I was working on another project during the week so I didn't get much done on the van until Saturday morning. I rolled the tubing bender out and got the rear anti-roll bar bent up.
I made a drawing of the bar in CAD with dimensions so laying it out took no guess work. The 4.71 dimension is the arc length of the "centerline" of the bend. This is the length of tubing used to make the 90deg bend between the tangents.
http://images54.fotki.com/v1642/phot...MVC009S-vi.jpg
Using the roller jig to mark the tubing. I laid out the tangent lines just like the drawing said. Rolling the tubing in the jig gives me a perfectly straight line, all around the tubing, at each tangent point. makes setting it up in the bender easy.
http://images59.fotki.com/v1640/phot...MVC010S-vi.jpg
http://images45.fotki.com/v1636/phot...MVC012S-vi.jpg
Here you can see the two tangent points laid out for one bend.
http://images54.fotki.com/v1642/phot...MVC007S-vi.jpg
Getting the bender set up. Having it on the cart AND automated, sure does make this less of a chore. The rear bar is 1" O.D. x .095 wall 4130. it bends pretty easy anyway but this makes fun.
http://images54.fotki.com/v1642/phot...jpg?1486245473
Set up for the 1st bend and about a 1/2 of the way through it.
http://images16.fotki.com/v382/photo...jpg?1486245478
Out to 90 degrees. I am sneaking up on 90 here. To get "90" the tubing needs to be over bent so that, when it springs back, it stays at 90. I over bend it a bit, stop, loosen the jack screw to let the machine relax, measure the bend then bend a bit more if needed. I did this twice for the first bend and once for the second. Knowing what it takes helps with the second bend.
http://images46.fotki.com/v1637/phot...MVC015S-vi.jpg
getting the second bend done.
http://images59.fotki.com/v1640/phot...jpg?1486245479
Part of doing this correctly is making sure the second bend is on the same plane as the 1st bend. Having one leg point up and the other pointing down is not a good thing.
This is the bar after bending. Setting it on the floor tells me if I got it right or not. No rocking in either direction means I got it right.
http://images46.fotki.com/v1637/phot...MVC017S-vi.jpg
In this pic you can see the tangent points and where they fell in the bend.
http://images46.fotki.com/v1637/phot...MVC018S-vi.jpg
All trimmed up and ready for the endlink tabs to be welded on. I won't do that until I get the rest of the system mocked into place so I can tack everything at one time.
http://images54.fotki.com/v1642/phot...MVC020S-vi.jpg
This is how the bar looked in my CAD model.
http://images45.fotki.com/v1636/phot...ARREAR1-vi.jpg
Thanks for following.
Mark