_dj_
Birdie Member
This is my first attempt to make a real basket. I bought a cheap welder and tube bender from Harbor Freight and a ring roller on ebay. Total cost of tools was $225. I had limited welding experience prior to this, so I basically taught myself. However, at my work, I engineer (copper) tubing assemblies every day, so it was right in my wheel house. I was able to draw a 3D model of the basket and make drawings from it. I made 2 jigs. The first for spacing the top spokes evenly and another for the cage. For the base, I was able to reuse the first jig.
I bought enough materials to make 3 baskets, but here is the breakdown per basket:
$30 - 1/4" OD round bar. cold rolled steel. Slightly less than 100' was used from what I can tell.
$12 - 1 5/8" OD steel sleeve. used 3 pieces as collars to weld the spokes to. A 3/8" bolt runs through it and the pole to keep them in place.
$50 - 2/0 electrogalvanized chain. This is by far the most expensive part. This basket uses 12 outer and 12 inner chains. Each is about 20" long.
Free - 1 3/8 OD fence post cut to about 54"
$5 - Misc hardware, Nuts and bolts.
$10 - Plastidip (3 cans) and spray paint (3 cans)
So the project was just over $100. But it probably took about 20-30 hours of labor. A lot of this was a learning curve with welding and the painting was a huge pain. Was it worth it? Definitely. I learned a lot and have a sweet basket, welder, and other tools to show for it. Would I do it again? Probably not.
Without further ado, here are the pictures.
The only thing I would change with the design is to make the cage deeper. I read the PDGA specs on a basket and it said 6" depth... what I didn't notice was that it was a minimum of 6". It wasn't until after I built it that I noticed it was quite a bit more shallow than most baskets on the course. It still works very well however and catches the discs beautifully.
Questions, criticisms, comments welcome.
I bought enough materials to make 3 baskets, but here is the breakdown per basket:
$30 - 1/4" OD round bar. cold rolled steel. Slightly less than 100' was used from what I can tell.
$12 - 1 5/8" OD steel sleeve. used 3 pieces as collars to weld the spokes to. A 3/8" bolt runs through it and the pole to keep them in place.
$50 - 2/0 electrogalvanized chain. This is by far the most expensive part. This basket uses 12 outer and 12 inner chains. Each is about 20" long.
Free - 1 3/8 OD fence post cut to about 54"
$5 - Misc hardware, Nuts and bolts.
$10 - Plastidip (3 cans) and spray paint (3 cans)
So the project was just over $100. But it probably took about 20-30 hours of labor. A lot of this was a learning curve with welding and the painting was a huge pain. Was it worth it? Definitely. I learned a lot and have a sweet basket, welder, and other tools to show for it. Would I do it again? Probably not.
Without further ado, here are the pictures.
The only thing I would change with the design is to make the cage deeper. I read the PDGA specs on a basket and it said 6" depth... what I didn't notice was that it was a minimum of 6". It wasn't until after I built it that I noticed it was quite a bit more shallow than most baskets on the course. It still works very well however and catches the discs beautifully.
Questions, criticisms, comments welcome.