CNC Tubing bender?

Does anyone know of a local place that has a CNC tubing bender? The problem I’ve been finding is no one can do a non-constant radius. Rules state it must be .065" wall but I believe we use .095" wall tubing.

This is for the main roll hoop for a FSAE race car.

Thanks.

I’m not sure if you’ll find this locally. But VR3 is not far across the boarder: http://www.vr3.ca/

.065" for a roll bar is the requirement? wow.

Normally wall thickness is determined by weight of the car and type of tubing. I don’t think that it all that shocking.

Awesome, thanks, I will check them out. And I guess local doesn’t matter, really, just preferred. It’s easier to get a sponsor from a local business than some random place that has never heard of RIT.

sounds like its time for a redesign.

We used VR3 when I was at MCC on our baja frame, they did awesome work. We had some obnoxious joints and they fit together almost perfectly.

lol, its way too late for that. I wasn’t involved with the design of the roll hoop this year but it has something to do with our chassis being a lot more areodynamic this year so it has to fit the contours of the body. It is going to be bonded to the inside of the tub (carbon fiber) so it has to be pretty damn close.

edit: rules state .065 for front roll hoop, .095 for rear. this is for the rear.

I love hearing things like this… You engineered it, now you find out you can build the fuckin’ thing… Not knocking you, I know you’re trying to push the engineering envelope and win your FSAE competition which is cool, that’s what it’s about. But doing this in the real world is how you live a life of disappointment in your manufacturing team who have to try to make what you design in a vacuum on Solidworks.

Thats exactly what I was thinking. Hopefully its a good lesson learned.

Dan

Just because they didn’t already pick out a vender for it? It’s not like CNC tube bending is impossible.

I get what you’re saying, but I think it’s a little over the top in this case.

Its obviously not impossible, but it makes sense to know what is readily available locally before you design something. In the real world you cant just run off to any vendor to have somthing made (at least not at a company of any real size). So knowing what services “approved” vendors can provide beforehand often drives how parts are designed.

Dan

Like I said, local is just preferred. We deal with nationwide sponsors all the time. Yes I understand designing yourself into a corner but I had nothing to do with this design process unfortunately. I am just using the resources I have available to help out.

Talk to the baja team they got a couple tubes bent last year by a supplier, I don’t think it was local…

why do you need a cnc bender?

non-constant radius bends