The Armour Archive

Alright.
SO for the past few days I've been trying to find something online to show me how to curve a heater. Maybe I missed something or just looking in the wrong place. Someone point me in the right direction please.

Shield press. Build that yourself, in any of several variations. You'll want to use a saber saw to make its forming ribs.

Nylon ratchet strap tiedowns, either over air -- gives a parabolic curve which isn't necessarily what you want -- or around a 55-gallon drum or a tree trunk, for a circular curvature.

A shield press frame can also have the plies nailed onto it starting at the centerline and working out towards the edges, temporarily until the glue has set.

Was that your question? Not quite sure from your OP.

Konstantin,
Yes actually that does I remember seeing something like that somewhere just couldn't remember where. You have helped a good deal.

Here is a web site i found has a good design for a press.

it might give you a few ideas.

http://www.yeoldegaffers.com/project_shieldpress.asp



Lanars

Actually, I have made several curved heaters using nothing more than three pipe clamps.

Really??
So how did you do this?
Curiosity is getting the better of me, since I'll have to wait on making a press and the tree closest to my house, is an 8" dia palm tree.

I saw a thread on this on my armoury:
http://www.myarmoury.com/talk/viewtopic.php?t=5240

I built mine with 2x8's and use clamps top hold it together. It has been a while since I made a wooden shield, I use aluminum at this point.

Pipe clamps work the same way as the nylon ratchet straps do. They push the edges of the boards towards each other, so perforce the layers of plywood must bend. Either method you help it along at the beginning by tightening things and pushing in the middle of the boards.

And you can stand things in the corner waiting for the glue to dry, or leave it on its back, lying on the pipe clamps, curve up. Place over newspapers to catch glue drips.

Cool, I had never thought of that. I should have to try that this weekend before the movers pack all of my stuff.

http://tinyurl.com/4vvjmlk

What Brannos and Darkyard use. Good enough for me

Hi

This is the kind of shield press I have used and I liked it.



http://members.cox.net/stonebridgearmoury/shield1.htm

Wow, I like the look of that one, because it doesn not appear to have any framework, just the four forms. One of the problems with a shield press is that it is still there when you are using it. The oldgaffer one should work well, but I have very limited space in my garage for something that I won't use all that often.

Did you start with 2x12s? When not in use, those would be a lot easier to store...though not as easy as my pipe clamps.

The problem with pipe clamps is that they do not actually make the two pieces of plywood fit perfectly to one another.

Yeah I used a 12 foot long 2x12 cut into 4 3 foot pieces. Instructions are found here:

http://www.angelfire.com/mi4/olafvanta/ ... hields.htm

I liked this design be cause it made a gentle curve and seemed more supported than ratchet straps or pipe clamps. I personally did not like using the ratchet straps. They seemed to bend too much in the middle and not enough on the edges and create more of a parabolic curve. Perhaps it was the way I used them. Another advantage I found with the 2x12s is they stored easier than a large shield press as they just stacked up together and I was able to keep them under my workbench. I have since given them to a friend of mine, but I have been contemplating making another set

A 12 inch long 1/2 inch drill bit made the job easier. Also, use a lot of large paper spring clips to hold the edges of the plywood together while the glue is drying.

William of Stonebridge wrote:. . . it made a gentle curve and seemed more supported than ratchet straps or pipe clamps. I personally did not like using the ratchet straps. They seemed to bend too much in the middle and not enough on the edges and create more of a parabolic curve. Perhaps it was the way I used them.

It was. Did that myself. Using formers shaped like the convex parts of your shield clamps with the ratchet straps, rather than bending in air without the forming ribs, would have gotten you any kind of curve, circular or not, that you wanted.

I think such formers would be wider than 1.75 inches. I figure blocks of 2x4 sandwiched between 3/4" plywood 'rockers' with screws and glue, with a maximum chord depth of five to six inches in two feet of length, giving a thickness per rib of about 3 1/8". Turn the 2x4 blocks so the narrow edges meet the plywood rockers and each former is now about 5 inches thick. And correspondingly bulkier to store, true, though you could stow the ratchet straps inside the formers. But meanwhile you have useful ratchet straps for your pickup loads or clamping that old rocking chair's joints that came unglued to the point where the chair would make any sitter do the Mel Gibson. No, not the Mel Gibson rant -- the Mel Gibson fall-down. Siège Perilous!

Just to explain pitbulls picture. If you look at it he set the blank between some boards and parked an rv on it.

Thank you, Mad Matt.



Have a good week.

Pitbull

I had to read Matt's to know where to look, sorry but I just love PB's Pit he's so cool. So, I really like William's press, especially since you could take a couple of Bungee straps or the like and put it up and out of the way, like the pipe clamps!

Thanks guys, now I know what to try when I get to where I'm going.
Cheers!

Curve a rectangular blank of plywood first. Then cut out the heater shape using a saber saw. Particularly if you are curving it in air without forming ribs. The pointy end would tend, in a big way, to stay flat if you cut before bending.

Unhappily the resulting scraps with their glued-in curvature and awkward shape would be very difficult to use for anything, and wouldn't necessarily fit for corner/top reinforcement bits -- but you just might get lucky. Otherwise, firewood.

[editz for clarity]

William of Stonebridge wrote:This is the kind of shield press I have used and I liked it.



http://members.cox.net/stonebridgearmoury/shield1.htm

I agree that the type shown above is more convenient for stowing when not is use. The downside, for me, is that it is harder to get in place and clamped down with only one person relative to a press with a fixed frame.

I think I'd lay a board across the top of the formers and sit on it while tightening the bolts. I got 230 lb and might as well use 'em. Can't sumo wrestle. Might go a good bit faster with wing nuts.

Beer.

Just got an idea how to make William of Stonebridge's clamping formers stay stable with just one guy working with them. Set the bottoms of the formers into two slotted stringers made of 2x4. You don't even have to notch the 2-by, just nail blocks of the stuff onto it, sort of embattled, so as to make slots for the formers to drop into. These stringers are not attached and will demount for convenient storage with the formers.

Probably easiest to first clamp the top of the blank and the bottom of the blank, and then put the clamping formers in the mid-part of the shield blank when its ends are already stabilized and clamped in place.

Pitbull Armory wrote:Hi

This is pretty funny. Is that an RV?