15 hours ago, ThomasPowers said:

Almost certainly no safety issues using the sockets as they were; but possibly grave safety issues burning them off...

Don't burn them off in a cemetery.

Frosty The Lucky.

I know a guy who makes his jigs of a steel plate with bent down edges that fits on the anvil with a square piece sticking down into the hardy hole. Then he bends a master and welds onto the plate. This allows him to make bends quickly with varying radius (spirals). I sometimes do the quick an dirty by bending an U and hold that in the vise. 

Here is the bending plate I made. I use a hold fast on the anvil, or clamp it in a vise.

It is 5/8" plate.

 

 

Square upset hole

 

 

adjustable mandrel bender, various sizes

 

 

 

adjustable bending fork

 

And an oval hole for drifting

Why not just put two pieces of stock in a vise? Thats what I see brazeal did in his leaf video.

Forging Carver  you missed the point.   With that plate he can bend around a variety of different points.   He can add additional points as he needs them by drilling more holes.

Thought I'd toss a bone. Jig bends 5/8" cold. Uses a cheater bar that hooks the outer holes. Big disc turns on a bearing. Plan to drill more holes for more versatility. Different sized center hub would yield different results. I just bent until I got what I wanted at the time I needed it

 

 

I made the same angle iron bending jig but used 1/2" stock for the spindle. I put it on BOTH angles and it has allowed me to set it up to do "S" bends in one heat and a very easy motion. I made the angles about 15"  long and mounted the spindles on opposite ends. I have pipe slices welded to flat stock to accommodate the bigger curves and just drilled a hole in the center of the flat stock to drop over the 1/2" spindle. 

The plate jig is a much more versatile system. I was just giving an idea for a cheaper, simpler choice.

I was fortunate enough to hit the local scrap yard right after a machine shop had dropped off a load of scrap, wasn't sure what I was going to do with a big tool steel plate and a bunch of round objects and pins, but this is what it eventually turned into and it works great.

 

 

 

Wow that does indeed look like a Bending Jig Kit, 1 ea   !

HOLY MOLY what a scrap yard SCORE!!! There's more potential there than your average Hosfeld bender.

You lucky dog I hate you.  <sniff>

You must have some darned good karma.

Frosty The Lucky.

Yeah i must've been living right on that day, all of the square, flat and round bar stock are various types of steel and they were all marked with a sharpie pen identifying what type and all still legible.

 

what a haul! 

What a thread! 01tundra, I can only gasp. Dodge:

"Thought I'd toss a bone. Jig bends 5/8" cold. Uses a cheater bar that hooks the outer holes. Big disc turns on a bearing."

Great Bone! The simple attachment point for the cheater bar just saved me a good bit of rumination over a trailer axle assembly I have selected as a base for my bending jig - Thanks!

Robert Taylor

Smal, flexible efficient for smaller stuff. I also use it to shape collars.

Just throwing this out there;

You can make your own Hossfeld bender 

Make it exactly the same as a Hossfeld so you can use Hossfeld dies.

For the most part I make my own dies but I bought the top gripper and the over 90 die cheaper than I could make them.

Probably been mentioned and I missed it. I use the KISS bending jig system.

Grab you up some scrap steel etc. You need two pieces of angle iron. Say 2" legs. Two 1/2" bolts, say 3" long.  Weld one bolt to one section of angle along the threaded portion of bolt only. The non threaded shank is above the angle.  cut off the bolt heads.

Place the two angles back to back in the vise. Now you have two posts sticking up from the vise. YOU adjust the gap.  You are not limited to a plate with holes. YOU adjust the gap. 

Best part; now start collecting bits of scrap like bushings and bearing races . One slides over the other.  AGAIN......YOU adjust the gap.

I would challenge anyone out there to invent a cheaper easier adjustable nearly unlimited size jig. You have a four inch wide jaw on the vise? That is roughly your max spacing width. The smallest is ......Obviously. .....1/2" 

If you originally make the jig from 3/8" bolts then your smallest size is 3/8.

If you have six inch jaw or eight inch jaw that is roughly your largest spacing.

Two sections of angle.  Two bolts welded onto one leg of each angle.  Build sizes from that up to what you need. 

The ones I build are almost free save for the two bolts I weld.

 

Greetings SR.

I posted a picture of the one I made earlier on this thread. Similar to yours.. 

Forge on and make beautiful things

Jim

 

Greetings All, 

I designed this bending jig years ago and it has served me well ... Not much it can't do. I posted this before but it is lost in computer heaven.

Forge on and make beautiful things

Jim

Jim, that's a really cool lookin item there. I'd really love to replicate that so Im gonna have to keep my eyes open for some materials. Is it safe to assume you picked the rod size based on the hole size in the pulleys etc.? I wouldn't think choosing the rod then trying to find stuff to fit is the right way but I'm wrong on occasion. Looks like the base is made from large square tubing and plate, nothing too exotic there. Like I said, that looks pretty cool, I thin I need to make me one lol.

Greetings Michael,

The rod size is 1 inch and I have bushings that allow for many sizes of pulleys. The rods are staggered at different angles and allow for positional bending and straightening .. The pictures only show a small amount of functions that my design can do. A few more. 

Forge on and make beautiful things

Jim

 

I think I may just have found a use for the rack off the worn out farm jack I was given that is beyond repair. 4ft long with holes every3/4".

11 hours ago, Jim Coke said:

Greetings SR.

I posted a picture of the one I made earlier on this thread. Similar to yours.. 

Forge on and make beautiful things

Jim

 

Yes sir. I see it now. The sockets threw me off. Yes. That is it. I have employed bushings and bearing races etc. Scrap I locate about the workshop I work at and scavenge it up for the blacksmith shop. I have made several welded jigs but they serve only one purpose for one task. When you weld, it pretty much isn't adjustable. 

13 hours ago, SReynolds said:

Probably been mentioned and I missed it. I use the KISS bending jig system.

Grab you up some scrap steel etc. You need two pieces of angle iron. Say 2" legs. Two 1/2" bolts, say 3" long.  Weld one bolt to one section of angle along the threaded portion of bolt only. The non threaded shank is above the angle.  cut off the bolt heads.

Place the two angles back to back in the vise. Now you have two posts sticking up from the vise. YOU adjust the gap.  You are not limited to a plate with holes. YOU adjust the gap. 

Best part; now start collecting bits of scrap like bushings and bearing races . One slides over the other.  AGAIN......YOU adjust the gap.

I would challenge anyone out there to invent a cheaper easier adjustable nearly unlimited size jig. You have a four inch wide jaw on the vise? That is roughly your max spacing width. The smallest is ......Obviously. .....1/2" 

If you originally make the jig from 3/8" bolts then your smallest size is 3/8.

If you have six inch jaw or eight inch jaw that is roughly your largest spacing.

Two sections of angle.  Two bolts welded onto one leg of each angle.  Build sizes from that up to what you need. 

The ones I build are almost free save for the two bolts I weld.

 

I use that style as well.

I would add, that by using slices of pipe to generate the required " ID " you're not limited to the width of the jaws on your vise.

My adjustable "bending fork / jig", uses 1" round bar welded to the angles, and I then drop whatever size collar I need over one of the 1" pins, and then set the remaining gap, to the size of the stock being bent.

I bend a lot of oversize chain links in this fashion, ( 2 1/2" to 6" ID ) and use them to repair "off-road" tractor and log-skidder chains.

Simple and effective.

 

.

1 minute ago, SmoothBore said:

 

I would add, that by using slices of pipe to generate the required " ID " you're not limited to the width of the jaws on your vise.

 

.

Not following you on that. I only add bushings/pipe to one of the "pins". I use the horn for most bending so I may not use a jig as much as others. As the bushings grow in dimension I have to move the two pins welded to the angle further apart. I have never required anything larger than a four inch vise jaw. If you got crazy and want an 8" radius I would "imagine" it will require a larger vise jaw. I don't use my 8 inch vise for tasks like bending. I don't bend anything that large/heavy etc. 

longer lengths of angle would work to expand on size, correct? My sections of angle are about three inches long. If they became 6" long then I imagine all the information I gave in above post goes out the window. Like I say, my angles are about three inches long. I don't really know. I didn't cut them. I have a large amount of them pre-cut in the scrap bin so I simply fish them out. Saves time cuz they are cut to length and I didn't experiment with longer sections.