Tube Bender

Intro: Tube Bender

I would have liked it to make a new seat for my recumbent bicycle and for it was necessary some aluminium tubes and to bend those on proper shape. In our town I have not found a place to bend some tubes and I have decided to make my own tube bender for this work.

STEP 1: Preparing

First time I went to scrap metal depot to find the necessary materials. I found some rusty pieces there. At home prepared the other pieces. I rounded the sharp heels of the laminated wood base, and my friends and his dad helped me to weld a handle and one more piece on the main forming wheel.

STEP 2: Mounting

Once all the components was together, I installed bearings in the wheels, I put all components an the base ti find the correct position and place for the components and I drilled the holes for each pieces. I used M10 metric bolts to obtain a massive construction, and because the support for the wheels from the scrap depot was also very thick and robust.

STEP 3: The Result

Immediatly after the assemling I tested my tube bender with a piece of plastic pipe with aluminium insert. I also drilled two more holes for fixing the base on a bigger working table. The whole tube bender is portable, the maximum dimension is ca. 40 cm on each side, and it's really heavy. I will use this only for 20 mm diameter aluminium tubes for my new seat.

STEP 4: First Use

Finally... the first use of my bender

Comments

[spark master]

err what di the wheels come from....I mean , I can bend emt I did it long enough, but what kind of wheels and then the frames to hold the wheels. Perhaps a smattering of theory of why you do things the way you do. Plus allowances, for bends.

thanks

[lecgo]

The wheels are from scrapyard, EMT also working, holding frame is plywood and also from scrapyard are the wheel holding metal pieces, Bend Allowance BA=90*(3.14/180)*(60+(16/2/20)*20)=106.76mm
90degrees of max bend, pii, 180, 60mmradiusofthewheel, 16/2mminnerradiusofaluminumtube, 20mmouterdiameteroftube.
Formula must be corected if tube has 22 or 16mm outer diameter what actually are the possible tube sizes.

[alan.swaffer]

If the handle was cranked to clear the other pulley it would be possible to bend up to 180 degrees.

[jhon wuba_nyserq]

Nice.

[lbrewer42]

Great build - thanks for sharing this.

[bricabracwizard]

Can you show us with a video how you work your tube bender?

[lecgo]

Yes, now I have the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rFhxoYIEGno

[bricabracwizard]

Thanks!

[stephenfitton]

Congratulations, to you as. You....

Have covered the one point missing from most tube benders,

By using two wheels same size flat spots are overcome in your bending,each wheels slight rotation while bending compensates for what otherwise is drag causinng tube to collapse into flat spots

Again congradulations

[pdub77]

This is great! Thanks so much for this idea. I am making one of these before too long.

[3DWulf]

Love it! Very creative use of old materials and limited space.

if you could have put your template under the wheels so you could align your work on the fly that would be a big help. This should be possible if you use a template that is the same thickness of you tube.

[lecgo]

Thanks for your ideea, it's really good! I will try it on the next project.

[SexyWood]

how do you bend back to back bends of opposing directions?

[lecgo]

That's a good question, because many time the bending are too less or too much. If it's too much and need to bend back I use the same wheels, I fixed the tube between them and I pulled with my hands the tube. It's not the best way, but it's work. For a quality work must find a better solution in the future.

[flyingpuppy]

This should be in the essential tools list of any workshop. Thanks for the tutorial.

[myplace2]

excellent,just what I have been looking for. I will be making similar soon I think.

[doobie69doo]

The easy way to make this bender is to buy pulleys for a clothesline.

Drill several holes to attach with screws to the wood base, I attached it to my wood worktable so I could remove it and adjust the wheel distance for different size piping

remember not to use plastic clothesline pulleys

works great

Good Luck

I

[purpelcraze]

even if it duz creas the toob if you fill it with sand befor you bend it it will prevent it frum crumpeling as mutch tape off the one end fill with sand then tape off the othere i dont have a pipe bender eather i used my reas hitch on my van to bend pipe but the sand keeps it frum kinking or colapsing & duz a good job

[lecgo]

Yes, that's the method! thanks for remind me

[Fredrockinva]

Nice work. No problems with creasing the tubes?
I bet you could cut a handle into the base, make that much more portable.