Teardrops n Tiny Travel Trailers

Here are some brake press plans i found i awhile ago. Not sure if this will be strong enough for what you need but seems like it would be.
http://www.cannedhamtrailers.com/pdfs/d ... eplans.pdf

Nice find, I bet if you only wanted to bend 0.020, you could gin it up out of old bed rails and a bent piece of conduit for the handle.

Have you looked into renting a bending brake?

Another option is a homemade bending brake. I can't find the web page I used for building mine, but I had good luck with bending up to 0.050" thick aluminum up to 48" wide up to about 140 degrees. There are a number of articles out there on how to build one yourself, using hinges, steel angle (and/or wood), and clamps or bolt/nut sets. It wasn't too hard or expensive to build - probably about three hours work and less than $100 for everything - nor was it hard to learn how to use.

I found the article - but not the original website. See http://www.cannedhamtrailers.com/pdfs/davesbrakeplans.pdf for the article that I used as the basis of my build. I went with smaller sized steel angle since I was only going up to 48" long, rather than the 96" the author used.

Thanks for the suggestions everyone! I found a shop to do the bending here locally and got the sheets back today. They look fantastic and fit like a glove on the trailer, so I am not unhappy to spend the money to get it done right. I did end up going with the shop that quoted me $150. They had great customer service even though it was a small job for their size outfit. I am happy to support local business. No regrets.

If I were going to build multiple trailers, I think I would consider making a brake as some have suggested. Thanks for the link to the how-to thread. I'll keep it bookmarked for future reference.