2021 - Volume #45, Issue #5, Page #25
[ Sample Stories From This Issue | List of All Stories In This Issue | Print this story
| Read this issue]
“Made It Myself” Metal Bender
![]() |
“I used angle iron on the ends bolted to steel plate on the one side and angle iron on the other for a 10 1/2 by 20 1/5-in. base,” says Bruhn. “The rollers are 16 1/2-in. long, 2-in. pipe that are mounted to 1/4-in. flat iron welded to the angle iron ends.”
To mount the rollers, Bruhn cut end caps out of 1/4-in. steel and center drilled 5/8-in. holes in them. He welded the end caps in the pipes to stabilize 5/8-in. rods that hold the rollers in place. The rods rest in holes drilled 3 in. apart in the iron plates at the ends of the bender frame, extending out of one end. At that end, Bruhn mounted 2 1/2-in. sprockets for #40 chain to the rods for the lower rollers. The wiper motor is mounted to the end of one rod. It is powered by a 12-volt motor with a switch for on/off and forward/reverse.
The third roller with its rod is mounted in steel collars that ride inside C-channel uprights. The uprights are welded in place to the end plates and angle iron. T-bolts threaded through a U-shaped bracket atop the uprights can raise the roller up to 3 in.
“I used set screws to attach the bracket to the C-channel uprights and to attach the drive sprockets to the lower rollers,” says Bruhn. “If I want to remove the upper roller or the lower ones, all I need is an L-wrench.”
One thing he used it for was to make a cone speaker for his brother’s antique phonograph. “Bending a cone is a matter of cutting the metal in a curve at the top and the bottom,” says Bruhn. “Then, when you bend it, the sides pull together.”
Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Bradley Bruhn, 157 Indiana St., Palermo, N. Dak. 58769 (ph 701 621-6529; mjosh8231@gmail.com).
![](/img/download-story.png)
Click here to download page story appeared in.
![](/img/entire-issue.png)
Click here to read entire issue
To read the rest of this story, download this issue below or click here to register with your account number.