For those who have always wanted to try out T-slots for rack-building

[screaming oranges]

Oh, the number of times I have mentioned how much I like Steve Blinn or Adona rack designs! Extruded aluminum exudes strength and elegance, gotta love those T-slots... but, the price, yikes!

Well, in my never-ending quest to one day build myself something along those lines, I came across this little gem of a site:

http://www.framexpert.com/

What's so special about it? A FREE download program that lets you build whatever you want using the t-slots. I've been playing with the erector set for about an hour now and it is pretty easy to use, especially given the fact that I have no experience with 3-D software whatsoever. It even provides a cost estimate of your build as you progress (which looks substantially lower than buying from the aforementioned gods of rack awesomeness).

Extrude aluminum and exude sexiness, my friends!

[swt61]

I've wanted to build a T-Slot rack for a few years now, but haven't found a reasonable source for the materials yet. Looks like a cool program though.

[Aura]

cool find Alex, I'll have to bookmark this for later use.

[Dusty Chalk]

No linux.

[morphsci]

Very cool Alex. This is useful in so many ways.

[Pars]

No PPC Mac either. But very cool nonetheless.

[luvdunhill]

Doesn't work with virtual machines either.

[Dusty Chalk]

Doesn't work with virtual machines either.

Too many nested levels?

[screaming oranges]

On a side-note, even if extruded aluminum isn't the preferred choice, this makes a nice creation template for wood projects. On that train of thought, I wonder how a project would look entirely out of wood, with the groove accents on the wood itself (extruded wood, if you will). Hmmmm...

Needless to say, the right machinery would be required to do something really clean-looking, but I'm liking the idea...

Edited February 21, 2011 by screaming oranges

[luvdunhill]

Too many nested levels?

nested levels of sarcasm, yes.

[morphsci]

Works fine for me on Snow Leopard, Win7, Vista, XP and Win7 in a Parallels virtual machine.

Edited February 21, 2011 by morphsci

[CarlSeibert]

So, on to the gory part. How much would enough extrusions to make a rack cost, more or less?

[screaming oranges]

Depends on the thickness of the beams used and height, number of beams, etc.

EDIT: I will make a simple 3-shelf rack and see what that comes out to for a definitive answer.

Edited February 21, 2011 by screaming oranges

[screaming oranges]

Ok, made a four-level rack. Runs to about $300. But this doesn't include the shelves themselves, as this is only the rack itself. This is with 1x1" extruded aluminum, includes feet and cover caps at top.

http://docs.google.com/viewer?url=http://docserv.epiphan.ru/1298327082.35.pdf

http://docs.google.com/viewer?url=http://docserv.epiphan.ru/1298327246.76.pdf

Note: There is something called "slot panel" in the programs that can be used for shelving, but I don't think it's meant for heavy equipment at all. I don't even know what material it is. My idea was to sit maple slabs across the beams or something along those lines. It would be considerably cheaper than the boutique stuff and still have that look.

Dang, extruded aluminum is expensive...

Edited February 21, 2011 by screaming oranges

[swt61]

The slot panel is more for enclosing the sides/back, but you could buy thin veneer plywood to do the same. I kind of like the open look. I would opt for shelves made from cabinet grade Baltic Birch ply, and would glue up 1 1/2" shelves, but 1" would be plenty sufficient. The edges of Baltic Birch finish up quite nicely, and it accentuates the industrial look of the T-Slot IMO.

There are ebay sellers of T-Slot aluminum as well, and I wonder if a group buy might help offset some of the cost?

Edited February 22, 2011 by swt61

[CarlSeibert]

Damn. The board ate my reply.

I just made a little amp stand with the shelf part 3/4 Baltic birch glued to 3/4 MDF. It's pretty stiff and very dead. (And cheaper than two layers of BB.)

I've been semi-fascinated lately with the idea of making shelves out of concrete, a la a concrete counter top. Or a concrete and wood structure. I made a set of speaker stands that way ad am reasonably happy with them. The pillars are actually PVC pipe, filled with concrete and veneered. the bases are basically a wooden tray, filled with concrete and flipped over. Add trim and veneer to taste.

Point is, the possibilities are endless.

How about a two layer, air suspension shelf? Or maple coupled in various ways to a masonry paving slab (like a buck at Home Depot)? Once you have the frame with cross bars, you could experiment forever.

The price of admission is the gall-darned aluminum. But then again, hardwood is ridiculously dear nowadays, too.

[Driftwood]

I was thinking of building something myself using some 80/20 or similar extruded aluminum and some butcher block, but by the time you figure in the materials cost and add in some niceties to make assembly nicer (like threaded inserts into the butcher block), it didn't seem like all that much of an economy vs. commercial offerings. Eventually I went with the Salamander Synergy system since several people here seemed to be happy with it, and it certainly has higher WAF than what I was planning on putting together myself.

Also, while using the extruded aluminum as shelf supports along with butcher block for the shelves makes for a rack that could probably support tons of weight, the thickness adds up quick and a 4 shelf rack would end up being a lot taller than I wanted.