Metal Bending/shaping

[Craved]

Found an article on the net for the creation and processes of bending steel tubing to multiple shapes that can be done by hand, thought i would share it around since i know this will come in handy for myself at some point.

How to Bend Tubing and Pipe by Hand

http://www.metalgeek.com/archives/2005/05/01/000047.php

[psi]

done this sort of bending years ago. For tube, i found that the flat surface of the jig distorts the tube to much. I ended up machining the jib (the first effort was on the lathe, but it was too tigh). i machined a U type shape into some ply I glued together. the U has to be a very snug fit for the tube to prevent distortion. my second effort, well i found an odd lookin thing at a scrap yard that was cast iron. looked like it may have been a flywheel or something. It had a perfect 3 inch grove already cast into it! it had lots of wear in that area and my really old neighbour swares it would have had a rope belt on it.

Bending 3 inch tube ended in ugly mangled bits of pipe. kinks galore! We had welded it to an old dozer (the neighbours) and used the car to pull the pipe round the flywheel. We repeated this many times and always ended the same. The same old neighbour told me about a trick of filling the pipe with sand. So, thats what i did next. YOU NEED HEAPS OF DRY SAND! but it worked. the sand helped the pipe keep its shape, 1 in 3 bends worked well, 1 sort of ok, and 1 was junk. Not a quick or easy method.. but do-able.

I gave up on it, and went and bought some manderal pipe bends! That was 5 years ago, and last time i saw the dozer, the jig was still on it! So if u ever find an old dozer with some funky lookin bits welded to the tree pusher, It was me!

Anyway it does work!