The Official Tube Bending Thread

[BAILEIGH INC]

Hey guys,

It's Shane from Baileigh Industrial here in Wisconsin. As you know, we deal with the Race Car, Hot Rod and Restoration crowd on a daily basis and would love to get a little more involved on the board and help out in our area of expertise.

We have a whole team of metal fabrication experts here and we specialize in tube bending and odd applications.

So, I will start this tube bending thread. If you have any questions about roll cages, bending tube or pipe, application issues, what wall thickness will work or not, wall thickness vs. center line Radius or what material will bend. Pretty much anything related to tube bending......ask away.

[BAILEIGH INC]

Ever wonder how much tube is consumed in a bend?

CLR (center line readius) x degree of bend x .0175

[skibum]

Here's is my question: How do you make the longer sweeping bends like the horizontal bars on the chassis of an Atom?

[BAILEIGH INC]

Here's is my question: How do you make the longer sweeping bends like the horizontal bars on the chassis of an Atom?

Large radius bends can be made with a roll bending machine.

http://www.bii1.com/benders/manual-roll-benders.php

http://www.bii1.com/videos/roll-bender-rm-55-videos.php

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qYmCYkMzhD0

[skibum]

Very cool. I guess for the average DIY'r, they just buy the prebent tube from a fab shop?

[pook]

WOW hats off! That was super fast shipping on the bender! I started to put it together and find a spot (couldn't help myself it was like being 10 again on Christmas morn:run:) some serious heavy duty equipment! and beautifully made!
Cant wait to start twistin some tube:coolnana:
Thanks again
PooK

[Karlo]

Which one did you get Pook?

[pook]

After talking with Shane and reading a BUNCH of feed back on different forums I bought the RDB-050 with the stand, dies, etc...
The vertical 90deg I have been using wastes far to much tube (to hard to load and to easy to go past) and that ain't cheap esp with DOM.
PooK

[pook]

I also bought the bend-tech software from Baileigh, I build way to much stuff to keep using old school plan and side 2D method. It works ok but its a pain at the same time trying to visualize how it will look or building models like I do now. So I just need 37 hour in a day and I should be able to get all this done and learn a new program:(

[Karlo]

After talking with Shane and reading a BUNCH of feed back on different forums I bought the RDB-050 with the stand, dies, etc...
The vertical 90deg I have been using wastes far to much tube (to hard to load and to easy to go past) and that ain't cheap esp with DOM.
PooK

Looks pretty.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4FiilR1Ht7E

[BAILEIGH INC]

Pook!

We demand pictures! :awais:

[pook]

I will, We're expanding our shop and I dont know where to mount it yet...besides its to pretty to get it all dirty!
PooK

[pook]

Well all I can say is WOW! What a nice piece of equipment! It's by far the nicest bender I've used.
It's hard to even find the compression area! and that giant degree scale is soooo nice:thumb2:
Check out the size of the metal on this puppy! That's a quarter standing there!
BTW I ordered the rest of my dies Friday, Thanks again!!!
PooK

[skibum]

Wow, very nice! I had to look thru the pics 3 times to find the quarter. Tiny!

[1993KA24DET]

what would be a good wall thickness on 2" main tubes on a car kinda like an Atom , wieght is always on my mind

[BAILEIGH INC]

what would be a good wall thickness on 2" main tubes on a car kinda like an Atom , wieght is always on my mind

Depends on what Center Line Radius you want to bend to.

[1993KA24DET]

Maybe 45', it would be the main tubes at the top of the car with a slight bend

[BAILEIGH INC]

Maybe 45', it would be the main tubes at the top of the car with a slight bend

Probably a CLR with .120" wall tube

[1993KA24DET]

So the smaller the Radius the stronger/thiner the tube can be?

[BAILEIGH INC]

So the smaller the Radius the stronger/thiner the tube can be?

A smaller the radius will require a thicker wall

[pook]

OK, think of it like this, If I need a tube to take a twisting load (torsional) and its small in diameter the thicker the wall the better, but I can get that same or similar torsional resistance by increasing the diameter of the tube while decreasing the wall thickness.ie... drive shaft vs axle.

Your going to arch the main tubes I assume? exo car style?
If so then the large diam tube takes the torsional loads while the trusses help handle the other loads.

.065" has been used but I feel it takes a ton of stress from the truss tubes trying to poke through them since they are small (the poke a hole in a beer can with a pencil thing) and unless your a pro TIG welder your gonna blow out the tube.
.120" in large diameter is super safe but very heavy. your really only left with with the .08's and .09's (As long as its structural tubing and not water pipe)...laugh but you would be surprised!

PooK

[1993KA24DET]

OK, think of it like this, If I need a tube to take a twisting load (torsional) and its small in diameter the thicker the wall the better, but I can get that same or similar torsional resistance by increasing the diameter of the tube while decreasing the wall thickness.ie... drive shaft vs axle.

Your going to arch the main tubes I assume? exo car style?
If so then the large diam tube takes the torsional loads while the trusses help handle the other loads.

.065" has been used but I feel it takes a ton of stress from the truss tubes trying to poke through them since they are small (the poke a hole in a beer can with a pencil thing) and unless your a pro TIG welder your gonna blow out the tube.
.120" in large diameter is super safe but very heavy. your really only left with with the .08's and .09's (As long as its structural tubing and not water pipe)...laugh but you would be surprised!

PooK

LOL or Electrical Conduit

[pook]

I put an exo cage on a guys truck and his buddy wanted the same but wasn't about to pay me to do what he figured he could do...the next time I saw him it was a bent with a pipe bender water-pipe exo cage....prob weighed twice what the little Suzuki under it did.

Ive seen muffler pipe roll cages...guys put a piece of scrap metal in a tube gap and fill it with weld....

People scare me.

PooK

[1993KA24DET]

is there a decent manual roll bender for under $800. im not going to use it alot and i only need to bend 2" round tube

[BAILEIGH INC]

is there a decent manual roll bender for under $800. im not going to use it alot and i only need to bend 2" round tube


http://www.bii1.com/benders/roll/roll-bender-bender-rm7.php :spin:

http://www.bii1.com/images/roll%20benders/roll-bender-R-M7-main.jpg

[B-T]

Danny doesn't want to make a scene, but it appears the customer support from Baileigh is not all that great. We all know Danny has done great work, and obviously knows how to operate tools including the bender we bought from Baileigh. The problem seems to be that the tube slips and twists when it is being bent or the inside bend crushes and makes the bent tube unusueable for our fixture. So far the answer from Baileigh has been that Danny is doing it wrong, but nobody has offered to either show how to make it work correctly, or send a new machine out. It is not only a huge piece of unuseable equipment, but it has wasted considerable materials trying to get our few 2" pipes bent up. We would just use our hydraulic bender, but it doesn't have 2" dies. I'm hoping somone from Baileigh will step up and help us out, things are about to go viral!
:)
BT

[BAILEIGH INC]

Danny doesn't want to make a scene, but it appears the customer support from Baileigh is not all that great. We all know Danny has done great work, and obviously knows how to operate tools including the bender we bought from Baileigh. The problem seems to be that the tube slips and twists when it is being bent or the inside bend crushes and makes the bent tube unusueable for our fixture. So far the answer from Baileigh has been that Danny is doing it wrong, but nobody has offered to either show how to make it work correctly, or send a new machine out. It is not only a huge piece of unuseable equipment, but it has wasted considerable materials trying to get our few 2" pipes bent up. We would just use our hydraulic bender, but it doesn't have 2" dies. I'm hoping somone from Baileigh will step up and help us out, things are about to go viral!
:)
BT

I'm here and ready to help. I do my best to take care of my forum guys. Call me in the morning and let's start trouble shooting again.

The problem is that we have never heard of anyone having the same problems as him and we cannot tell what he is doing wrong by the pics he has sent or him describing it over the phone.

If anyone has a camera and can shoot a video of him bending some tube, we could tell what is going on. Something is off. If it is the bender we will gladly take care of it. We have a ton of the RDB-050 benders out there and everybody loves them.

Just give me the tools to help you guys. I just need a video.

Call me in the morning.

Shane 920-482-3220

[pook]

we cannot tell what he is doing wrong by the pics he has sent or him describing it over the phone.



Looks like we reached a solution.
Thanks Shane

[pook]

looks like we reached a solution.
PooK

[dave_ozz]

My first post.

A mate with my roller
http://i204.photobucket.com/albums/bb238/dave_vic_ozz/Tube_bender.png

older version. It needed more torque so I added another set of gears and a bigger drill.
http://i204.photobucket.com/albums/bb238/dave_vic_ozz/15092010002.jpg

Rollers in Lathe with tool made from 2" bar, cut to a spoon shape to do final clean up cut.
http://i204.photobucket.com/albums/bb238/dave_vic_ozz/rollersinlathe.jpg

sectioning off the rolls
http://i204.photobucket.com/albums/bb238/dave_vic_ozz/rollersinthebandsaw.jpg

[pook]

Nice roller dave_ozz! I opted to make my own as well using a winch! got about $350 bucks in the whole setup and works like a dream!
PooK

[dave_ozz]

Nice roller dave_ozz! I opted to make my own as well using a winch! got about $350 bucks in the whole setup and works like a dream!
PooK

That is quite clever.

I drove both wheels as I had no idea how it would work. Does the one wheel work ok. I guess it does.

dave

[pook]

I've never had it slip. I was going to run a second chain from wheel to wheel but once I gave it a test run I found no reason to in my case.
It's a shame there isn't affordable tools for fabrication out there. :(
PooK

[dave_ozz]

I must say I was pleasantly surprised my rollers gave me such repeatability. Build it strong is the clue here I think.