Front forks - part one

Ok, time to have a go at the front forks.
I had a design in mind with standard square tubes. Square tubes are more easy to handle and don't roll of the table ;-)
I first started out with cutting the 4 fork leg tubes equally to the correct length.
Next I paired the leg tubes two by two and clamped them together as a pair:

Check out the left end of the tubes in the picture above: I filed them round so they will accept the bearing housing later on. Also in this picture is the steering assembly which will go on top of the forks (just above to the right) and the axle with the bearings and bearing houses installed (in the middle of the picture).

Next, I needed to cut and file the contours of the steering assembly in the leg tubes:

To keep the tubes together, I already welded them them at the bottom (on the inside of the fork legs).

Needless to say I repeated this for the other pair of tubes.

Back when I made the steering part, I made sure I had a hole in the bottom of it through the center of the steering axle. This hole was tapped with M6 thread. I now used this hole as a reference to the center of the steering axle. As you can see in the picture below, I screwed in a threaded bar and used it to hold the fork legs equally spaced from the center. I also made sure there was no 'wobble' in the fork: both ends of the fork assembly must be flat on the table to make sure the big wheel will run perfectly in the center of the bike.

I haven't done the final part yet: spot weld everything together. I just want to run some checks tomorrow: I have to make sure the axle will run parallel with the steering part.

Anyway, the fork assembly will look pretty square after I weld it together. Everything will have to be ground and filed round and smooth. But let's just take one step at a time... cleaning and finishing up the whole bike is still a couple of months from now...