building a tubing bender

[vin-man welding]

here is a different style of bender that you might try to copy.
http://www.lowbucktools.com/hydbender.html

[nocheepgas]

jd2 is a awesome bender!hard to beat em for the money. ive made a couple of copies of it.All parts are laser cut and exact copies.im looking to sell them.

That sounds like it might head you towards some legal issues!

[nocheepgas]

Shop Outfitters makes a nice bender too. It seems to be very similar but yet different from something like the JD2. I wish someone would be able to tell me why you might chose one over the other. I've read everything there is on both of those but can't seem to get the answer.

If I'm not mistaken the follow bar on the Shop Outfitters bender is a roller, as opposed to the style of die on the JD2 model. I've heard that the roller style did not perform as well as the other, leading to more distortion in the bending radius.

[vin-man welding]

just looked up the JD bender and that JD32 looks nice for $375.

[WyoRoy]

That sounds like it might head you towards some legal issues!

Maybe, but most of the bender designs out there were taken from the original Hossfeld bender which appears to now be in the public domain through the expiration of the original patent. For the small amount saved buying a pirated copy it would make more sense instead just to fabricate one of your own design from the number of plans and articles out there on the Internet if saving money was a top priority. Benders are cheap, whether manufactured or fabricated, the dies are where the companies make their money. Personal opinion, but if I were one of the bender companies and you wished to buy an exact copy of the bender I built from someone else I would be quite happy with your choice knowing the dies sales were coming.

[FusionKing]

jd2 is a awesome bender!hard to beat em for the money. ive made a couple of copies of it.All parts are laser cut and exact copies.im looking to sell them.

I am assume you mean the ones you have taken the time to whip out and not that you are going into the bender biz.
I believe copying is a form of flattery until you profit from it. That is one of the problems we have with China today. When I bought my JD2 I actually bought from the company owner...he spent a good hour with me and made a special die as well. Super nice guy. He told me how he was building a roll cage years ago using a Hossfeld and could not believe how slow it was. He then came up with the ratchet design and sold the heck out of them.
If I was gonna screw over a company by being too lazy to design my own bender, I would pick some fat cat CEO type not a regular guy that has to come to work everyday and and labor, just like you and me, like Pro-Tools and others have done.
I doubt that is what you plan to do tho.

[1428turbo]

fusionking you assume wrong,im going to take the HUGE profit from the first 2 i sell,play KENO with the profits and win big!,take that money and build 10,000 units! I will then take over the world!!!!! one bender copy at a time!The world will be my oyster! Seriously,dude,lighten up!

[Fishy Jim]

Why isn't the diacro design copied more often?

[WyoRoy]

Why isn't the diacro design copied more often?

Has its patent gone to public domain?

[TS-Off-Road]

Why isn't the diacro design copied more often?

Prolly 'cause it only bends up to 1" tube.