Harbor Freight cheap bender review

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Uncle Stretch

Uncle Stretch

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Feb 9, 2008
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Ok everybody is coming up with these wild tubing bends and I cant do them so I said, Hey I want a cheap peice of junk Harbor Freight bender. So $162.50 later and a quick trip to Harbor Freight and I have one too. The first thing you notice is the one box is really heavy. The other weighs nothing. You get it home and strain your liver and take it to where you hope will be its final resting place ,and unpack it. Its pretty much together other than the top roller, shaft and adjusting wheel. You start working on it and it dosent take a rocket scientist to finish. It comes with differant wheels. Most look bigger than what you want ,but hey I can use big tubing. I had some 1'' I think (just guessing here) tubing, so I stuck a piece in the bender and cranked down on the top wheel a little ,and turned out the coolest spiral bend . After everybody saying they had a lot of slop in them, I looked. The bottom two rollers can slide back and forth on the shaft alot and that makes the spiral part. It comes with washers on the outside of each bottom shaft. I loosened the top two (metric) allen bolts and slipped a washer on each side of the spacers next to the wheels. Tightened up the top (metric) allen head cap screws and I was in business. The wheels are tight in the bottom now. They still turn easy enough...but no slop anymore. I stuck another piece of tubing in and made a very nice curve, that was straight as Hiawatha's arrow. So unless something unforseen happens It looks like it will work good. I would think it would be best to take one of the bottom rollers with you when you go to buy tubing, so you will know it will fit your rollers.
 
Re: Sprang for a bender

let me know how it works with 1" tubing(aside from the cool spiral you made :wink: ) when you get a chance please....
and you can still get a nice curve with out using one...its just really time consuming and takes a few bikes to get them(not to mention the bars you need to cut up to sleeve it all :wink: )....
 
Re: Sprang for a bender

Cool. Now you are ready to recreate this in a stretch model.

1939%20Rocket%20Bike%208.jpg
 
Re: Sprang for a bender

Yeah Clancy that bike is deffinatly can be built with one of these benders. Sensor in this first picture you can see where I stuck the washers inside the bender on the bottom shafts to tighten them up. Worked good and there really wasnt any need for the washers on the outside of the shafts anyway. The top roller has slack too ,but with the bottom ones tight it will run true without problems.

bender001.jpg


In the second picture you can see the top two allen head cap screws ,and if you loosen them you can get the washers in alot easier.

bender002.jpg


The last picture is the 1'' tubing I bent. It just takes a minute or two.

bender003.jpg


Looks like the next size up roller is 1 1/2'' the one that comes in it is for 1'' tubing. Then there is a big one maybe 2'' I didnt measure it.
 
Re: Sprang for a bender

thanks for the heads up and let me know what you think of it after theres a few bikes run through it(was also wondering how 5/8 or 7/8" would do in it also since i like smaller tube for stays).....at some point i really need to get one
 
Re: Sprang for a bender

2manybikes said:
Hey Paul,
I knew there was a reason you wanted to have an anything goes build-off 8)
Perfect excuse for some new tools :D
Click to expand...
I dont know what I was thinking on that. I'm not that good at coming up with creative designs and I'm probably going to pull out. I build to better myself and really not to be judged. I post just for fun. It gives people something to look at. If they dont like my stuff then Its no biggie. I can see already that I'm way outclassed in this deal. Its like your painting a bike and Olli builds something without a fork...and you go Dang! :shock:
 
Re: Sprang for a bender

I will run some smaller stuff through it and see what happens. I am curious to see what happens with the scedule 40 I normally use. I'm thinking that the smaller stuff will bend just fine. It should stay in the lower part of the roller. You might have to kinda hold it with your hand to keep it straight. I'm thinking drawing a line before you start down one side where you know its straight wouldnt hurt either.
 
Re: Sprang for a bender

After messing with it some more. If you bend that schedule 40 pipe with it ,you will find its alot harder than tubing. I think if you used it for that very much It will tear it up ,and you will have very big arms. It will loosen up the set screws fairly quick. Used with tubing it works good and is easy to make bends. I am going to the steel supplier today and buy some 1 1/2'' tubing that seems to be the choice of materials and try it.

For a cheap bender ..so far it seems to be something that will work for what we do. It needs some adjustments ,but for the price I think it will fit in fine with frame building. If you bend long peices of tubing it will hit your roof. It will have to be done either outside or in a tall room. :?
 
The steel place had some 1 5/8'' .I thought it would work....wrong. it mashes the extra down in the rollers and makes it an oval shape, and is really hard to bend. Get the size for the rollers. :cry: :cry: :cry:
 
Ok for the last of the review. After two days of bending pipe , its not as easy as you would think. It takes a bunch of turns on that big wheel to make a decient curve ,and for a loop you will be there all day. It makes you sore and you keep looking at the Monster thinking surely there is some way to put a motor on this thing. You will wind up with enough bent tubes to make a set of tuned headers for a smallblock chevy. They will bend tubing...the smaller 1'' is alot easier. That big 1 1/2'' will make you work. So would I buy one again...probably. Its a decient piece of china junk for the money. :roll:
 
My dad picked one of those up, and then proceeded to whip out some custom exhaust for my motorbike. He said it was worth the value, but nothing special. My exhaust turned out pretty great though!
 

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