Tubing tool plans??? Help!

[Flat47]

Anyone have plans for a home-made two handed tubing tool to share? I'm making my own, and thought I had it right, but...mine's not so good. I tried to copy the x-shaped style with the vice grips on top, but when I open the tool up, the vice grips don't move apart far at all. Like about a inch. They stay nice a parallel, but they don't open enough to work on tubing.

Any suggestions (other than buying one)?

Thanks!

(Mods: If this thread should be in Home Made Equip section, my apologies - please move if need be.)

[jcb]

you should post a picture of it so people can see it and give better advice

[noreast maple]

Weld a small piece of metal on the side where visegrips are and move them out a little.

[wildlifewarrior]

This is what I made yesterday, needed some welding. I havent used it yet but mechanically when I tried it on scrap tubing it worked great. You could always insert a rod with a flat plate attached clamped into one of the vice grips so it can insert fittings into drops.

It is two vice grips with a half inch coupling cut in half and welded into the vice. then I have those welded into another set of wide vices which open just enough to allow the ts to fit in.

http://mapletrader.com/community/showthread.php?18630-Connecting-drops-to-lateral-line/page2

Mike

[wiam]

6551

This is one that a friend of mine teaching at a high school metal shop built about 20 years ago. We used 3/8 connector nuts.

[Flat47]

65536554Here's where I'm at:

[wiam]

In my opinion you will want more than 1" of travel

[wildlifewarrior]

You would want at least the travel as wide as a tap or spile tube fiting. The way I did it was I set up the distance with a scrap piece of tubing with a fitting installed so that the edge of the coupling was against the T which would let me know I was at the right distance when we welded it.

Mike

[jcb]

What would happen if you drilled new holes in the two straight pieces and moved them up an inch or so I am thinking that would allow the tool to open wider

[maple flats]

How about adding new cross straps longer than what you made. Just remove the existing ones and clamp a pc of tubing with the longest fitting you use (T ?). Then determine the new cross strap length needed and make a new set of straps. One end should be welded, only one end pivots. Then use a lock nut on the pivot bolt so you don't lose parts in the snow.

[wiam]

It looks like the slots would allow it to close further than the first picture. Is this so? In my picture you can see that the handles are bent out. This was an after thought to give more movement. I just used a torch and bent them sideways.

[Flat47]

This is definately a work in progress. Last night I tacked it all together and it works, but needs fine tuning. I'm going to take the advice and bend the handles out and extend the slots up so it opens further. We'll see how that helps.

Thanks everybody!