Tube Bending. Any Words Of Wisdom?

ponykilr

Guest
I bought a HF tube bender for $60. It seems well enough built for what I plan to do with it. I plan for my first project to be a simple bumper mounted light bar/hoop for my F350. It will be made from the 1.25 tube I picked up from Michael here on the forum.

I saw a fairly good tutorial on Pirate but just wanted to see if you guys have any word of wisdom or advice about the voodoo of bending tube.

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I'm an eye-ball guy. No tube master, no angle finder, no notcher. When bending two identical prices, the first is easy, the second is a pain.
 
I like the idea of laying out the angle you need on the floor or cardboard and simply matching the angle on both bends (in the case of my simple hoop)

My question in my mind is knowing how much to bend while it's on the machine. Make a cardboard template? An adjustable large square?


I would like to eventually make a rear window guard hoop thingamagigger too.
 
Well that is a pipe bender which is much different than a tube bender.
 
Well I am not going to be bending big tube or making cages. Are you saying this is just not going to work?
 
It will work for your purpose. You will probably have to pack the tubing with sand if you're bending anything with a thinner wall to keep it from kinking. Also it is easier to bend more than un-bend
 
No, like said it should work for something that you don't want to count on to save your life. I have heard of packing the tube with sand before from some old school people.
 
And I should add I've owned a bender for about 3 years now and only bent up a crewmember for a jeep so I'm no expert just sharing things I've read on the interewebz
 
After reading more, it seems the issues are with the dies being sized for schedule 40 pipe. Perhaps for what I am doing I will just use pipe. I read that the real A53A pipe is as strong as HREW tube, just a different outside diameter.
 
Whether you're using the $60 HF pipe bender or a $1k tube bender, both take practice. So, practice. Yes, you'll "waste" some pieces of pipe/tube/rod, but the knowledge you'll gain about the operation of your tools is worth it. All benders will have some degree of spring-back, in which the material being manipulated will measure a degree or two (or three, or whatever) less than you thought on the machine. This is from the properties of the material literally unloading or springing back from the tension that the machine imparts on the material. Nicer tools will account for this, or will have some type of moveable degree wheel to more accurately measure the actual bend.

Also, grease up the die before inserting the tube, couple squirts of wd40 should be good.

Also, be care with that HF Chinese steel. Make sure it is properly assembled, and check the hardware/connection points fairly frequent. Wear eye protection.
 
redneck indicator for usage of length in each bend.
works as follows:
Select desired die and material, different radius produce longer bend using more net material....bigger radius longer tube.
Mark tube every inch from end to end (long enough to make a 90 in your case) That bow and arrow device wont go past it with any good results. Use more tube than needed. The little waste this time around will amount to nothing during the learning curve.;)
Center punch each mark.
Now insert tube. Line up tube with a start reference. In your case I'd use the center for this exercise. On other machines the start point of the radius die is a good idea.
Kink until 90 degrees is met. WITH THE CENTER PUNCHES OUT.
Now you have a story stick and a crooked piece of metal.
Count inches used the make full 90.
Use later to estimate partial bends by using "now" known tic marks for reference. Also useful in full size mock ups and layouts.
Get two pieces of 2 inch flat bar 18-24 inches long. Bolt them together at one end so they pivot. It makes a handy large scale angle finder. Once you have what you want bolt it tight for repeat offenders.
 
I've also saw people weld sectioned tube to the pipe die to make it fit tube sizes better like a sleeve. Seems like a lot of work for a boomerang bender, but to each his own. It worked for a guy I work with, but he even said it was hack and bought a JD square later.
 
As you know now, if you bought 1.25" STRUCTURAL TUBING--Hrew/Dom/4340--it isn't going to bend for shit, it will fold in half. If you bought 1.25" A53 PIPE (uncoated hopefully) then it will work fairly well with some practice. Warrior has some good advice on making a reference 90 and as far as repeatable bends what I used to do instead of using an angle finder--which will turn out to be useless for this--is measure the actual stroke of the cylinder rod to the thousandths, then repeat on next piece. This thing will easily do what you're looking to do. As far as searching on Pirate and the rest of the web, using the term "pipe kinker" will probably get you a lot more hits.
 
One of my favorite recent threads (hardline?) were all the things folks are using the kinkers for... straightening links, mini-press brakes, door stops :D
 
For the cost, frustration, compromise, and lack of flexibility, might as well spend the $ on a quality tube bender. Hell, I have an extra JD2 I'd sell for $150 minus dies.

That's my word of wisdom. :)
 
rockcity said:
For the cost, frustration, compromise, and lack of flexibility, might as well spend the $ on a quality tube bender. Hell, I have an extra JD2 I'd sell for $150 minus dies.

That's my word of wisdom. :)
Click to expand...
^^ I may be interested if he is not. Pm me with details. Thanks
 
Caver Dave said:
One of my favorite recent threads (hardline?) were all the things folks are using the kinkers for... straightening links, mini-press brakes, door stops :D
Click to expand...

Awesome thread. And yeah its on HL. Not too proud to say I've had a kink-o-matic in my garage before. Never done structural tube work with one, but I know a few people who have built some pretty cool stuff with them. It will honestly be fine for what the OP wants to do once he gets used to it.
 
I hear you guys. I am not planning a cage or building a buggy. Just want to make some tube steps and a front light hoop. I think I will buy some A53 to use.
 
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