Pipe Bending??

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I am building website for my products which are mostly kustom framebuilder's parts.
Headtubes, bottom bracket, kustom dropouts, tubing, etc.
I was going to sell tubing with certain bends and rolls stock, as well as custom bends and rolls.

Any feedback on any common bendangles you guy use, etc.??

Was just talkin to John Brain and he said he thinks I should make afew rear triangle kits to get people over that hump and not stuck in the "box" (or triangle) of the rearend with limited tools...

Any feedback on anything??

-SIC Nick
 
Greylock I just started on a bender similar to that one. I took my two 1'' rollers, from my Harbor Freight roller bender, to my fab buddy and he is going to build me a bender. I don't use the 1'' roller much anyway and with an arm to rotate one around the other, I'm hoping It will work. I will keep everybody posted.
 
Uncle Stretch said:
Greylock I just started on a bender similar to that one. I took my two 1'' rollers, from my Harbor Freight roller bender, to my fab buddy and he is going to build me a bender. I don't use the 1'' roller much anyway and with an arm to rotate one around the other, I'm hoping It will work. I will keep everybody posted.

I like that idea! I have a few sets of those rollers too! time for a little fabricating :D
 
Ok got my contraption back from the fab guy. Its so cold that I may not get to try it for a while. Anyway he did a good job on it. Price $40....which I thought was a bargain. It uses the two 1'' roller wheels and pins from my Harbor Freight tubing roller. Here are a few pics so maybe somebody can use the idea to come up with them one. Doubt if it has to be exactly like mine, but this is what we came up with. When it warms up a little , I will do some bends and see how it works.

WARNING!!! with a quick test this design has enough leverage to tear your well mounted workbench from however you have it hooked to the wall.......Need to bolt this thing to a telephone pole or something. It started to bend the pipe some till the workbench gave way. :roll: :cry: :roll: :shock: :shock:


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I tried some ,I think 10 ga. 1'' and it really deformed it. I might as well have taken a hammer and beat it round. I'm going to pick up a piece of 16 ga tomorrow and try it before I write this off as a loss. Stay tuned.....I'm not holding my breath that this is going to work any better than using an electricians hickey. (conduit bender) :cry:
 
Looks like a really cool rig. I have watched my bending closely using a conduit bender. If the tube fits loosely in the sheave it tends to flatten out. Maybe if the sheaves had slightly taller shoulders it may support the tubeing more and prevent it from flattening out. I dunno........seems like an idea. Hang tough on this bender you made and see if you can trick it.

Looks easy from my computer screen.... :roll:

Graylock
 
Greylock the two rollers are exactly 1/2 the size of the tubing and they are against each other as the go around. It should bend the tubing without any distortion. I think the tubing was so thick that it tries to stretch and distort instead of bending. I hope a new load of thinner tubing will solve the problem. People here are building frames that have nice tight bent tubing. I sure wish if they have found the answer they would let us in on it. Maybe the answer is a really expensive bender. Who knows.
 
i dont know if it would help or not, ive never bent pipe, but what if you heated it then tried to bend it? or sprayed lubricant on the dies and tubes? and if you resort to packin the tubes full of sand, how do you keep it from coming out and ruining the bend? i would think theres alot of pressure on whatever you cap the ends with. sorry uncle stretch, i have no answers, just more questions! :wink:
 
I think the old way of packing the tube with sand does work. Heating dosen't seem to do much good though. My fab guy said he tried bending some tubing and heated it and it still deformed. I'm really afraid that I'm trying to turn too tight a bend. I will know tomorrow if thinner tubing works in it.
Sorry for hijacking the original post Skoda, probably should have done my own since its trial and error.
 
Ok this is not the answer. Even with 16 gauge 1'' tubing it just mashed it instead of bending it. So the moral of the story is ,unless one of you guys that can actually do this ....tells us how , I guess its back to the drawing board. :cry:
 
Uncle Stretch said:
Ok this is not the answer. Even with 16 gauge 1'' tubing it just mashed it instead of bending it. So the moral of the story is ,unless one of you guys that can actually do this ....tells us how , I guess its back to the drawing board. :cry:

What kind of angle are you trying to bend to, Uncle Stretch? Most tube benders like the one you had built have larger dia formers/rollers. I have one at work somewhere, and will dig it out and post some pics with sizes.

I'm pretty sure that with the 1" x 16 gauge tubing, you will have to pack it with sand, or maybe even pack and heat. Also, make sure the seam is at 90 degrees to the bend.....if the seam is on the inside or outside of the bend, the tube is more likely to deform or split.

I will do a "How To" in a couple of weeks on bending with heat and packed sand. Just have to get a few things sorted out in the new workshop.
 
The ultimate would be able to bend a 180 degree to make the chain stays on a frame. I have seen several people here bend a complete rear triangle. They do bends that look like a loop tail and weld the drop outs one to them. If I didn't see it done, I would probably think it wasn't possible.....Plus I see benders that are simular to mine do a perfect bend on 1'' tubing. I have done something wrong , but I'm not giving up.
 
i dont think skodas going to mind since he hasnt posted here in forever :wink:
im guessing youre referring to spinmans b2
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you could always ask 4th horseman(i cant say he'll say how he did it or not but worth a shot)...might have to try getting ahold of him on the f.b.n. though since i dont think hes a member here
ohhhhhhhh............i just noticed....that frames made out of e.r.w. tubing :!:
 
Yep Sensor he is one , but there are several that have that same talent. Not sure if they would want to give up the way they do it or not. I saw he posts on the HAMB . I was going to sit down and do a search and see the ones on here that can do it and ask what the heck they are using to do it with. I guess my next trial will be with sand. Everybody says sand works. I saw a guy post that he used sand and a harbor freight hydraulic bender and did tubing fine. Right now it so cold in my shop , that whatever I try has to be a quick deal. I'm going to do the sand deal and if it dosen't work, I'm going to post that its a myth. Seems like a lot of work for a bent piece of tubing. :oops:
 
Uncle Stretch said:
Yep Sensor he is one , but there are several that have that same talent. Not sure if they would want to give up the way they do it or not. I saw he posts on the HAMB . I was going to sit down and do a search and see the ones on here that can do it and ask what the heck they are using to do it with. I guess my next trial will be with sand. Everybody says sand works. I saw a guy post that he used sand and a harbor freight hydraulic bender and did tubing fine. Right now it so cold in my shop , that whatever I try has to be a quick deal. I'm going to do the sand deal and if it dosen't work, I'm going to post that its a myth. Seems like a lot of work for a bent piece of tubing. :oops:

It's definately not a myth Uncle Stretch. I did it nearly every day for 12 years when I was working in my trade as a Coppersmith. I had to bend copper, brass, steel, and aluminium pipe/tube in all dia and wall thickness. Never did it cold though, always with heat, even when I was using a former/mandrel. When we got an exhaust tube bender, we still used the packed sand method for a number of jobs.

Check out this link: http://www.rorty-design.com/content/sand_bending.htm
 
I have read almost everything that you can on benders. I'm just about to buy a jd2 if someone there will tell me it will do what I want it to. Hummm third bender and they are getting more expensive each time. Oh well got to get the economy going somehow. :roll:
 

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