Sit-On Spinning Toy

I made this spinning toy for my daughter, she like to spin. The base and the small 'wheel' are stationary while the plate or saucer the kid sits on spins freely on bearings.

Steel Frame

The main frame is made of 0.75" rectangular steel tube with 0.125" wall thickness. It was galvanized surplus steel, so need to be careful not breathing in welding fumes. I bought 4 lengths of 39" of this steel tube for $5. Sounds good but the catch is that the steel is attached to a cargo net with about 30 rivets. So I had to drill out all those rivets but hey, that's all fun too. The frame was cut to size with horizontal metal cutting bandsaw and MIG welded together. I also welded 1/2" nuts to ends of the lower 'legs' so that the legs would only contact the ground in small discrete locations. This ensures maximum stability. Here's the picture of the frame only after painting. I finally got a new color of paint, no more green!

Bearings

The bearing is a 6" thrust bearing assembly made for a lazy susan cabinet. I first tried a non-ball bearing assembly made for boat seats from cabelas. The thing is so hard to spin it is useless for this project. The bearing assembly was only a few dollars, less than $10 including shipping from some bearing company I found online. Here's the picture of the frame with the bearing assembly riveted on.

Saucer

The saucer is a 1.0" thick particle board. The board came off the treadmillmobile that was scrapped. I traced out a circle pattern and cut it out with the vertical wood bandsaw. I then painted this part black.

Wheel

I bought the wheel at the surplus shop the same time as the steel to save on shipping. The wheel is 6 inches diameter and 1.5" in width. I had to weld the bearing sleeve to the hub to prevent it from rotating about the mounting shaft. I should have just bought a wheel without bearings but I liked the color of this one. The shaft is a 3" length of 1/2-13 threaded rod welded to the steel tubing. The wheel is secured with a nylon inset locknut.

Friction Enhancer

The platform has adhesive backed 120 grit sandpaper too keep the kid from spinning right off. Those are the white circles in the photo below.

Link to the initial design of the toy.
Design01