Vintage Tubing Bead Roller

[astroracer]

I found this tubing beader at a flea market last summer for 35 bucks.


It will do 2" and up tubing. This is a piece of 3" exhaust pipe I used to test function.

Worked great! After a few passes thru the rollers I had an "almost" perfect bead.


With some practice this will be a nice addition to the tool box. It does decrease the inlet a bit, as you can see but that doesn't hurt anything as far as flow goes. The rubber fitting will blend into that nicely.
I am looking to make some additional roller dies for this so I can do smaller tubing I.D.'s. 1 1/2 and 1 3/4 for radiator lines are a must have.
Mark

[Navy7797]

Theres no reason you can't bead edges on panels also, just not deep off the edge. Nice find !

[astroracer]

Theres no reason you can't bead edges on panels also, just not deep off the edge. Nice find !

Exactly! Another person said that is what these were used for originally. I'll run a few beads on some scrap to try it out.
Mark

[MP&C]

Awesome find Mark, good to see old tools with a new lease on life..

[firebird77clone]

Keep your old tools away from my friend Jill!

She will weld them together as a piece of folk art.

Although, I did happily donate to her an old pair of tin snips. I have fought with them so much, I'll be happy to see them turned into a bird's beak or whatnot. A good friend hooked me up with a three piece set by Rigid ( I think) and oh they cut nice!

[rspears]

That's a very cool old bead roller.