# Wire & Tube Bender



## Ken I (Dec 20, 2011)

In response to a request for plans by DaveRC as well as a forthcoming need of my own - plus I can't find anything "off the shelf" that I like - I designed and built a wire / tube - bending / forming fixture.

Here are some sample parts bent on the fixture.






You can use the centre pins as a pair to hold the rod whilst bending with the outer pin as a one size fits all general purpose approach - like this it can bend wire up to 5mm diameter.
You can also perform double parallel bending which is handy for manufacuring offsets.

By slipping rollers over the pins and adding the guide unit you can form the wire around your inner form roller to generate specific bend radii.






Set up like this to do one bend at a time it will bend up to 1/4" mild steel rod (I have bent 7mm diameter).

By adding the stop you can set for a "production run" to get a whole bunch of identically bent parts.

By making forming rollers to slip over the pins you can bend tubing with minimal flattening or kinking.

Whilst I haven't tried it I would guess you could also perform some limited bending of flat or profiled stock.

The main pins are made from 6mm diameter silver steel (unhardened) and the rollers and for bending and forming are also machined from silver steel and hardened.

For radii smaller than 3mm you would have to make a stepped pin.

Sure over time you will have to make a bunch of rollers & pins as required but they should last forever and you will ultimately accumulate a useful set.

Other than for forming tube the inner and outer roller do not need to "nest" exactly with the wire being bent.

I did not trust myself to accurately hand grind a 1/16" radius form tool and had zero faith in my mini-lathe's ability to plunge form turn it in any case so I milled the rads on the RT (relying on the cutter diameter to give an exact radius).





Here the forming rollers being used to form 1/8" x 3/32 steel tube (for NOS injection lines) as well as 1/8" x 3/32" brass tube etc.






Here are the various parts that make up the fixture - which is intended to be mounted in a vice.




Note the smaller knock out holes drilled right through in case of a pin getting stuck.

I will post the 2D ACAD drawings in the downloads section for anyone who's interested - you can obviously play with it to your heart's content and adjust to imperial dimensions where better suited to your purpose.

Since making it I have added a few more holes to the torque ring to give more opportunity to use existing rollers on other sizes and I have increaced the length of the split clamp which holds the stop to make it more user friendly (it fouled the guide arm in some locations).







If anyone has any better ideas or improvements - lets have them.

Ken


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## ShedBoy (Dec 20, 2011)

That is awesome Ken, I reckon I may build one of them. Thanks for sharing

Brock


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## Captain Jerry (Dec 20, 2011)

Ken

That's a nice design. You didn't leave much room for improvement.

Jerry


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## arnoldb (Dec 20, 2011)

Very nice indeed Ken Thm: Thm:

Kind regards, Arnold


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## Ken I (Dec 20, 2011)

Thanks guys.

Captain - I built it primarilly because I want to get 6 identical bends for my elbow engine - also the manifold pipework for my V4 was a sod without this so I'm sure it will get a fair amount of use.

Regards,
      Ken


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## portlandron (Dec 20, 2011)

Thanks for sharing, it' now at the top of my list of tooling to build.


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## PTsideshow (Dec 20, 2011)

One of the more useful shop builds, as you say looks to be an often used tooling, rather than a ones or twice piece of kit and plan holder. Great job and thanks for sharing!


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## bezalel2000 (Dec 20, 2011)

Ken

Definitely worth a khama and perfect timing.  :bow:

I have a project in the wait, that calls for a small tube bender - and this is it.  Thm: Thm: Thm:

Improvements: It needs an attachment that can generate more 'shed time' for those of us who need it.  ;D

Cheers 

Bez


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## ref1ection (Dec 20, 2011)

Great design and perfect timing for me also. ;D Karma to you.

Ray


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## Ken I (Dec 21, 2011)

Bezalel  said:
			
		

> Improvements: It needs an attachment that can generate more 'shed time' for those of us who need it.



Dangnabbit - there's always something you forget to add in !

Any ideas ? Sending the wife away on an extended holliday would free up a lot of time for me.

Ken


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## steamer (Dec 21, 2011)

....yea but you also need to create the send the kids with her attachment! :big:

Dave


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## tel (Dec 21, 2011)

No point really - by the time you get over the hangover they'll all be back anyway!


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## steamer (Dec 21, 2011)

tel  said:
			
		

> No point really - by the time you get over the hangover they'll all be back anyway!




 Rof}


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## hopeless (Dec 29, 2011)

Very nice made tool Ken and a nice size for hobbiests. Very similar to one my father made in the early 60's from an article in popular mechanics though his was larger as he was making a lot of veranda posts and pot plant stands with scrolled steel.


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## Brian Rupnow (Dec 29, 2011)

Ah, Ken---You're not just a pretty face!!! Very nice piece of tooling and very well documented. Congratulations on a good job.---Brian


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## billm (Jan 9, 2012)

any chance you could post the plans in pdf format, some of us old farts don't have cad software


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## Ken I (Jan 10, 2012)

Bill,
   There is no way to edit a download post and I don't want to post again - but I have attatched it here.

Hope this works for you - from one old fart to another.

Ken 

View attachment wirebender.pdf


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## billm (Jan 10, 2012)

Thanks Ken, that will work

Bill


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## doubletop (Jan 11, 2012)

Thanks Ken

I can see a number of these being made, very useful tool. 

I'm sure David Clarke editor of ME and MEW would be happy to pay if you were to write an article about it for him. He's always on the lookout for items like this. Its not like the precedent hasn't been set either, projects featured here have also appeared in ME.

Pete


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## Ken I (Jan 11, 2012)

ME already approached me and it is also on their website.

I know there is no conflict of interests really - but somehow it bothers me just a little - HMEM being "home" to me.

Ken


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## ultramate (Sep 11, 2013)

Ken can you please contact me regarding wire bending in Cape Town

I want to use s/steel for medical purposes


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