tubing bender help

[mark m.]

Hey Race, looks great. How about a picture of the bender you used?

[racerone3]

Hey Race, looks great. How about a picture of the bender you used?

i don't have any pics of the machine i used, but it was real similar to this one Model 32 Hydraulic Tube Bender

[wfo]

thats kinda what i have also..its definitly worth the price..without any hyd or elect ability
you can always add that later..

[racerone3]

I was looking around all the local fabrication shop shops for a ring roller to make the main hoop on my racers cage. a friend who owns one of the local fab shops mentioned that he had heard the one that "horrible freight tools" sells was actually pretty good. Tubing Roller so I decided to try one. as expected it had a few items could be a lot better and took some slight modifications to make it a descent tool, but it actually did a good job. i got it on sale for $149 and if i can get a few uses out of it, then i'll consider it money well spent. i bent the hoop pictured out of .090 mild steel. figured out the length of the curve (pi X r) divided by 2, and wrapped the tubing with duct tape to act as stops then went to bending.

[jerseybigfoot]

Very neat Race. What size rollers does it come with? I see you are starting a Harbor Freight bending shop. Do you have to prewarm the HF benders on the wood stove for them to work?

[racerone3]

Very neat Race. What size rollers does it come with? I see you are starting a Harbor Freight bending shop. Do you have to prewarm the HF benders on the wood stove for them to work?

the other bender has actually proven to be quite handy, just not for what i bought it for. as for roller sizes, there are 3. one fits 1 1/2 tubing perfectly... not sure what the other 2 sets fit. they are nothing close to what they are marked. I hate when winter comes along, because i have to stop using the wood stove as a work bench/anvil/collect-all... I would like to move it out of the middle of my shop, but projects like this make it nice to space all the way around it.

[rattlesnake]

I have one of those 16 ton Harbour Frieght benders and I use it to bend rebar....works great!!
I have heard that if you make inserts that fit tight around the tubing and tight into the die they will bend tubing properly.

[racerone3]

let me bring this up one more time... I've decided that it's time to invest in a real tubing bender and i've narrowed it down to 2 possible choices. Pipe Bending Machine, Tube Benders, Square Tubing Bender and JD Squared, Inc. I was just wondering if anyone has experience with either of these machines? pro tools is running a special right now for a notcher, bender and 2 die sets for around $1200. I can pick up roughly the same package from JD2 for around $975... if the pro tools machine is better I don't have a problem shelling out an extra $225, but if the 2 are very comparable the difference in price isn't justified. while I'm still in the "searching phase", if anyone has a recommendation of another bender I will also throw that in the ring.

an update on the HF Ring Roller. the included dies are 1", 1-1/2" and 2"

[wfo]

if you get the protools setup make sure you get the heavy duty frame assy..
the part that the dies fit into is thicker so if you need to bend larger tubing it will
handle the stress
years ago i paid 250 for the bender 275 notcher 50 for the stand and i think the
dies were 125 to 210 each depending on size, dont buy the degree wheel part
its not worth the $

[racerone3]

thanks for the reply, that's exactly the kind of stuff i need. you can read specs and "reviews" all day, but peoples real world experience tells the true tail