simple machine for making U Bolts

ralph klimek Feb-2011

I had a need to make some U Bolts for the construction of a new 160M short top loaded vertical. U Bolts are hard to find and hard to make nice ones using just a vise and hammer.  Something was needed that held the work piece securely against a mandrel.  The main difficulty is
finding tube stock that is suitable for a mandrel, the reason,  the finished U bolt has an effective radius somewhat larger than the mandrel.  I used any
old iron tube stock I could find about the place and made a whole set.  Construction and use is self evident from the pictures.  The tubes should be welded to 6mm iron angle stock, thinner is too flexible.  The hole in the holding piece should be a tangent to the mandrel for the stock in use.  I use 10mm threaded stock for my U Bolts because I can find a lot of this material in biulders' skips.  Hand force applied through a 600mm length of steel pipe does apply enough force to nicely bend this 10mm thread stock.
thumb.imgp5281-bender.jpg
thumb.imgp5283-bender.jpg
so good that I made three of them !



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page created Fri Feb 11 18:44:12 EST 2011