Over the summer we found a mess of old barrel hoops - more rust than
steel, no doubt. A few weeks ago I turned them into two of these



(I only took a picture of it during a recent snow storm, and just uploaded
them now... I know, I'm lame... )

A friend recently gave me an old AC225 he had no need for, so I
figured I'd use that to weld them together. I really had not done much
stick, other than one night in an adult ed course I took over a year ago.
All I can say is that it's a good thing that I didn't get a picture of the
beads... they'd be embarrassing and you guys would laugh me off of
this bboard... In truth, some worked out fairly well, some didn't.
It was a learning experience. It was fun playing with the output
setting on the buxxboz and to see the effect.

Each sphere is 4 hoops, spaced more-or-less equally. Once I welded
them all together, I drilled a 1/2" hole through the middle and
stuck some 1/2" rod up through the hole and welded that in place.
The finial on top is cast iron thingie we found and welded onto the
rod.

The sphere is kind of flattened -- they did not nest "nicely" so the bigger
ones had to be squished down to fit.

Frank