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Has anyone ever used longeron bending dies on the sharp bend?

eh_v8_tor

eh_v8_tor

Active Member
Hi Folks,
I'm bending my longerons for the RV-7...for the second time, but that's another story!
I have the shallow curve done, and the aft canopy deck is drilled to the longeron. The next step is to make a sharp downward bend just in front of the aft canopy deck.
Bending dies have worked brilliantly for the shallow bend. When holding the male part of the bending die up to the side skin, it looks like it could work for the sharp downward bend as well.
Has anyone in the VAF group tried this? If so, would you do it again?
Thanks,
Steve W.
 
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If I understand your question, the sharp downward bend is the bend towards the firewall. I used a hydraulic press for my gentle side bend and this worked well. But the sharp downward bend (towards the firewall) is actually a twist AND bend, so I don't think longeron dies are appropriate and I didn't use my hydraulic press here. I pretty much followed the instructions, clamped the longeron to the bench and used a crescent wrench, etc. to make the twist/bend. HOWEVER, when they say SHARP, they mean SHARP. This bend in side elevation has to follow the profile of the forward side skin. My initial bend was not sharp enough and didn't follow the profile of the skin, as a result, the prepunched holes might not have had proper edge clearance. I had to disassemble everything and make the downward bend sharp. I did this with a dead blow hammer as the instructions said and it took a lot of beating to get the bend right.
 
Longeron

terrye said:
If I understand your question, the sharp downward bend is the bend towards the firewall. I used a hydraulic press for my gentle side bend and this worked well. But the sharp downward bend (towards the firewall) is actually a twist AND bend, so I don't think longeron dies are appropriate and I didn't use my hydraulic press here. I pretty much followed the instructions, clamped the longeron to the bench and used a crescent wrench, etc. to make the twist/bend. HOWEVER, when they say SHARP, they mean SHARP. This bend in side elevation has to follow the profile of the forward side skin. My initial bend was not sharp enough and didn't follow the profile of the skin, as a result, the prepunched holes might not have had proper edge clearance. I had to disassemble everything and make the downward bend sharp. I did this with a dead blow hammer as the instructions said and it took a lot of beating to get the bend right.
Click to expand...

What he said. Look at the side skin. It's a pretty sharp bend. Hit it with a big hammer but watch the bend. It will twist as it bends. You have to work both at the same time.
 
Thank you for the replies! I appreciate the help.
I actually ended up using both methods.
I made a template of the side skin out of thin cardboard.
The bending dies don't actually start the bend until about 2" to 2 1/4" from the edge of the die. With this in mind I got it pretty close while carefully using the die and checking the bend frequently against the template.
It came out very close, but I still needed a bit of hammering to tighten the curve and impart the last of the required bend. It came out really good! Certainly better than the first one.
This worked great for me, but as they say "your mileage may vary"
Steve W.
 
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