Press Tutorial?

there's a simple press you can make with all the steps included on skibuilders.com
go to how to guide
then press
then frame
it's a small, standard frame for personal pressing, and from what i've heard, should work fine.

now what i need is an I-Beam press, but i'm not finding much info... guess i'll just have to come up with the design myself, shouldn't be too awefully tough to figure out.

Basically just come up with it yourself.  That is what I did and many companies do to.

The principles are pretty simple.

Also, check out skibuilders & graf, both have press building tutorials.

most of the i-beam presses on skibuilders and stuff are super overbuilt. I-beams are expensive, so I'd do some calculations, which are kinda tough if youre not an engineer, so try the beamboy programme (I have OS and it needs windows, so I have no idea if its good)., or talk to an engineer. I know one, so that's what I did. but I dont think you should need I-beams any more that 3 or 4 inches, not those 6-10" ones a lot of people are reppin.

well...this depends a lot on the pressure you press at.

many home builders press only around 30-50 psi.

I press at 70 PSI and I know others with beefier presses who press at 100 psi.  So it just depends.

iggy, i would be more than understanding if you wouldn't want to, but do you think you could post any drawings/designs you have (or at least email them to me?) for your press?  I'm looking to build something extremely similar to what you've constructed, and i don't know if i should draw something up first, or go the the metal yard to scrap some pieces and then design from what i have.  again, i can understand if you don't want to share your designs/ideas for the world, but it would most likely help me out quite a bit.  thanks!

I can basically describe it to you.

Basically it is 2 5"x5"x3/8" steel beams.  Each on makes up the top and bottom of the press.

They are just connected with bolts to 10" long sections of the same steel essentially forming a box.

If you were to look at one side, it would go:
2 beams
10" sections
10" section
10"section
2 beams

then I just added legs to lift it, which you can do a number of ways.

You could just replace all the little sections with I big piece of I-beam too. 

I am eventually going to build a bigger one, and the design will almost be the exact same.  Just two huge beams on top, two on the bottom, connected with steel.

Design can be based a lot of what you can find.  I couldn't find shit, so I had to buy everything, so at least I knew exactly what I was getting.

Where are you located BTW?  I am probably selling this press, heaters & all, at the end of the year if you are interested and close to WA.

i undertand perfectly what you've done now. thanks a ton.  burly steel, simple design, gets the job done.
I'm in eastern washington, probly 3-4 hours away from you?  if you were to sell the press now, i'd be pretty interested, but i need to get going on this project pretty soon here, becase i'd really like to get some proto's made.  however, when it comes time to sell, i'll still be very interested actually, so be sure to post here or hit me via PM.  how soon is "the end" of the year? ;)
i'm curious, how long of a ski can your press acommodate now?  it fits 2 skis in, but how long of a ski can you press?  is the resason for building a bigger one for a longer ski, or to press at higher pressure?

It would probably in April or May.

It only is one ski wide.  only 10".  

It will fit a ski up to probably 193cm right now.  I am pressing 191cm without much trouble.

New press reasons:
Double bay
Double Wide
Much beefier (current one probably weighs 1500lbs, next one will probably weight 5000lbs)
and longer lengths.

basically with the new press, I want to increase the amount of production I have significantly.  I will hopefully be able to build between 3-5 of these presses.  So hopefully have 6-10 press bays.

These ones are a bit expensive if all the steel is new.  Probably like $6000 or so a piece.

that's quite the endeavor.  for now, i'm only planning to build one press that holds 2 skis that i can press at 70-100 psi with at least a heat blanket on the bottom, maybe one on top.  might build another in the near future, but that's what i'm planning for now. 
that's sick you have plans for high production.
thanks for the insight.

I'm located out of Iowa, plus i work at menards so i can get most of my materials fairly cheap.  Im going to start building a press this spring.  I'll probably just build the same one off ski builder for my first press, then just go from there.