Success!
I've been rackin' my brain on how to get these skins bent without investing major amounts of $$. So I called Dad. You gotta love Dad! Told him what I was trying to do and what my problem was. He confirmed my problem but came up with something I hadn't thought about. "Son.. your problem is lubrication! Go down to the hardware store and get yourself a wax toilet bowl ring...rub that on your skin and 2x4's. That will keep the skin from binding against the 2x4." (Taking great liberty here.) Ok.. that made sense to me. He had a couple of other suggestions as well.

Off to the hardware store I went (after doing some flying first.. gotta do that more often, I'm getting sloppy.) Bought a wax toilet ring thing and another piece of angle iron.

Long story short, I got the skin bent. The wax definatly helped. I still had the problem of the center portion of the press bowing up but I used a 2-ton bottle jack and some 2x4's run up to the ceiling joists to push it down.

Here's the result. Now I just have to get the other one bent.

Success!!

(Time: 2 hours)
- posted by Matthew @ 10/7/2003 10:17:10 PM