had an idea! crazy modification of death!

[Steve302]

the reason you can weld, turn and polish a destroyed crank is because its a non-structural weld, cut the cast crank in half, weld it back together and see what happens

[Steve302]

the reason you can weld, turn and polish a destroyed crank is because its a non-structural weld, cut the cast crank in half, weld it back together and see what happens

[fordman]

ok well if you want to cut and reweld the drop beams go for it.

[layedout72]

this does work, its been done...succesfully. matter of fact i believe the guy cut the djms and made 6 inch beams out of them. plus he bagged it so it sees more stress than springs i guess.

its went cross country once, and gets loads of miles every year. his name is jamey jordan.

[AlleyCat]

I've seen a set of forged I beams that were cut and rewelded to lift an F250.The truck ran several years and a lot of hard miles without a problem.The guy who did the welding knows what he's doing.I can weld well enough for most things but for something like suspension parts I'd rather have someone who does specialty welding on a daily basis handle it.

[averagef250]

the reason you can weld, turn and polish a destroyed crank is because its a non-structural weld, cut the cast crank in half, weld it back together and see what happens

Every weld is structural to some degree.

Welding on the circumference of a steel or cast round does induce stresses into the part.

I repaired a center pivot joint on a ranger log skidder that sheared in half. It was 10" T-1 round stock with 3" fillets. The round stock sheared clean through at the weld area because it was improperly pre-heated.

If you gave me a nodular cast crank in two pieces I could weld it back together. It wouldn't be straight, but I would stand behind the weld joint being just as strong as the rest of the crank.

Going back to what I said to begin with, your own knowledge, equipment and skill is the limiting factor, not the part. The fact that the part is cast or that it's a heavily stressed suspension part isn't the reason why you can't weld it, it's because you don't think you can do it.

A big thing some of you may be missing here is the different types of cast iron and which processes can be used on which types. If the beams were regular gray cast the only way most people could cut and weld them back together would be weaker than the original. Since the beams are either nodular or forged steel this is a non-issue. I haven't looked at bumpside beams in awhile, but I recall they are forged and not cast. I know the later 1980+ ball joint beams are cast.

If the beams were gray cast iron they could be cut and welded as strong as original, but it would require the beams being heated to very high temperatures and using TIG.

[averagef250]

OK, to take this a step further, these are pictures of my 48" rigid pipe wrench. I had to cut it in half to fit it in a tight spot. When I was done with the job I put it back together. The pipe wrench is CAST nodular iron and believe me, it's had the snot beat out of it with cheaters after putting it back together.