Talk Morgan Forums Morgan Sports Cars Classic Morgans (pre-CX) Tooltray - how to bend aluminum?

After the experience with aluminum building an enginecover and the hoodstay I want to go further.

Building a tooltray. Reading so much as possible I want to do it as a DIY.

Not only I read about the 1.5mm is the maximum for a DIY, I just noticed it in the real world.

So the question: how do you bend the sheets in your garage or at home?

And the total other way: I wonder about the british expierence about/ around Kitharas and glassfibre is there someone
who has build a glassfibre tooltray?

René

I would argue that 1.5mm ally is the maximum?

I've only got a medium sized bench vise - when bending steel, I tend to use two chunks of hardwood, sandwiched round the steel, clamp eveything in the vise and then use a bit of brute force, and then fettling with a plastic mallet. If it's more than 3mm steel, I'll use a bit of heat.

I use the same method as TBM ..... in my case I use a couple of bits of angle-iron instead of wood and if the piece I'm bending overlaps the vice by much I use G-clamps to make sure the ends stay tight against the aluminium ..... with aluminium I use a bit of 50x100 against the metal and move it along each hit .... going backwards and forwards until the bend is complete ..... ali is soft and it saves the chance of hammer marks. I doubt you'd need more than 1.5mm ali for a tool tray.

K

Ok, I’m assuming you know that the Ali should be annealed before bending?

There’s a trick that you can use to know how much heat to apply. Rub some soap (old fashioned stuff, comes in blocks, used for washing hands etc) on one face of the Ali along the line you want to fold. Gently heat the other side of the fold line with a flame (blow torch is fine). Watch the soap stains and they will turn brown, when they do the Ali is annealed. Best to play the flame along the full fold length rather than do one bit at a time.

The Ali will both age and work harden so once annealed fold it within an hour or so - doesn’t need to be folded hot or warm

Failure to anneal will introduce potentially catastrophic stresses into the sheet Ali.

Brilliant tip, I never knew that. I’ll be out in the shed giving annealing a go tomorrow. Many thanks indeed 👍🏻😄🍾

It depends what aluminium it is...

1050 H14 which is what most people will sell you is perfectly fine to bend without annealing- in fact its not heat treatable so it wouldnt do anything
3003 and 5251 (old NS4) are tougher, but still bend with out annealing
6061 and 6082 absolutely need annealing before bending

as above but remember once your there...there is no going back with Ali unlike mild Steel
That is workable to an extent.

Very useful info Simon on the different specs

Back when I was an apprentice at BAe we called that Solutionising - I never found out why.

Also we quenched it when the soap turned brown.

When I was adjusting my wings to fit and bending over the edge, I found that annealing was essential as others have said.
One extra useful tip I found was that a black marker pen scribbled on the area to be heated gradually disappeared as the correct temperature was reached. A lot less messy than soap.

https://makeitfrommetal.com/how-to-anneal-aluminum-the-beginners-guide/