Metal Fab Shop In A Box (A Rather Large Box)
By Eric Dykstra
Professional metal shops with copious amounts of space allow you to keep job-specific tools on hand. Dedicated tube benders and press brakes are great, if you’ve got the cash and space — but what are small shops and dedicated hobbyists to do? The Universal Fabricator, a metal fabrication multi-tool, combines a powered pipe/tube bender with a hydraulic-press-brake-type plate bender.
You can use the tube bender either by hand or hydraulically. It’ll handle both round and square tubing, up to 1-1/2″. Mounted up top, the “Handy Bender” can bend 5/8″ x 2-1/2″ mild steel up to 90 degrees. It comes with a V-block, for forming lighter material, and a repeatable bending attachment that allows you to precisely make repetitive bends on multiple pieces for production.
The setup costs $4,500, without the various pipe bending dies. Not cheap — but it packs a lot of functionality into a package that takes up less floorspace than all its component parts would.
The Universal Fabricator [Shop Outfitters]
March 25th, 2008 at 1:30 pm
Not bad for the price if you’ll be working with smaller stuff, but I’d really prefer to be able to bend up to 2″ tubing for that price.
March 25th, 2008 at 5:42 pm
hot