Bender building advice

[bigbadbugga]

I'm looking at the possibility of building a sheet metal bender to bend sheet stainless up to 1.6mm thick and 1800mm long.

Is this doable on a manual bender? Or is the force needed to bend it going to be too great?

Also, I may need to do some bends with a 50mm radius that are around 1000mm long, can I bend this around a piece of pipe?

I already have a sealey type bender I got off eBay, so was thinking of scaling it up big time using some big box section and angle, I have about 6M of 50x100x5mm RHS I was thinking of using as the bed and front folding flap. I also have some 50x25x3mm and 50x50x3mm.

Any ideas welcome guys.

 

[nodeward]

thats pretty big but it is possible, might be easyer to go for a press brake type folder especially if you want some different radius'

 

[bigbadbugga]

Hmmmm, never thought of a press break type, couple of bottle jacks would do the job of the pressing do you think?

Might be a bit more complicated to make though?

 

[Engineer]

Unless you are thinking of doing quite a bit of ongoing production work needing the bends you mention, then why not get the work carried out by a sheet metal place with a CNC press brake?

 

[Hitch]

I must say i agree with Engineer...
To bend 1.5 ss, you need about 15-20 tonnes per metre....

So at least youl be needing 30 tonnes, then the deflection on the bending beam becomes more, especially on a wide machine.......bits of 50x25 aren't going to cut the mustard for theis one.

Keep your eye out for a hand folder, edwards truefold, something like that.

 

[astro_al]

I have an Edwards bender and it weighs around a tonne, more if I recall right, and very little of that mass is in the stand / base. It has a capacity of only 4 foot (although will bend a bit thicker than you specify) and seems to be constructed mostly from inch and a quarter plate, 3/4 plate and 1/2 inch plate.

As you extend the width capacity you struggle more and more with stopping the beam bending in the middle. I think you're just way off with your materials and expectations if I'm honest. You need to make the main beam and the swinging beam as beefy as you possibly can, or all your nice long bends will be on a radius.

Good luck, Al.

 

[bigbadbugga]

Thanks for the replies guys, I had a feeling I was going to be pushing the limits of a home built machine.

I think I'll try to find a friendly local fab shop who can do the bends for me,