Plasma table thin steel storage tray

[SRdesign]

I was storing my 14ga 4 x 8 sheets under my table on the floor of my shop. That’s what I mostly use. But eventually I’d like to store larger sheets on a low riding platform that will roll under my table. So I made a pull out drawer that fits in the cross braces of my table. It will slide out 5ft with 3ft left under the table. I don’t ever have more than 5 sheets of 14ga in my shop at one time as this isn’t my full time job so it won’t be a ton of weight on the tray. It’s made of 2x2x3/16 square tube, 1”pillow block bearings, 1.5” rod that was turned down to fit the pillow block bearings and turned down to keep the 2” tube from moving left and right, unistrut, and unistrut trolleys. I’m still waiting for the paint to fully dry before I load sheets onto it with the crane.

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[ROKCRLER]

Thats pretty cool! I wish my table had under table storage access like that

[djreiswig]

Neat idea. Did you put stops in the strut to keep it from rolling out too far? The square dimpled washers and strut nuts would work good for this.

[adbuch]

This looks great! I will look forward to seeing it "in action". Nice design.
David

[SRdesign]

Neat idea. Did you put stops in the strut to keep it from rolling out too far? The square dimpled washers and strut nuts would work good for this.

The strut is bolted on the front cross member. The bolt head keeps the rollers from rolling out of the end. It is welded in the middle section and bolted at the other end of the table.

[SRdesign]

This looks great! I will look forward to seeing it "in action". Nice design.
David

Thanks David. I’ll probably load the sheets on this afternoon. My hope is that with 5ft sticking out I can slide the top sheet out enough that I can load it up onto the table easier. We will see how that works out

[arnegrant]

Nice.

[djreiswig]

This looks great! I will look forward to seeing it "in action". Nice design.
David

Thanks David. I’ll probably load the sheets on this afternoon. My hope is that with 5ft sticking out I can slide the top sheet out enough that I can load it up onto the table easier. We will see how that works out

You might need a lock so it doesn't roll back in while you're loading the sheets. Or maybe you already thought of this.

[SRdesign]

I loaded my sheets of 14ga that I had in the shop. The drawer works almost the way I would like it to. I can pull a sheet out and load it on the table but I still have to have a support or back stop to keep the sheet from wanting to slide backwards while loading. But it does the main job that I built it for which was storage. Yes djreiswig, I was worried that I might need a lock but for whatever reason when I loaded the first sheet it didn’t want to roll back in. I think by dumb luck the way I “designed it” (more like winged it) the rollers in front are slightly lower than the unistrut trolley height so it doesn’t want to roll in freely. But once the first sheet is on, every sheet after that slides on pretty easy. It rolls in and out better with the weight on it.

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[Jason@bc]

Good job there SR Design, anything that makes work easier/faster is worth the effort, and being able to do it yourself is even better.

[SRdesign]

Good job there SR Design, anything that makes work easier/faster is worth the effort, and being able to do it yourself is even better.

Thank you sir. I’m especially glad they’re off the floor of the shop.

[tinspark]

Nice Idea. I like the tuned down 1-1/2 shaft with the tube slide machined in

[tnbndr]

Perhaps you could modify it and open the ends and have tubing slid inside the tray that will slide out when it is extended. These tubes would support your 3' of overhang from drooping down as you slide a sheet back and lift up the front. If that makes any sense.

There is a video of the storage I built in this thread somewhere:
viewtopic.php?f=130&t=12845

[SRdesign]

Perhaps you could modify it and open the ends and have tubing slid inside the tray that will slide out when it is extended. These tubes would support your 3' of overhang from drooping down as you slide a sheet back and lift up the front. If that makes any sense.

There is a video of the storage I built in this thread somewhere:
viewtopic.php?f=130&t=12845

I’m not sure what I’m going to do yet as far as that’s concerned but it is a good idea and it would definitely work as you describe it. Funny thing about your video…. I watched it a few years ago before I built my table and I liked both your cart and the sliding mechanism on your table. If you look closely at the pic above you can see about 2” of space between my water table and the square tubing on the side of my table. I was going to copy your idea but use unistrut and unistrut rollers to slide down both sides. I never ended up doing it and I used the unistrut and rollers for this project. Now that I have an overhead crane I don’t think I will ever make the slider… but it was a great idea by you.