Teardrops n Tiny Travel Trailers

I found some trim at HD (it's not the angle iron stuff)it's aluminum stair edging that seems to flex OK but I'm sure it's deforming a bit. So....... If you flex some harder aluminum trim can you tap it back into submission with a hammer and a piece of wood or would the result be ugly? I'm sure someone out there has more experience with this than I do.

thanks
dave

I had heard that you can anneal the metal with a torch and soften it up a bit. I have never tried this, however, I am sure some one on this board can explain it better than me. I found my aluminun trim at a wholesaler, it had a marine application. It was very malable and had predrilled countersunk holes used on boats. It was alittle pricey compared to the home depot carpet stuff. But well worth it as for a nice tight professional look (hey I did it my self) and I am no proffessinal installer.Hope this helps

Woody

Yes I've heard people mention annealing on the board but no details. I'm familiar with annealing but as a hardening process. One of our projects in school was a drill/thread/radius gauge. It was made from aluminum and was heated in an oven to harden after we were done.

I saw Jessie James heat some metal prior to shaping it on a bag but they didn't go into any details either.

So if anyone knows how to anneal (soften) the metal let us know.

I think some annealing information you are looking for is in this thread... if you need more detail, let me know...

http://tnttt.com/viewtopic.php?p=3396

Mike...

I couldn't resist so I tried that method yeaterday. I did not have any aluminum angle so I used 3/4" SQ x .062"Wall Alloy 6063 tube. 6063 is recommended for bending, 6061 is not. I posted some pics in my personal gallery http://www.mikenchell.com/forums/album_personal.php Sorry for the quality. It is hard to hold a torch and take pics. Also my computer skills are not so great.

I used an oxy/acet torch. Acet only on low for soot. Turned on O2 for heating flame.

A few notes: Practice a few times. With aluminum there is a fine window between heating it to its release point and it melting away to nothing. Once it even blisters it will crack when you bend it. Heat a 6" or so length of it so it will bend at a larger radius and not kink.

This soot method is a good indicator of temperature but once you get some practice you can apply pressure and heat it just until it releases to save you a step.

For angle I would strongly suggest you make a jig so you can tap the leg flat. Heat as you go and bend it a little tighter than you need it. You can use wood but keep a wet rag handy to pat out fires.

I hope this helps, D. Tillery

Do you have to do anything to harden it back? Or is just left in it's soft state once it is installed?

When you work it, you re-harden it. It is called work-hardening. The more you work it by bending or hammering, the harder it will get and eventually crack from overworking without re-annealing it. You will need to experiment with your material to determine at what point you need to re-anneal before cracking and how many times you can repeat the process before it cracks with your particular material.

For our purposes on teardrops I would think that the bit of re-hardening accomplished by bending it into shape would be enough. Even if it did not re-harden at all it would probably still be OK since we mainly only use it for trim.

I heard a wives' tale about vibration hardening, a bowlmaker, car trunk, dirt road and a failed demonstration which may have some applications to pulling teardrops many miles but I hesitate to ramble any more.

I hope this helps and do I need to add my disclaimer about me not being a metalurgist and don't believe everything you read on the wwwasteland?
D. Tillery

In school they did tell us about the potential for pieces breaking due to vibration work hardening. Probably more likely because aircraft generate more vibration.

Wow! I didn't know we had to be rocket scientists to build these teardrops... I just annealed my aluminum till the flame turned orange, and then shaped it to my profile.

Towards the end of my project I was wearing leather gloves, and the alumimum was probably still a little bit warm when I shaped it... but it was looking pretty good.

Don't know if it rehardened when I did that. I didn't see any cracking or fracturing due to vibration, and believe me, the HF trailer has plenty of that. But since I'm not going to attach a rocket engine and wings to the teardrop, I'm not going to worry about it!

Mike...

I just made a post and included a link for Aircraft Spruce. I was looking around and found this http://www.aircraftspruce.com/catalog/topages/lancasterformer.php

Does anyone know anything about this unit? Looks like it would be handy (but not necessary) to have.

Good find asianflava, same units at Eastwood are $300 for the set:
http://www.eastwood.com/shopping/product/detailmain.jsp?itemID=1488&itemType=PRODUCT&RS=1&keyword=stretcher