Cutting the copper tubing can be done with a pipe cutter, but this pinches the annealed tube too much as these small diameters.
I prefer to cut with a mitre and an x-acto micro saw. This method allows you to cut extremely precisely and to remove a tiny section from the end, which is difficult to do with a regular pipe cutter.
I mounted the custom bending dies I made on a cheapo 4" machinist vise. Somehow it reminds me of the critter from Alien.
Starting with a roughly 2.5" radius bend made with the regular tool, the custom bender can tighten up the radius to about 1.5".
This image of the line from the exit of the HX to the brew reservoir shows both a large bend used where there is space and a tighter one where there isn't.
I got caught up in the process of making this bracket and it was all done before I realized that I hadn't taken any process shots:
I cut off a 3" section of 1/8" x 2 1/4" cold-rolled steel and then cut that in two lengthways. Mark and centre punch the hole position, then drill using first a small bit to locate, a couple of intermediate sizes and then the finished sized bit. Then I did a "don't try this at home" by putting the 1/8" stock in my new 16 gauge rated (i.e. half the thickness) V-jaw metal brake. It is [i]just [/i]strong enough to bend the inch-wide piece of material - any wider and it would be hammer time. The V-jaw makes a nice sharp bend - close to the material thickness in radius.
Here is the bracket with the 3/8 BSPP parts it will support: the line in and the two feeds for the HX and boiler.
I prefer to cut with a mitre and an x-acto micro saw. This method allows you to cut extremely precisely and to remove a tiny section from the end, which is difficult to do with a regular pipe cutter.
I mounted the custom bending dies I made on a cheapo 4" machinist vise. Somehow it reminds me of the critter from Alien.
Starting with a roughly 2.5" radius bend made with the regular tool, the custom bender can tighten up the radius to about 1.5".
This image of the line from the exit of the HX to the brew reservoir shows both a large bend used where there is space and a tighter one where there isn't.
I got caught up in the process of making this bracket and it was all done before I realized that I hadn't taken any process shots:
I cut off a 3" section of 1/8" x 2 1/4" cold-rolled steel and then cut that in two lengthways. Mark and centre punch the hole position, then drill using first a small bit to locate, a couple of intermediate sizes and then the finished sized bit. Then I did a "don't try this at home" by putting the 1/8" stock in my new 16 gauge rated (i.e. half the thickness) V-jaw metal brake. It is [i]just [/i]strong enough to bend the inch-wide piece of material - any wider and it would be hammer time. The V-jaw makes a nice sharp bend - close to the material thickness in radius.
Here is the bracket with the 3/8 BSPP parts it will support: the line in and the two feeds for the HX and boiler.
No comments:
Post a Comment