Welding Tips and Tricks

New guy here. I just found this website and Jody has some great videos and tips. I thought I would share a project I just finished welding. I'm going to powdercoat it but I wanted to test everything out first.

I bought the plans from a guy on ebay and they are some great plans. It's a JD2 model 3 bender and a Harbor Freight tubing roller. I have always hating bending tubing horizontally as it took up so much room in my cramped garage. I ended up mounting my bender on a stand that I put in my truck hitch and then I would store it against the wall when not it use. This method worked but was a pain in the butt to move over to my truck. I initially had it mounted to the floor, but that didn't work at all. This stand was made for the roller too so I went ahead and bought that as I've always wanted one for some projects around the house.

I have to say the air/hydraulic jack is the bees knees. Along with the Wixey digital angle finder, it makes bending much easier. No more long cheater and trying to see your angle gauge from 8 feet away.

Anyway, here it is a crappy weld pic too. I tig welded the entire thing. Some decent looking welds, some pretty sucky. I was trying to practice all positions.

Thanks,

Jason

Nice work!

Expect good reviews and many questions. That's been a recent topic.

This IS the best welding forum on the net, not for the traffic, but for the fact that any topic or question will be treated with respect by people of all skill levels.

Steve S

That looks good! I like the attached angle finder.....i should do something like that, too.

For what it costs versus a heavy duty tubing roller machine, the Harbor Freight one is actually pretty good. It's kind of a pain having to turn the wheel so many times for a roll, but I suppose it's also a good workout. Somewhere on youtube there is a video of a guy who attached a Harbor Freight electric pipe threader to his HF tubing roller. The speed and torque work out perfectly and the threader motor is reversible.


Other Steve

Otto Nobedder wrote:Nice work!

Expect good reviews and many questions. That's been a recent topic.

This IS the best welding forum on the net, not for the traffic, but for the fact that any topic or question will be treated with respect by people of all skill levels.

Steve S

Thanks Steve. I have admired your work on here for a few weeks since finding the forum. Keep up the good work.

Thanks,

Jason

delraydella wrote:That looks good! I like the attached angle finder.....i should do something like that, too.

For what it costs versus a heavy duty tubing roller machine, the Harbor Freight one is actually pretty good. It's kind of a pain having to turn the wheel so many times for a roll, but I suppose it's also a good workout. Somewhere on youtube there is a video of a guy who attached a Harbor Freight electric pipe threader to his HF tubing roller. The speed and torque work out perfectly and the threader motor is reversible.


Other Steve

Thanks Other Steve. I have seen the pipe threader upgrade that you speak of. Swag offroad is selling the kit for that. If I ever do enough rolling, I may invest in that upgrage. Right now it's just something else to play with.

If anyone is thinking about doing this upgrage for the bender, I would highly recommend it. Now the only thing holding me back is my single stage compressor. That air/hydraulic jack takes a good bit of cfm of air.

Thanks,

Jason

West, nice bender! The welds are nice, too. I like the wheel on the outside. I just finished the tower on my bender. I'm welding the tower to the base today and will have pics tonite! Lots of questions is right. What size tube are you bending? What wall thickness? Are you having trouble bending thin or thick wall? (.065 or .120?) How exact were you when you laid out the holes? I got my plans off e-bay as well. I wanted to bend a complete 180deg., but, alot of benders had the jack above the die not below and you can't bend 180 with the jack above.
Oh, I forgot. Welcome to the forum. I'm sort of new, too. The guys here are the best. Very, very helpful. Let's see more pics!

CraigLam wrote:West, nice bender! The welds are nice, too. I like the wheel on the outside. I just finished the tower on my bender. I'm welding the tower to the base today and will have pics tonite! Lots of questions is right. What size tube are you bending? What wall thickness? Are you having trouble bending thin or thick wall? (.065 or .120?) How exact were you when you laid out the holes? I got my plans off e-bay as well. I wanted to bend a complete 180deg., but, alot of benders had the jack above the die not below and you can't bend 180 with the jack above.
Oh, I forgot. Welcome to the forum. I'm sort of new, too. The guys here are the best. Very, very helpful. Let's see more pics!

Thanks Craig. I wasn't very clear in my first post but the wheel is for the tubing roller and not the bender. I have 2 seperate tools on this stand. The bender is a JD2 model 3 bender so I didn't lay out any of the holes on it. It was fabricated by JD2 and I just put it together. The roller is a Harbor Freight tubing roller. I took a pic showing it.

As far as the bender, it will bend 0.049 wall up to .120 wall up to 2". I don't have any 2" dies to verify that, but that is what is claimed. I would like to get a 1.5" die and 2" die, but they are very proud of them. Maybe if I can make a few bucks with some projects, I will get a few more dies. Right now, I have a 5/8", 3/4", (2) 1" dies, and a 1.25".

Here are a few more pics of the stand and welds.

Thanks,

Jason

Don't pick on yourself for those welds.

It shows that you don't weld every day. OTOH, I don't see anything in those pictures that would make me worry about those welds.

You did fine.

Steve S

Otto Nobedder wrote:Don't pick on yourself for those welds.

It shows that you don't weld every day. OTOH, I don't see anything in those pictures that would make me worry about those welds.

You did fine.

Steve S

Thanks Steve. That means a lot coming from you after seeing your work.

Jason

The best welds you see are from people who do only that, all day,every day.

The only way to build a stack of dimes is to repeat yourself. For days. Or, in some cases, years.

I don't weld often enough to stack those dimes...

I'll settle for a stack of "loose change"....

I'm not even getting the stack part yet. It's more like a pocket full of change. And lint, a button, and maybe a Werthers Original.

Thanks,

Jason

Here's a crappy video of the bender in action. I'm bending 1" 0.083 wall ERW tubing. It bends about 45-60 degrees per pass. It takes about 3.5 full extensions of the ram to make a 180 degree bend. It's probably a little faster than doing it manually, but it is way easier and much more accurate since you can actually see what degree you are stopping at.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vaiUkFNT ... e=youtu.be

Thanks,

Jason

West, very nice. Here's my boat anchor. I'm almost finished. as you can see in one of the photos, the bottle jack's pivot is 90 deg. off. I'll probably save up an get the air/hydro bottle jack instead. I just propped up the jack in this photo to see how it fits. It fits good. All the pins fit really good, but not all. One or two are a little tight. That's O.K. Each pin you use, you need a different bending die. That's another $300. Every different size tube is a different bending die. That's another $300 or so. So, most or all of my project will consist of 7/8" tube 4" radius, (top pin). The welds aren't great, but, I'm going to transfer the machine to some saw horses and work on it there.


I forgot to mention. The swing arm is not built yet. It goes on the upper pin. The pin that goes thru those upper tabs that are sticking out.

Craig,

Yours is looking good. I didn't have the patience to build my own bender.

What dies are you using? The dies for the JD2 are anywhere from $135 for a 1/2" small radius to $405 for the largest 2" die.

Thanks,

Jason

I'm using 7/8" with a 4" radius. They're from Pro-Tool. About $195 - 10% off for new customers. They are designed to fit this particular bender. Tomorrow I'll get some help to transfer it to some steel saw horses. I've made the decision to get the bottle jack from Harbor freight. Alot less head aches in the long run. I think I'm going to pain it black. I spoke to the guys at Pro-tool and they said that they realize that not all of the people who make these benders have machinist tools and the skill level varies. That's why I made this one. Also, I'm gonna chase the holes tomorrow and make sure that all fit right, even though I'm not gonna use them. I also plan to make a go-kart. I'll probably use 1 1/2" tube steel with a 6" radius, but, I'll have to save up for that. I still need to make the swing arm and probably wont post any pictures 'till then.

It took a minute, but I saw the pivot issue! LOL!

Oops?

Good excuse to upgrade the jack!

Steve S

Nice. Many people might be surprised how bending tools and equipment can open a lot of doors in fabrication work. I started out with an ancient manual Hossfeld bender that someone stored forever at a place I worked at and I have been bending/welding pipe ever since as a day job.