Home Made Load Frame
Home Made Load Frame
(OP)
Does anyone have experience building a load frame from scratch? After looking at Gilson and Humboldt prices ($3500+/-) for their basic load frames, I am wondering how hard it might be to make one.
I am a bit of a dunce with mechanical/electrical stuff. Where is a good place to get started to figure out how to build such a machine?
I am a bit of a dunce with mechanical/electrical stuff. Where is a good place to get started to figure out how to build such a machine?





RE: Home Made Load Frame
RE: Home Made Load Frame
RE: Home Made Load Frame
I've even used this sort of thing for "consolidation" testing of Shelby tubes with peat maybe 12" high to estimate settlements in peat bogs or to estimate time for surcharging needed.
For this idea of doing it yourself for gear you probably need a well equipped shop, including a MIG welder. A metal lathe comes in handy also. Of course a drill press capable of 1" diameter holes in steel. Bench grinder, power hack saw, etc. are a few also very handy.
RE: Home Made Load Frame
The manual load frames are a little cheaper to purchase than the motorized versions. Regarding manual crank and Remac testers; how do you know what your strain rate is? I believe ASTM D2166 states it should be 0.02 inches per minute for soil. If applying a faster rate of strain, you will get a higher compression strength value. Obviously hand crankers and Remacs are used, and Remacs and even sanctioned by certain DOTs for field testing of split spoon samples. Nobody uses Remac testers in my area. I would be afraid of being accused of deviating from standard practice, thus rendering the Remac results useful information but more closer to a pocket pen than to a true UC test regarding the accepted reliablity of the information. Basically, I could supplement UC testing with a Remac, but not replace the load frame. What are your thoughts in this?
RE: Home Made Load Frame
RE: Home Made Load Frame
Have you ever been in a lawsuit where a lawyer called in to question any of your methods that were not performed in accordance with a locally accepted practice or an ASTM procedure. If so, what happened?
RE: Home Made Load Frame
RE: Home Made Load Frame
OG is correct that the test is not one of critical accuracy, so why worry about the method so much. Well, even though the accuracy of the test doesn't mean a great deal in respect to the overall geotechnical recommendation, there is a reason the procedural aspects of the standard must be followed......
Terratek is right that we have to be concerned about adherence to published/accepted standards. In particular, D2166 is a standard that is referenced in the IBC and in various state codes, thus making it a mandatory standard and must be followed as if included in its entirety within the code. To deviate from the standard can constitute non-compliance with the building code, thus making you violate our standard of care, which in turn, puts you in a liability position.
Construction litigators have gotten a lot more sophisticated over the years. When I first started, almost any lawyer would take a client's construction claim and deal with it as any other litigation. Not so anymore. Construction litigation is a legal specialty and has a lot of legislation and case law to back it up. Even a seasoned attorney who is not a construction specialist will typically shy away from taking on a construction case. As a veteran of over 70 depositions and over 15 trials, a few arbitrations and a bunch of mediations, I can assure you the expert's methods are questioned in every way possible!!
RE: Home Made Load Frame
I was hoping you would chime in, since you inspired my post in the first place. You made a comment in a past post once about load frames being easy to make and how load cells are ever cheaper online. Do you have an electric powered load frame plan/schematic?
RE: Home Made Load Frame
It has been a while since I built one, so don't have schematics available. The first one I built was hydraulic and manual. The second was strain controlled using a screw actuator (electric). The software control and the relays we needed for load reversal were a bit of a challenge (it was not for soils....it was for loading tree stands for testing). Same concept applies to soils. That was about 20 years ago. The software and controllers are much better now, so shouldn't be much of an issue. You can probably get by with less than $1500 if you do it yourself. Hopefully you can weld as that makes the frame construction much easier. I built the hydraulic one out of steel channel and it would easily do 10 tons.
RE: Home Made Load Frame
Every now and then we'd have a visitor to the lab who would find "his" piece of equipment and look lovingly at it. Seems as if everything was fabricated as part of the course requirements for Soils Engineering and the prof used all the equipment in his own (private) engineering firm. Some of that eventually came to the satellite office where I worked.
I tried to track down whatever happened to it all, but it seems to have disappeared in a series of office closings and consolidations. Too bad--it was great stuff.
RE: Home Made Load Frame
The experience was phenomenal!
RE: Home Made Load Frame
Same here--it was a lot of what made the job exciting and fun.