Bending stainless Steel

[rajjes]

I need to shape a 1" wide 1' long SS bar (316) into an L shape, can I bend it using the vice and hammer away or is it too brittle and would snap?

 

[eyehavit]

You will need a very sturdy vice indeed to cold bend a 1"diameter 316 ss round bar. This is really a job for an engineering workshop with proper bending equipment and/or has oxy acetylene or oxy propane available.
It will bend reasonably easily if the bar is heated approximately 2/3 through just to cherry red and bend towards the colour.

 

[vyv_cox]

You don't say how thick your bar is. If it's not more than about 5 mm it should go unheated without problems. Austenitic stainless steels are quite ductile, i.e. not brittle.

 

[VicS]

[ QUOTE ]
Austenitic stainless steels are quite ductile, i.e. not brittle.

[/ QUOTE ] But stainless steel does tend to work harden. I would be worried that whacking away at it with a hammer will do just that.

If you want a decent looking job with no hammer marks and a decent symmetrical right angle bend then it is my considered opinion that it would be well worth finding a small local engineering works who could do it on a bending machine. Get them to drill any holes you require as well unless you have acces to a decent drilling machine.

 

[mikemonty]

If you need a short radius it gets more difficult, but with the workpiece horizontally (to keep the bar end straight) in a big, well anchored (oops I said that word!) vice, and a big lever CLAMPED to the bar to keep the portion you want left straight, er, straight, it should bend within a reasonable radius.
Once it starts to deform it gets easier.
Your problem will be getting a bend without a twist.
As usual with these things its all in the initial setup.

Mike

 

[FAITIRA]

Assume it ISN,T round bar 1"x1", no hope of an "L" shape, you don,t say how thick the 1" strap is, better to bend cold if it,s thin enough, but not over a sharp edge like a vice jaw.

 

[milfordman]

When you say 1 inch wide do you mean that it is round in cross section, in which case the term to use is diameter. Also you use the word bar this is in engineering terms refers to a solid piece of material. If the material is hollow it is referred to as tube or pipe.

If it is 1 inch bar, and you intend to bend it cold, you will not only need a very strong vice, but the bench will need to be fixed to very heavy structure.

I do not have experience with forming stainless steel tube. But I know with other metal tubes once you go above 22mm diameter you can get creases on the inside of the bend. The reason is that if you just use a former to bend around, the tube will deform so that the neutral axis (centre line on symmetrical cross sections i.e. round tube) remains the same length. The outside of the bend increases in length. The inside of the bend reduces in length, hence the creases.

On a professional bending machine the material is gripped and as it is formed it is also extended in length so that the outside of the bend increases even more, and the neutral axis increases slightly. This results in the inside of the bend remaining the same length, so that it does not crease.

So as others have said if you want a quality finish go with the engineering workshop.

All the best

 

[milfordman]

Hi there Rajjes,

If it is 1 inch wide by x mm thick it would be called bar, my apologies. In which case you would be able to bend it in a vice.

Recommend using soft metal in vice jaws(copper, brass or aluminium) to avoid marking work piece

 

[rajjes]

Yes it is actually a flat bar. Although there seems to be consesus that it will bend I will probably go to an engineering shop to drill holes etc and for an overall neater job.

thanks to all for your replies.

 

[wagenaar]

What actually is the definition of "bar". I would call a piece of metal of a width of 25 mm and just a few mm thick and a length much longer than the width a "strip". After hot rolling a wire of up to appr. 12 mm was called a wire-rod and above that size coiled bars. I think we should try to straighten the definitions so we know what we talk about.

 

[santeana]

So how thick is it!!!

 

[santeana]

We could grow old debating this but I broadly agree. In my experience if the thickness was measured as "gauge" it was generally termed "strip"; a little thicker, termed "plate". That said any thickness that was in a coiled form was also termed "strip". I agree with your wire/bar distinction; maybe raise wire to 15mm. However, in my experience wire was always coiled so I'd reverse your form to - "coiled wire and bar". Bar almost by definition isn't/can't be coiled but that may have been a typo. Generally bar was round section or a shortish length of significant width and thickness. "Rod" was always straight 'wire' until it became bar!
Think I've aged 6months already!

 

[wagenaar]

iI agree that basically a bar is straight. Therefore the "coiled bar" is something of a contradiction, but that was the term that was used.