In this weeks video I’m making a drill powered roller bender that can be used to roll steel and aluminum strips. Devices like this are used to make metal rings or strips that have a curve. Since I’m doing more welding lately I figured it would be nice to have a tool like this.
I wanted the roller bender to be both strong and not to big so I decided not to use metal tubing, which is really strong, but reinforced strips instead. With the roller bender being fairly small it worked out fine to use strips with a corner profile welded onto it.
If the roll would be very wide the device would probably be to flimsy like this and need more of a frame, but that’s not the case.
After designing the whole thing in fusion 360 I headed over to the workshop and cut all the metal strips to size. Starting with the base of the roller bender. The two rollers on the bottom can be free rolling so I used 5 standard bearings with a tube as the axle on each side.
The top roller has a bit more functionality: it has to be able to move up and down and it also works as the driving mechanism to roll the strip. To keep it flexible I made the top roller from a piece of aluminium round stock and glued a bolt in the end. This way either a drill, ratchet or wrench can be used to drive it.
Check out the video to see how I did it!
Tools used
Stick welder
Angle grinder
Cordless drill
Drill press
Lathe
