Bending stainless steel tubing

[eljainc]

Hello,

Can someone tell me what is the best tool to use for hypodermic stainless steel tubing. This would be very narrow tubing, about 18 to 20 gauge or roughly 1/8" thick.

I saw there was a thread from a month or so ago that discussed stainless steel wire bending. I'm just not sure if that jig would work with tubing too.

1/8" diameter 303 stainless steel rog bending

Thanks.
Mike

[307startup]

There was a pretty decent article in Street Rodder magazine about the guy who does all brakelines for the Ridler Award winners...
anyway, he routinely bends SS tubing and makes it look easy...
don't know if it would help, but sometimes you find good information in the most unlikely places...

[mikek10]

A rotary draw bender with a mandrel would give the least deformation.

You mention 1/8" wall. What is the diameter?

A wire bender would most likely result in flattening and reduction of the bore.

[eljainc]

The wall is much less than 1/8". This is very thin tubing, 14 gauge.

OD = 2.11mm
ID = 1.6mm
Wall thickness 0.0100"

[diecutter]

You might want to try sliding a lightly lubed copper solid wire that just fits into the I.D., and then bend and pull out the wire. The tubing bends like its solid due to the inner support. Worth a try.

[tullsa]

depends on the radius of the bend ,a standard brake line bender will do a good job a radius any smaller would require filling with something like lead or solder but would allow a very tight bend if the stainless is very brittle then the best is to use silica dust and hot forge the piece at 1400 deg f sounds like a lot of work for a small pc and I've had success in bending hard s s with just heating and no internal support on a 2 d bend