which material are the tubes?
fill it with sand
bend very slowly in stages,,,, the sand will keep it from collapsing
What diameters are you considering? There are springs you put the tubing in before bending. I bought the Micro-Mark bender primarily for bending wood but it also has grooves for roller bending smaller tubing. Anything much larger, you can use a tubing bender.
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3mm OD brass
Should I cap each end to keep the sand in?
I dont know.... I was just guessing... seemed to make sense....
Find a piece of solid brass rod the same ID as your tubing. Insert the rod in the tubing and bend away! (Then try to figure out how to remove the rod! LOL!!)
That's funny! Lol
I wont build any more models that will have bent tubing so the tool will just sit. And Billing provides a length of electrical wire of the same diameter that is covered with black cloth. It simulates wrapped steam pipe. So if I totally screw up I can use the wire.
Here are few suggestions
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Mini Tube bender.
Hi, I'm building some live steam models and will need to bend quite a few tubes in the near future. One pressing need was to make a pressure tester for the boilers I build and this also involved some mini tube bending - 3 mm diameter in this case. So I decided to make a manual bending device...
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Less expensive way:
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Has anyone tried filling the tube with molten lead (if at all possible with very small dias) and reheating after bending to remove the lead core? There is also a metal on the market with a very low melting point. I forgot its name, though.
I think you can make a jig to bend it better than this, more uniformly anyway, but you can see how this person does it for copper tubing for an alcohol lamp. Starts bending at 3:26 and he uses aluminum oxide grit blast medium to fill the tubing and keep it from going oval during the bend.
Straighten the tube up to get the brass bar out
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Another hobby of mine is building custom, water cooled computers.
I always need to bend clear PVC tubing, by heating it up with a heat gun. To prevent the tubing from collapsing, I insert silicone rods. Once the PVC has cooled down, you just pull out the silicone rod.
I'm confident you would be able to do the same with brass tubing. You would most likely need to lubricate it with mineral oil or another lubricant. The only challenge I see is finding it in smaller than your 3mm OD. With that said, you can search for "silicone rods". Good luck!
Cheers,
Ken
I always need to bend clear PVC tubing, by heating it up with a heat gun. To prevent the tubing from collapsing, I insert silicone rods. Once the PVC has cooled down, you just pull out the silicone rod.
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I'm confident you would be able to do the same with brass tubing. You would most likely need to lubricate it with mineral oil or another lubricant. The only challenge I see is finding it in smaller than your 3mm OD. With that said, you can search for "silicone rods". Good luck!
Cheers,
Ken
Hi Ironrod60,
How tight is the bend?
Lead solder of the appropriate diameter is a good substitute for simulating pipe work you can glue the bend onto the tube.
A block of wood can made with the correct internal radius then a groove filed into the block for the tube to snuggly sit into then bent to shape.
I would recommend annealing the tube before and probably several times during the bending process.
Copper tube lends itself more to bending, again after annealing.
To anneal heat the tube to a cherry red and quench in water for best resalts.
Hope this helps.
Cheers,
Stephen.
How tight is the bend?
Lead solder of the appropriate diameter is a good substitute for simulating pipe work you can glue the bend onto the tube.
A block of wood can made with the correct internal radius then a groove filed into the block for the tube to snuggly sit into then bent to shape.
I would recommend annealing the tube before and probably several times during the bending process.
Copper tube lends itself more to bending, again after annealing.
To anneal heat the tube to a cherry red and quench in water for best resalts.
Hope this helps.
Cheers,
Stephen.
Trumpets curvatures (and many other things) are made with frozen soapy water inside to prevent colapsing
On something this small just the handling of it might melt it before you bend it
I would go to a brass Rod that fits inside, or Cooper wire, whatever you find 1st
On something this small just the handling of it might melt it before you bend it
I would go to a brass Rod that fits inside, or Cooper wire, whatever you find 1st
If you anneal the brass rod beforehand, you can probably remove it from almost all curves. Heat until red with a propane torch.