposite in this case.
It would be interesting for an engineer to run this project up for some analysis. I am very critical of my own work and hindsight is a wonderful thing, most things I build I would improve again from shear experience.
I think this a great project and has so many basic design options and basic loading, good layman's study and could certainly help with basic design skills.
Some of the concerns here are legit but not crucial such as sway and twist. They could be better explained or drawn by someone that knew how. My deal would be to try to see how much I could get in this space with the least amount of time and materials.