The Monroe Mark II Mailbox
For Christmas, Michelle asked me to build her a new mailbox since the last one that I had built was in her opinion too small i.e. it was too hard to get the mail and newspapers out of it. In my opinion it was fine, we just get too much mail, but since she is a good wife and doesn’t place much demand on me, I decided to build a new and better mailbox.
The Monroe Mark II Mailbox is two inches wider, two inches longer and two inches taller with a redesigned easy in, easy out door. It is still constructed of .25″ thick steel and will be mounted using four 3/8″ grade eight bolts, on the existing and proven mounting post. The plates were cut from a larger sheet using a computer controlled plasma cutter and MIG welded together using .035 steel wire. Before welding the roof on, I sprayed epoxy primer on the inside of the box to prevent rust.
Unfortunately it has been pretty cold this winter I was having problems with the igniter in my shop furnace, so I was not able to get the shop heated up to more than 62 – 65 F which was not really warm enough to allow the primer to cure properly. Even though I reduced the primer with a cool reducer – rated to 60 F, it really needed to be much warmer for it to set up properly. Based upon this experience, and the fact that the trailer is still buried under 8″ of snow – I may put off sand blasting and primering the ’56 until it gets warm enough to where I can easily hold the paint booth to at least 70 F.
After welding the top on the box, I primered it with an oil based primer that had a low temp rating of 50 F, it is curing better than the epoxy, but it’s going slow. Did I say it’s been cold this winter? We have been having night time lows around 1-2 F for the past couple of weeks! Anyway, I should be able to spray the color coat sometime today or tomorrow and hopefully it will replace the Mark I box this weekend.
I guess I should have taken a few photos of the box during it’s construction – but I was lazy – I will do some photos when I install it!
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