canopy bows

[Onex93]

Hello,

I've been struggling to get the canopy bows to adhere to the shape of my plywood templates. Does anyone have any guidance/ alternatives?

Thank you

Onex93

[Mike53]

This is how I did it. http://www.onexmike.org/canopy.html
Mike

[thomasjones42]

"I've been struggling to get the canopy bows to adhere to the shape of my plywood templates. Does anyone have any guidance/ alternatives?"

I finally gave it up and just bought a tubing bender.

Tom Jones
Onex 0133

[gcm52]

"I've been struggling to get the canopy bows to adhere to the shape of my plywood templates. Does anyone have any guidance/ alternatives?"

I finally gave it up and just bought a tubing bender.

Tom Jones
Onex 0133

What did you buy? There seem to be a lot of options from cheap to expensive for tubing benders?

[tljones42]

"I've been struggling to get the canopy bows to adhere to the shape of my plywood templates. Does anyone have any guidance/ alternatives?"

I finally gave it up and just bought a tubing bender.

Tom Jones
Onex 0133

What did you buy? There seem to be a lot of options from cheap to expensive for tubing benders?

I actually bought a conduit bender at the local hardware/electrical supply store. I have two tubing benders, neither of which are large enough to accomodate the canopy bows.

[sonex892.]

If the Onex bows are similar to the Sonex that is big radius bends you shouldn't need a bender. All I did was screw a couple of wooden blocks onto a flat table a few inches apart and did like this bloke does bending heavy square tube.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VO-OatK4HzI
As with all metal, will need to slightly overbend to allow for springback.
Steve
Sonex 892

[DCASonex]

Did same as Steve, works fine. If concerned about kinking the tube, screw a 7/16" bolt in one end, fill FULL with sand, screw second bolt in other end. Be sure to allow about 6" tangent each end to cut off after bending. Assuming original A model, if not already doing so, push windscreen bow up as far as possible with supplied Lexan material. Makes for a bit more headroom and cleaner line.

David A.