[Shop-talk] Bending stuff

[Mark J Bradakis]

One of the projects at work today was installing a new fuel cell
in a Lotus Elite.  Neat car.  One of the securing straps involved
making several bends in a 3 foot length of 1/8 thick steel, 3 inches
wide.  It involved clamping in vices that couldn't handle the full
width, lots of whacking with a big hammer, breaking a sweat and
occasional use of improper language.

We're not about to spend many tens of thousands of dollars on
a fancy, full featured press brake or some such.  Are there other
alternatives?  Some set of forming dies you can use with a
typical shop press to make bends of various angles?

My arm hurts from swinging that, uh, darn hammer!

mjb.