home made rotisserie

[absintheisfun]

okee....
The typical me--put the cart in front of the horse.

I started building a rotisserie out of two engine stands. The problem, is that the vertical support is too short. I had planned on mounting this to a 67 Camaro shell (I heard that it was only about 750 lbs)

If I keep going the way I am, the car will actually sit above the center turning point (the whole car will be about 3 inches above center)

Sitting back and thinking about it, it appears to me that this will be WAY off balance, and cause the car to very quickly turn itself upside down once it is mounted to bring the mass below the turning point.

Am I right in thinking this? If I go forward with this will I end up in tears when the roof of my car smacks the ground and flattens?

My concern is that having the weight off-center will cause a severly unsafe and unmanagable turn...

I can get pictures if it will help explain...

[GetMore]

You've got it right, the pivot point must be raised. You want it as near the axis for the center of gravity as you can reasonably get it.

You didn't really think it was going to be as simple as bolting the stands to the car, did you?

[absintheisfun]

I kind of figured that was the case..I simply wasn't thinking...just "driving forward" I'm glad a I had a moment of clarity--too bad that the moment came on a day that I can't get any steel! Have to wait until tomorrow.

Thanks

[Mathius]

I've seen some engine stand rotisseries before. You should consider stabilizing your setup a bit by running some horizontal tubing to the base of each stand, to keep the two engine stands tied together. These pieces should be removable.

A simple hitch pin setup and some square tubing would work. On a side note, I've always tried to figure out a way to cheaply build a rotisserie that actually jacks up the car, and then rotates it. You have to get the car pretty high up in the air to mount it to an engine stand, and of course there's no point in rotating the car if you don't have ground clearance and you just end up denting your rocker or worse, roof, on the rotation.

Mathius

[astroracer]

I built this chassis rotisserie over a couple of weekends. I modified a pair of cheap engine stands and have less then $120 into this set-up, including paint and castors.
Here are a few pics...


I raised the pivot point and replaced the lower tube with a longer piece to increase the footprint. The "stretcher bar" you see clamped between the stands is just temporary. I have the pieces cut out to stretch the assembly to the length of my '49 Ford F1 frame. This short configuration will work well for holding subframes and the like.
This rotissirie will put the chassis at about chest level so my back will like that.
Mark