Ozzy, the hospital tray BB30 showed is great. He gave one to my brother and we use it a lot. It’s pretty sturdy too. We just laid 2 compsands in separate bags plus a rocker jig on it and holds that without any problems. It will give you plenty of height and it’s really simple to lift up when you want to do the laps. It also has wheels, so it’s so easy to move around and store when you don’t need it. I wish I could find those locally.
I have these stands for when I cut long pieces of wood, but they would need to be converted to have a top that can hold the board.
Look for these kinds of things too. We use them at work.
I thought you meant a different kind. Sorry. I will check around for something like that, but I live in a tiny town. The nearest big city/hospital is an hour away, so it’s doable if I get lucky. I am on a very tight budget, but I’ll have to do what I have to do. I have a dedicated glassing room with two regular glassing stands and two cloth racks at normal height. I only need the lift for lapping cleanly. Thanks!
Thanks. But I’m not sure how I could work a manual locking knob with a resin covered glove. That might get messy. It would be great for an adjustable workbench like you use it for though. Appreciate it!
If you’re willing to spend more money, there are pneumatic adjustable laptop carts too. We have those where I work, and you can adjust them by pushing a lever. We use these for laptops, not making surfboards. Just put a plastic bag over the adjustment knob/handle/lever and you can grab it with a resin covered glove. Same for the roller stand. Once you convert the top to have a platform for your board, you can put a plastic bag over the handle and keep that from getting resin all over it.
Those medical trays from BB30 are great because you just lift it up and it stays where you set it. The release machanism is for lowering it back down.
Only other thing I can think of is to make something that uses an air bladder and use a foot pump to make it rise. By the time you are done making it, it would cost more than the low cost things I have links to. The cheapest thing I bought to make a glassing stand was an adjustable paint stick, then I used a paint roller and messed with the part the roller goes on, and then you stick the paint stick into a bucket with cement, or rocks to hold it straight up. Problem is that it’s not as sturdy as I want it, but this only costs about $10 for the stick and roller holder.
Just in case, here’s the link to the company where I got the hydraulic/motor part. Of course it’s a french one but I am sure that you will find similar ones in the states. It’s a bit expensive, though, but you will get an idea of the different applications and in turn will be able (maybe) to find a second-hand device for cheap, who knows?
the one I made from the motorcycle lift, I bought the lift for 45 bucks and spent a couple dollars on angle brackets to hold the (scrap) wood securely.
I tried making one from the bottom half of a barber chair but I must have found the wrong kind, mine wanted to spin in cirles all the time. I guess some of them if you pull the pump handle UP, it locks the top half so it won’t spin around.
I like the surgical tray idea but haven’t hunted around to find one. The motorcycle lift I just happened to stumble across, so that works well for me!
Cleanlines is right on. Nailed it. For glassing a barber or hairdresser chair with a hydraulic foot pump is what you are looking for. Search Ebay and Amazon… They are suprisingly cheap, even new. Anything with a single foot on the floor for shaping is too sloppy, but for glassing they work well and can be adapted easily. Everything mentioned above is Sway Way(overkill). Simple is always best.
1% or less of the “big boys” you mentioned in your opening post use those types of racks. They cost too much and too much can go wrong. The 1% that do use such a rack set it at mid-point and dress and laminate one board at a time . Passing each newly lammed board off to an adjacent rack.
Funny. When I sit on one of those barber chairs, it makes me want to spin around too.
The only lift like yours that I could find around here is a manual screw jack type sissor lift that you have to crank a handle round and round for over $100. I like the surgical tray idea but finding one might be near impossible. I also need the rack to be a sturdy rack in the lowered position because I don’t have the extra room to wheel something out of the way to use a standard rack most of the time. My situation and set up cuts down my options.
Wow those are all pretty slick. Here’s my cheap manual version, one of my shop neighbor mechanics hooked it up. Gotta lift one side then the other, but no mechanical parts and fairly dummy proof. Good also for setting fin boxes cuz you can lift just one side and level the tail area out. Used old truck hubs, two sizes of steaight stock, drillhole on outside and weld nut to that, weld straight piece to make a tee out of the bolt that fits the nut.
Thanks Drew. Here’s mine that I built 25 years ago out of wood. They’re just too much of a pain to lift with a resin covered glove in the middle of laminating.
Keith nailed it, in my book. Or the barber chair if you made sure it was lockable out of spin mode.
The foot pump action seems ideal. Keith and I talked about a good ol’ cheap sicsor car jack - but you’d need to do something to turn the crank… Hands free seems perfect.
It’s my opinion that most of the glassing racks I’ve seen pics of here on Sways are all set at too low a level to begin with. Glassing racks need to be up at about “tit” level. I acutally construct mine a little taller than that as I am the only one generally using them. It is easier to sight across the deck or bottom. And---- Not much to bend slightly to see under the rail and lap. I’ve seen pic of guys around here using racks just over waist high. That’s just too low. Occasionally you’ll see a pic of a Glass Shop’s lam room, racks etc. and off to one side will be some kind of step stool or a 2 ’ ladder. Reason; The only draw back to using a tall rack is it can be difficult to get a lam/logo straight when you are using a tall rack. So a glasser will sometimes pull up the stepstool to get a look at the lam from above and make sure it is aligned properly before rolling out or flipping his cloth. Lowel
