Tube Bending for Automotive and Transportation
Repeatable production tube bending, where the four hundredth part has to match the first.
What automotive work brings to a bending shop
Exhaust and fluid lines, roll structures and frame tube, seat and chassis components, and the structural tube inside trailers and specialty vehicles.
This is repeatability work. The problem is not making the bend, it is making it four hundred times to the same numbers so every part drops into the same fixture. Fourteen cold bending machines means a run can hold a dedicated setup rather than being torn down and reset between other jobs, and that is what keeps a production part in tolerance across a batch.
Codes and standards: OEM drawings and customer specifications, with dimensional repeatability and gauge control mattering more than any pressure code. Send your project specification with the enquiry and we will confirm in writing what we certify against before anything is cut.
Tight radii need the tooling
Automotive tube tends to be thin-walled and bent tight, which is the combination that collapses without internal support. Ball mandrels hold the wall through the tangent point and wiper shoes stop the inside of the arc wrinkling.
Send the wall-to-diameter ratio and the centerline radius together. Those two numbers decide what tooling the part needs, and the tooling decides both the price and whether the bend is possible at all.
What to send with a automotive enquiry
Five numbers describe a bend: outside diameter, wall thickness, centerline radius, bend angle and the tangent length on each end. Add the material and the quantity and the job can be priced. A drawing, a sketch or a photograph of a marked-up print all work, and the quote form takes an attachment up to 25 MB.
For production tube work, send the wall-to-diameter ratio and the centerline radius together, because those two decide what tooling the part needs and whether it is possible at all. Send the tolerance and the quantity, and tell us what the part is inspected against: where a customer gauge exists it is better to work to it than to a drawing interpretation.
Put the documentation requirements in the enquiry rather than in a later email. Material test reports, non-destructive testing and heat treatment all cost money and time. Retrofitting a documentation package onto a bend that has already been made is slow, and sometimes it is impossible.
Materials we bend
If the grade you need is not listed, ask. This is what comes through most often, not a limit.
What we can bend for you
How we would make it
Wall thickness, radius, material and schedule decide the process. Send the drawing and we will tell you which one fits.
Heat Induction Bending
Cojafex induction bending up through 42″ O.D. and 4″ wall, in any radius, angle or plane.
Coiling
Helical, spiral wound and serpentine coils, cold, up through 10″ pipe.
Cold Bending
Rotary draw bending on fourteen machines, with mandrels and wiper shoes where the radius needs them.
Mandrel Bending
Ball mandrels and wiper shoes for tight radii and thin walls that would otherwise collapse.
Large Diameter Pipe Bending
The work most shops turn away: up to 42 inch outside diameter and 4 inch wall.
Stainless and Alloy Bending
Stainless, duplex, Hastelloy, titanium and nickel alloys, bent without wrecking the metallurgy.
Questions we get from automotive buyers
Can you hold tolerance across a production run?
Yes. Fourteen machines means a run can keep a dedicated setup rather than being torn down between other jobs, which is what holds a production part in tolerance across a batch. Send the tolerance and the quantity with the part.
Can you bend thin-wall tube at a tight radius?
With the right tooling, yes. Ball mandrels support the wall through the tangent point and wiper shoes stop the inside wrinkling. Send the outside diameter, the wall and the centerline radius and we will confirm.
Do you make fixtures or check gauges?
Tell us what the part is inspected against at enquiry stage. Where a customer gauge exists it is better to work to it than to a drawing interpretation.
Have a drawing? Send it over.
Send a drawing or a sketch and our team will get back to you with a quote.