Pipe benders?

[96-GM]

I looking into built some bumpers and sliders for my truck and am thinking on buying a pipe bender this is the one i have been looking at: http://www.princessauto.com/shop-garage/fabrication-equipment/metal-benders-accessories/8068033-16-ton-pipe-bender

What do you think about that? what do you guys use, lets see some pics.

[Koots]

Doesn't look too bad, i saw this exact bender in a Princess Auto in Dartmouth and thought it was not a bad deal. I bet there are much better ones but foor the price you can't go wrong.

I'm not expert though, but i've been planning on picking one up for myself lately too :D

[Levi18]

Gotta love Princess Auto.

[kkustomz]

It works ok for how much it cost.

Jd2 bender

[gottravel]

Dude are you plumbing? or doing exhaust? That bender is junk and will weaken your tubing. You don't want a pipe bender you need a mandrel tubing bender. A little more complicated to use but a little time and is not that bad to figure out. www.jd2.com sells a manual bender for really reasonable price. I build bumpers, cages, long arm front suspension u name it with mine and it works great.

[GreaseDog]

:word: that's a pipe bender, pipe is for plumbing.

what you want is tube, and that will require a tube bender.

[96-GM]

kinda late now i haven't been on here in a while and my parents went into the states last week and picked it up for me for less than $200. It would kind of be a pain to get it returned now because i live in canada. Haven't tryed it yet because its a christmas present but will it still work for tubing?

[gottravel]

Tubing is measured by outside diameter and pipe is inside. There are some pipe and tubing that is close to the same outside dia. Either way that bender will bend what your going to use just dont plan on it looking good what so ever and it will definetly weaken the material. It might even crush it enough to crack it along the bend ive seen before. Just use .120 wall thickness at least and dont try and build any roll cages with that thing.

[GreaseDog]

will it work? yeah, probably. will it be durable? nope. i've got a buddy with rock sliders and a stinger made out of pipe. they were on the truck when he got them. they dent very easily, and have lots of cracks in them from impacts.

[kkustomz]

You must be referring to a schedule 10 pipe denting easy. Alot of pipe used for bumpers or cages are 1.250 schedule 40. Almost half of the dirt track guys use that bender. If you have the correct size pipe it will work descent.

[GreaseDog]

You must be referring to a schedule 10 pipe denting easy. Alot of pipe used for bumpers or cages are 1.250 schedule 40. Almost half of the dirt track guys use that bender. If you have the correct size pipe it will work descent.no, its all SCH 40.

if you're building cages with SCH 40 pipe and a pipe bender, you're retarded. not only does it lack the strentgth of the properly sized tube, but it weighs significantly more.

[kkustomz]

It works ok for how much it cost.

Jd2 bender

No he is not retarted, he is on a budget and what he has should work fine for him. Around here most steel suppliers refer to 1-1/4 sch 40 non pressure tested as pipe, when its actually 1.660 (ERW) tube When talking about pipe, dont go to your local hardware store and buy pressure tested black pipe in the plumbing section, it is weak and breaks when you try to bend.All tube will only come in a bare metal finish. Black pressure tested gas pipe has a thick black coating and yes it is weak and cracks if you try to bend it. Check and see what you are buying.

[GreaseDog]

post 4 has a pretty good explanation, the whole thread is pretty good really.
http://coloradok5.com/forums/showthread.php?t=119976

[96-GM]

post 4 has a pretty good explanation, the whole thread is pretty good really.
http://coloradok5.com/forums/showthread.php?t=119976

Some really good info in there pretty much explains the difference between pipe, tube, HREW, DOM, sch 40 and all that. I guess i bought the wrong bender for that i want to do but hopefully it will work out ok.

[gottravel]

Dude for building bumpers and rock sliders you'll be fine but pipe is made for plumbing and tube is made for structure. pipe is designed to not burst under pressure. the alloys are different and tubing is just going to be stronger as long as you stay away from seamed tubing. you can just tell how much stronger DOM is over seamed by just how much energy it takes to bend it in the bender and 4130 tubing is even stronger than the DOM. I built my buddy a front stinger bumper for his his jeep cj7 out of 1 3/4 DOM .188 wall and he nose dived off a log pile 5 feet right on it and all it did was scratch the powder coat. you wont see pipe hold up to that.

[Killer_bee]

i got a buddy with one like that and his works great