I built a Tube bender, starting with Gottrikes plans, but modifying them to use a Hydraulic cylinder, instead of the HF jack. I also mase the swing arm out of 1" thick material and comensated for the larger dimensions. For a Power unit I have a 12V self contained Monarch pump, and I control it with a digital scale head that I modified to read a 3600 PPR digital encoder. It gives me 1/2 deg accuracy when bending, and I can set the angle and press start, the bender will run until the desired angle and stop. I am currently collecting data to compensate for spring back, and will encorporate the values, so the bender will automatically compensate considering the material size/wall thickness, and the angle of the bend.
The legs retract to take up less room for storage, I used 2" trailer hitch recievers for this:
Leg detail I added caster wheels to help move it around, by notching the ends of the square tube:
First project for the bender:
I designed the bumper using Bend-tech Pro software, no way in hell I would have been able to do it with out the software.
This is my "High tech" digitizer, I bought a 4 x 8 sheet of white paneling (the type used in bathrooms etc..) and a plumb bob. I marked all the important points on the paneling, noting the different heigths, then measured them and used them for the bumper design.
The legs retract to take up less room for storage, I used 2" trailer hitch recievers for this:
Leg detail I added caster wheels to help move it around, by notching the ends of the square tube:
First project for the bender:
I designed the bumper using Bend-tech Pro software, no way in hell I would have been able to do it with out the software.
This is my "High tech" digitizer, I bought a 4 x 8 sheet of white paneling (the type used in bathrooms etc..) and a plumb bob. I marked all the important points on the paneling, noting the different heigths, then measured them and used them for the bumper design.