Lets see your pics of some small projects

[Fishy Jim]

The bender in the pic you're asking about is for flat and square stock. They can be modified with round face dies to do rounds and heavy wall tube, but nothing like exhaust pipe.

If you could put a big enough cheater bar on the handle, and fit your pipe in there, it would only kink it in half. You need a draw type bender for thin wall. A lot of people confuse those with mandrel benders. Mandrel benders have a follow die INSIDE the tube being drawn to retain the full ID in the bend.

[triggerman]

can that tool make them bends on 2-1/2 dia pipe?

Chief, I don't have a clue what it is capable of. I bought it to bend 1" strap and 1/2" rod.

Other guys here are gearheads, maybe they know.

[toecutter]

thanks triggerman.
Fishy jim explained the matter, quite perfect too I might add. thanks Jim!

you know us tinkeres trying to cut corners

[Goodhand]

Here's a photo of one of my small projects. It is a torque wrench extender that I made, so I could use my wrench with a 150# upper limit to torque the flywheel bolt on a VW engine, requiring 253# of torque. My guess is that some of you will have one of these extenders, but I'll bet some will not. By using the extender one can double the torque provided by a standard 1/2" drive torque wrench. When using the extender, a setting of 125# of torque on the wrench will yield 250# at the socket.

I drilled, then filed, a 1/2" square hole to accept the socket coupler on the wrench, and welded a 3/8" to 1/2" drive extender to the other end. The distance between the hole center and extender center should equal the functional length of the wrench, depending on which style is used (beam or clicker).

[holsters]

Here are a few of mine.

I'm just a hobby weldor. Mostly self taught. I only have a torch and a little Thunderbolt so the thin stuff is all gas welded. Gas is slow, but I enjoy it. Maybe someday I'll get a mig, but can't justify the expence for now.

The work bench tops came from an old modular office cubicle set up that was taken out of our billing office at work. They were free and so cool I took them home and made 4 rolling work benches. I'm still trying to talk my buddy out of the other 4 tops that he got.

The wheel base on the burnishing station has the brake rotor welded into it. They are both cast-offs from one of our ambulances. The rotor makes the base very heavy and stable.

1) Torch cart (gas)
2) Weld table. Plans adapted from welding book. (stick)
3) Leather burnishing station. (I make custom holsters and gun belts.) (stick)
4) Steel and pipe storage (gas)
5) Work bench (stick)

[Sberry]

I was trying to catch up a bit but some super nice stuff in this thread I certainly hadn't thought of. In the second pic the bracket started as a 1 fixture unit but got extended with a conduit coupling and additional guy wire. In the last one I use that getup for service lighting near equipment. These new CF Ls will be even easier and cheaper to operate but for near a compressor or electric panel I usually use a common 100 watt incandescent lamp.

[Goodhand]

I was trying to catch up a bit but some super nice stuff in this thread I certainly hadn't thought of. In the second pic the bracket started as a 1 fixture unit but got extended with a conduit coupling and additional guy wire. In the last one I use that getup for service lighting near equipment. These new CF Ls will be even easier and cheaper to operate but for near a compressor or electric panel I usually use a common 100 watt incandescent lamp.

Novel approaches to getting light where you need it, but it's sure hazy in your shop. Don't you have an exhaust fan?

[Broccoli1]

Not haze- Low MP camera

[modela]

This is the welding corner with the fan in the upper left.


I was fortunate enough to pick up this hood from a place that was shutting down. It went from rectangle to 12" round which just matched up with my fan. I custom made the shroud (painted red) with a removable panel on the left to get at the motor.



Fan is in the very corner and exhausts through a Dayton shutter to the outside wall. The 90 degree elbow and the round to square are standard HVAC parts.



I bought a 3 phase motor on ebay to use with a variable speed drive. This gives me control of the fan rpm, cfm, and noise level. The fan is mounted on rubber mounts to keep down vibration.

[curly]

This is the only one I've got handy. Of course, the idea came from someone else on this forum.

Anybody wanna tell me how to get the threaded hole in this. Some kinda tap thing I believe but I've never done that so don't know. Anyplace to get one resonably priced, like harbor freight or NT? What are they called?

That actually may just be a nut welded onto the thing...but I'd still like to know (tap and die or something)