See through flooring/Meat conveyor

[SCfearfarm]

Haha a good random title right? I am working on 2 projects right now and I know some of you guys will be of some help to me. I want to have a see through floor with water under it (not plexiglass) that customers can walk on. My first idea is metal grating like you would see on a mezzanine etc. but I can not find anyone who has just a few pieces of it and the people I did find were not willing to ship it to me/sell such a small quantity to me. I thought about just spacing wood out and leaving cracks that you can see through but I am worried a small foot might end up in the crack and it not be safe. If you have any ideas for this let me know! Also, I am working on a butcher shop scene that has a moving conveyor. I have seen the one at transworld for 1299 plus shipping and then like 500 more for the meat....but I want mine to go through 2 rooms and be bigger and there has to be a more affordable way to make it. I've thought maybe bicycle type chain with gears and an electric motor? But I can't figure out how to keep the chain "on track" around the bends.....and the hooks/meat will put it down off track as well. If you can help me solve either of these let me know because I have rattled my brain looking for different materials for these 2 projects! Thanks in advance!

-Matt

[dudedigital]

I suppose it depends on the weight/quantity of the meat your moving, but maybe a cable system could work. This would give you the ability to do bends/direction changes. You could make a fake conveyor belt with the center cut-out to hide the cable system.

The video below gives a general idea:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QLgF-thdHcg

[Jim Warfield]

A few years ago

A local farm owner financed a hog operation. The building has many galvenized steel mesh flooring grates throughout it. I wanted them. I waited a few days too long, the owner died. The hog operation was only operated for a year, everything was like new, but the hog market crashed and the farmer would have been working for nothing had it continued.
I did buy some new floor mesh a 3? 4? ft piece 8? 10? feet long for $75.oo
the Farm supply place I got them from had them for many years, forgot they even had them.
A quarry might have some pieces of such material, they use them to shift the rocks through, sizing them since jobs do require big and smaller sizes of rock for road building.
If you do get a steel meshed floor piece, don't install it on too much of an angle off of level because a small amount of condensation or water can make the metal slippery, even though it looks like a real gripper, it might not really be.
As fate would have it, for some unknown reason I got a catalog via US Mail recently from The Brown-Campbell Co. who makes and sells fiberglass and metal mesh for flooring. They have service centers in Cincinnati-Cleveland-Dallas-Memphis-Minneapolis-South Carolina and sales offices in California-Chicago-North Carolina-Philadelphia 1-800-472-8464
I knew there was some reason I didn't pitch this catalog!

[Dreamreaper]

For your floor you are looking for expanded metal and you can find at any metal supply places or if on need small pieces look at welding shops I spent 15 years as a welder/millwright they will have it. The butcher conveyor sounds like you need a coveyor belt/head spool/drive motor/ tailspool and a conveyor pan for the belt to run on. I would look at a lumber mill to see if they have anything that you could use they have to change these out often so they may have them for free or very cheep. Good luck hope it helps.