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Any idea of what theis fixture is from an aviation plant?

Randalthor

Cast Iron
Joined
Mar 7, 2018
Location
Kansas City
I purchased some equipment from a aviation plant closing. This was a fixture included in a pallet of stuff. I've no idea what it is used for. Wondering if it is worth anything, or should be thrown in the scrap pile. The fixture is heavy and weighs about 75 lbs. It obviously took a lot of machine hours to produce the fixture, but of course it may be so specialized it's really not worth anything, except for producing a very specific airliner part.

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Hard to tell any scale but round and 75lbs probably indicates landing gear. Looks like you're missing some fixture details. Did this come out of the old Boeing plant?
 
I'll go with a landing gear fixture too, that was my guess before reading #3. As to worth, whatever you can get from the scrappy. Or use it as the central pillar for a coffee table.

BTW, best use of a paper towel core(?) for scale I've ever seen...
 
Before it was scrapped I’d pull all the hardware off. The cap screws and the adjustable pins could come in handy for another jig. If room was no object keep the whole thing...never know.
Joe
 
many fixtures made for specific part.
.
if you needed to hold a 90 degree pipe elbow obviously you need a fixture to hold that specific shape. without fixture often its often impossible to machine part
 
Identity is one key to value, rarity is another, usefulness is another. The best is demand, if there is demand for an item, chances are good it will be more valuable, and sell faster, than if there is little or no demand for it. The fact that the company sold this jig in a pallet load at auction, tells me they no longer had any use for it. The chances of finding someone who is building airpanes and needs it is pretty slim. Many of these kinds of items go into the yard art supply stream, as there is some demand for yard art. Usualy for so much a pound. Sorry for the news.
 
Thanks for all the replies. It did come out of a recently closed plant near KC. They had taken the name down, but I think it was Triumph aviation. They auctioned everything off. When I went to pick some stuff up I asked one of the guys at the plant why they were closing. He said 45% of their business was Airbus and Airbus didn't renew their contract. Sad. He said they were closing down several plants because of that.

Milland, you're right that was a paper towel core I used for scale, lol. I was in one of my shipping containers, and that was the closest thing I had for scale.

I suspected it wasn't worth much because it was so specialized. Thanks for all the responses which confirmed it.

It came with a pallet of mostly large chuck jaws, which is what I really wanted. I think there are about 40 sets of mostly soft jaws (a few hard jaws) on the pallet I plan to offer those on the For Sale here on the forum.

It's interesting one of the things I bought was a couple blueprint cabinets. One is a 10 drawer cabinet and one is a 15 drawer cabinet. I bought those for next to nothing. $20 bucks for both by the time the buyers premium was added. Everyone there was after all the big machinery, but no one was interested in these cabinets. I really wasn't interested in them either, but thought I could store a few tools in them for cheap storage. However after I bought them, I started looking online. These things sell for a couple hundred bucks per 5 drawer cabinet, used. (they are modular and stackable). New, they sell for about a grand per 5 drawer section. I put these on Craigslist for $125 per 5 drawer sections. Just mentioning so if any of you folks go to an auction like that, you might look at the blueprint cabinets if you don't mind reselling something, and can get them for cheap.

Another interesting thing about the cabinets is that they came PACKED full of airline drawings (literally thousands of them) despite there were stickers on the cabinets saying "Authorized Personnel Only". I would have thought Airbus and Boeing would guard their technology a little better. I ended up just burning the drawings, since I never plan to make airplane parts, and of course I wouldn't try to sell something like that. It was a big fire.
 
Yep,you were lucky on the b/print drawers.......they are very trendy with the factory apartment set ,and usually sell for megabucks to the upmarket industrial kitsch dealers..........but a funny thing with airplane stuff.....I had heaps of the service gear from the airforce auctions,like the 3 leg jacks ,and wheel access stands.....was cutting them up ,when restoring old planes became trendy with the rich ,couldnt get enough of anything with yellow paint on it.
 
depending on what the prints were for they could have been worth their weight
in carbide to some one trying to keep something old flying.
if they were selling the cabinets, they are long obsolete.

most likely the same for that fixture take your pick of what ever was once made in that plant
and not in production now.
 
depending on what the prints were for they could have been worth their weight
in carbide to some one trying to keep something old flying.
if they were selling the cabinets, they are long obsolete.

That actually makes me feel bad, not only for my potential loss, but for the loss of information. But the realities and grind of life governed my choice. I'd never had time to look through thousands of drawings to try to match a buyer with drawings he needed. There was a huge pile of paper about 2'+ we'd emptied on the ground scattered everywhere. I'd never had time to sort and file them all, and they had to come out of the drawers to make the drawers manageable to handle. Like everyday, we were in a hurry. We did keep one drawing out of the whole bunch. My help noticed a page of a complete detailed drawing of a Learjet. It looked pretty cool so I told him to put it back in one of the empty drawers.

I suppose on hindsight I should have piled the drawings inside and perhaps offered them to someone here to go through. Maybe someone would have thought it worthy to come pick them up and have gotten some good out of them.

Of course I don't feel too bad, as any number of people could have bid just a few dollars more an they would have owned the cabinets with the drawings.
 
Those blueprint drawers are great for thiner light weight things. Mics and calipers, screwdrivers, blueprints/drawings, test meters/leads, etc...

Thick or tall and deep/wide as well.

Just shed one drawer, cut you a double-high-sheet-steel cover for the front of the one below the gap, grab the rattle-can.

Less work than trying to re-purpose the front salvaged off the pulled and asided drawer and easier to swap back if/as/when. Or hang the pulled one under yer benchtop. Big Box has ball-bearing slides.

Stiffeners can be added as well. The rails are good for it. Paper gets heavy enough, yah have much of it.

One-each double-height in my two stacks, they each seem four times as useful 'stead of part-time aggravating.

Puttin' risers on the sides or a plywood box between so as to create an OPEN gap in between two stacked units, and stuff such as arbours for the horizontal mills, drawbars and such can have a new home for nearly free.

Or build that riser-box into the plywood reinforcement you needed under the bottom unit to attach good caster wheels, anyway. Or both.

Side panel, optionally hinged "door" full height, each side, now your long rules, taller calipers, cordsets, hoses, and scraping dovetails have a safe place to hang.

Store-bought storage gear can be plumb lazy. Not sacred.

Gots to remind it who da BOSS now and then, yah wanna get useful WORK out of it.

:)
 
depending on what the prints were for they could have been worth their weight
in carbide to some one trying to keep something old flying.
Red Chinese airforce might do? Not THAT long ago, saw an entire squadron lined up at a joint military/ commercial aviation base. All shiney-proud polished bare alloy glistening in the sun like brand-new!

MiG 17's. // Shenyang J5. Prolly sold to DPRK by now.

PRC military has some new stuff now.

HAD been described as the world's largest outdoor military MUSEUM.

It weren't entirely a joke. Yet even today.

:D
 








 
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