[zrwhat]

We have a new opportunity with an existing customer that is asking us to bend and end-form a small Ø0.134in thin walled 0.008in Full-Hard 304 Stainless tube. We have been looking into getting into this type of business and this opportunity may allow us to fund a CNC Bender & End Former. Just looking for some help to make sure there isn't any major hurdles or black-art involved in bending and forming the 304 in the Full-Hard state. Thanks for the help!

[cro-magnum]

without knowing what the parts may look like it is hard to say if CNC is needed. I would look into an old Eaton Leonard or the likes. They are pretty sophisticated with their electronic detents to control bend angle and rotation. VERY VERY simple machine to operate, which you will need because you would be stepping into bending with a fairly tough job. A machine like this would cost you around 4000 and up for a ready to work machine. To run a tedious job like you have you may need to rebuild the head because you will be chasing slop all over the place. You have 5 critical tools for mandrel bending tube like that and they all need to stay exactly where you need them to pull off a successful bend.

Down the road if this is working for you, you could increase your output with a CNC machine. I would rather you have a 5000 dollar whoops a **** than a 105,000 dollar one.

I'm just a tube bender for the Man, so I don't know much about how much you have to make to tie both ends. If you have any questions about the physical part of the bending I'll share what I know

Travis

[tullsa]

a mandrel bender may or may not be required ,what radius will the tube be bent on and how many degrees ,if you were looking at more than a factor of 6 or more tube diameters for the die and the bends under 30 degrees ,a simple press would suffice with no internal support required ,if your going to a cnc bender a model that provides boost would be the most helpful , what throughput are you looking for ?