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'swaging' panel steel with simple tools


Steelies

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Just saw steelies's write up and am impressed with the results.

However what if you want to swage panels but dont have access to a sheet bender.

Well im sure most of us have a hammer in our tool box someplace.

Heres how you do some caveman metal work.

Equipment you will need

Hammer or heavy mallet

hacksaw/grinder

a wood router is nice to have for this but not essential

what you do

get your piece of sheet metal and mark out where the swages need to be.

Get some rod of the diameter you want the swages to be, the swage will come out slightly larger than the rod. Steel ideally, wood is a bit soft but will work for one or two till you destroy it.

Cut the rod to length and round the ends off. If you dont they will cut.through the sheet. Again the swage will come out a little longer than the rod.

Get a flat surface you can lay the sheet on. Wood is great, you will need to cut or use the router to make a furrow slightly larger than the rod.

Ideally you want to be able to clamp the sheet flat to this. Use clamps and some 2x4 on either side of the swage to keep it perfectly flat and aligned.

You can get away without this if you really want, have seen it done by standing on the metal over a cut in some concrete.

Hammer your rod into the divot

Job done

another way to do this is to place the sheet over the rod, and using a wide flat blunt chisel to hammer along the edges. This doesnt come out as nice, but will do the job

Your pal

Tortron

P.S. Could mention that this way you can hammer in fun shapes like W and circles or whatever

 

found this vid. similar to what i said

 

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