Australian/New Zealand Luthiers Forum

I bought this cheap bending iron on ebay £19 inc: free postage from China to UK...took the regulator from an old cooker..and a cheap digital thermometer and put them all together.

I had to remove the 2 core power chord and fit a 3 core with an earth for safety..and I drilled a small deep hole into the aluminium casting on the underside and fitted a thermo couple sensor into the block...I mounted it all on a board and the whole unit is screwed down to the bench by means of a screwed hand knob
going into an 8mm threaded insert in the bench top.

It takes about 10 minutes to get upto bending temperature which is not helpful for quick jobs....but It's does work very good and i'm quite pleased with it....I'm now thinking of making some kind of insulated protective hood to fit over the iron so i don't get burned by it while it's cooling down

timbuck wrote:I'm now thinking of making some kind of insulated protective hood to fit over the iron so i don't get burned by it while it's cooling down

Why don't you add a water cooling circuit instead?

A nice piece of equipment, especially the upgrading part!
And I want Chinese shipping tariffs for my wood purchases from Down Under (or also from Great Britain, you seem to have some really good tonewood dealers on the island).

QUOTE
If any of you have interest in such things, here's a PDF file of an electric bending iron I put together a while back. Right click on the PDF below and select Save Link As.. to download. Enjoy!

http://handmademusicclubhouse.com/forum ... g-iron-pdf

lucpet wrote:QUOTE
If any of you have interest in such things, here's a PDF file of an electric bending iron I put together a while back. Right click on the PDF below and select Save Link As.. to download. Enjoy!

http://handmademusicclubhouse.com/forum ... g-iron-pdf

Another one here
http://www.khalafoud.com/Jameel_OudConstruction.htm

lucpet wrote:

lucpet wrote:QUOTE
If any of you have interest in such things, here's a PDF file of an electric bending iron I put together a while back. Right click on the PDF below and select Save Link As.. to download. Enjoy!

http://handmademusicclubhouse.com/forum ... g-iron-pdf

Another one here
http://www.khalafoud.com/Jameel_OudConstruction.htm

Note that the guy in the second link is bending ribs for an oud....the wood for oud (and lute) ribs is alot thinner than an average guitar side and doesn't require as much heat to get it to yield.