Here's the best way to bend 12\" pipe =)

Jack

I worked at Todd's shipyard in Seattle. I used to enjoy watching the old timers on the bending beds do their thing. It was fascinating. They worked on a large perforated deck with assorted rose-buds and come-alongs and would stroke their chins and put a little heat here and there along with a little cold rag and just walk the pipe into some fantastic shapes...and they would fit. It was great to see what they did, but what was perhaps best was the way they worked. Slow, cool, deliberative. They had it, knew it and didn't flaunt it

Daniel_3

J.C.A._3

But....

My tubing cutter wouldn't fit on it.

Darn ! Thats some big flame!!! Chris

Unknown

In the...

immortal words of Paris Hilton, "That's HOT!"

bob young

Where is hot rod when you need him ? lol

Todd S_8

What is this for?

Awesome photo.

Paul Fredricks_3

I used to work for a company in Mt Vernon, NY that made wire and foil out of precious metals. To make wire out of platinum we used hand held hydrogen torches to heat a bar of platinum to white hot. The bar of metal was then put in an electric hammer device to pound it into a 1" square by 16" long bar. That could then be fed through dies to make it smaller. The torches in the picture remind me of the ones I used. Boy were they hot.

Jim Bennett

I wouldn't wanta....

pay THAT gas bill!

Yikes!

Jim

Daniel_3

This picture was taken from a website called shorpy.com

I frequent often since it gives a great blog into early American life during the homesteader era and WWII.

"January 1942. Louisville, Kentucky. "Large pipe elbows for the Army are formed at Tube Turns Inc., by heating lengths of pipe with gas flames and forcing them around a die." 4x5 Kodachrome transparency by Alfred Palmer."

This website is a very cool look into the early 20th and late 19th century with glass plates even from the civil war era. Sometimes you find old heating systems on there and the quality of these digitized glass plates and kodachrome shots seems like the finest photography to this date and beyond.

Daniel_3

Amazing, the cost for that in today's economy. . .

Joe_123

Crane Company photos

Here is a photo I copied from a crane company book showing what kind of operation Jack is talking about......the perforated floor and etc.
Small photo, but you get the idea. I can enlarge it for my viewing on my computer, but can't figure out how to save it in large format to send it here to view....