Buying a Pipe and Square Tube Bender Advice

Yes a tubing bender will cause distortion. The outside of the bend will tend to flatten as you stretch it amd the inside will want to wrinkle get pressed in as you compress it.

The tighter the radius the more severe the changes to cross section over the bend.

Tubing can be packed with sand or filled with low melting temperature allow, then emptied after bending. There are, of course limits.

Definitely check out the bends made by any bender you are considering.

hydraulics only make it easier... it also depends on your budget.... it comes down to compromise.

Tube benders will distort the tube,

I have heard to keep the tubes from distorting is to fill it with sand..., I myself didn't have too much luck with that but people say it works.

For round tube, you would need a mandrel to correct the distortion.

Baileigh carries tube benders, they sell what is basically RMD benders... I believe RMD makes it for Baileigh

We run several makes, depending on size an application. Several are MIIC brand hydraulic CNC, one of which goes up to 60mm with or without mandrels. We also have Keins, UTE, Pines (Hydraulic), BLM and Eaton-Leonard (Servo). All of these are capable of shaping tube with multiple bends and angles.

The amount of distortion depends on many things. The chemistry of the material, wall thickness, bend angle, clamp & pressure die force, and inside support (sand or other media, or mandrel) and are present in either hydraulic- or servo-powered.

To minimize distortion on round tubing (we call it ovality), many times we will design the dies with a "crowned" radius profile that stretches the material toward the outside of the bend.

https://www.jd2.com/p-32-model-3-bender.aspx

Wow! Not being an ME, I learned a lot from the first video. I thought it would be extremely difficult to bend square tubing. When he started showing the samples and how they did it, I realized that I had seen the types of bends that were made. Lawn chairs came to mind - the "grooves" in the inner and outer radii.

Anyway, thanks!

Don't know if you want to spend the money, or what volume of tubing you are bending, but tubes and pipes are sometimes filled with soapy water, then frozen and bent while the ice is frozen.

I once worked with an OEM exhaust system manufacturer and he said they use this method a lot. It is especially useful in bending double wall tubing.

Thanks for the tip. I had not thought of that method but I certainly can make use of it in other projects.

Plumbers bend pipes routinely as part of their trade:

• Pipe bending springs are sometimes wound down the pipe before a bend is made.
• Pipe bender machines are available, from hand-operated to hydraulic, etc.
• Freezing water inside the pipe, as mentioned above, serves to limit the distortion inevitable while bending.
• As an alternative to frozen water, packing the pipe with sand before beding it is another technique.

Electricians also for conduit,... the larger conduit 2" bends doe have quite a larger radius

Can you confirm that this included square pipe/tubing? If you have a link, that would be great .

No. His business and mine used round tubing for exhaust systems, where smooth flow is critical.

I doubt that it's worth the bother with square tube since smooth flow usually isn't a concern. (or you'd use round)

My guess is that it would work, but I don't know. It'd be fairly easy to find out.

I am a controls engineer at a sanitary stainless fabricating shop, and our primary business, despite the success of our process skids, is still what we first excelled in - U-tube heat exchangers. So in defense of tubing benders, I will say I've been here 30 years, and all I've ever seen the fabricators use to make the u-tubes is a hydraulic bender with a mandrel chase. Now if there is an industry where the internal finish is critical, it is in the sanitary fabricating industry. Most of the customers require a video borescope recording of the tubing internal surface. The tubing is bought polished and not re-polished after bending, so, apparently the internal damage is not very great. Pharmaceutical and bio-tech companies are not appalled by the end result of a tubing bender.

However, these benders for that type of result are a tad bit more than your $300. (multiply by a factor of 200) For that price you will probably get a gouged/flattened mess. I guess you know what a hand bender will do to the exterior. See if you can find a shop with a good bender and have them do it for you. (don't try your local sanitary fabrication shop, as they won't allow carbon steel in their building)

cost was never really mentioned, nor the application its used for... and its not pocket change for these benders either.

I really need one that does a neat job for a reasonable price. I am looking at 300 $Au...

Well, yes it was, as seen above, and it is ridiculously low price for a good bender. I assume most people work with carbon steel. I would hope an alloy such as austenitic steel would have been presented in the original post, as that obviously makes a huge difference in the capabilities of the machine. for that matter, if the use is for copper or aluminum, that won't be touched by a sanitary fabricator either, mostly on principle, as the rust problem doesn't exist with pollution of the machine by them.

Thank you all for your advice. I think I will have to rethink this project. A belated good new year to all.

I would like to suggest Woodward Fab Manual Tube & Pipe Bender WFB2. I myself used the tool. It comes with below features

• Bends up to 2 inches Diameter Tubing
• Equipped with CNC machined components for precision &
• Offers round or square bending applications

And, the price of the tool? It’s just over $300, which is within your range. So, you may give the tool a good consideration. I am a hobbyist woodworker too. So, I know the machine is as useful as to a metal worker like a cabinet table saw is an important cutting tool of woodworkers.

I have a bender that sits unused.

You hand crank the rod through a set of spaced wheels. The bottom center is hydraulic.

I have some 6x6x10' fence posts that I've plated together as a big lever. It works well as a smasher of parts .. surprisingly powerful and delicate.

If you could make a jig for each part there's a way to produce them.

Square.. as you've seen is the enemy.