Do we have something like this laying around? Would be easy enough to make a jig, but I wanted to check before I went through the trouble
Not that I’m aware of. You can use the chop saw technique. You set an angle for the size of your tube/pipe & cut. I used to use that that way when I got tired of burning through hole saws in that Eastwood jig. I don’t fabricate like I used to making stuff for Jeeps. If you look up on Pirate 4x4 it’s documented there.
You could also mark the pattern with welding chalk and use the hand-held plasma cutter to chop it, assuming that precision isn’t a big deal in your application.
I’ve seen very large endmills used to notch. I’m in favor of that method because there’s no jigs and it’s inside the normal use case for that tool.
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Same here. The higher end notchers use an end mill.
Can you use the Bridgeport to notch the pipe?
Not ideally. While the Bridgeport can drill, it is made for milling. Also depends greatly on size of object. Also drilling at an angle means orienting the material to the angle or tramming the head (which unless you are willing to true it back up to 90 degrees throws a lot of work on next user)
Yah I get your point. I have very little experience on mills like the Bridgeport. My thoughts were that a simple angle iron jig could easily be fabricated to hold the pipe at the proper angle while the large mill head is used to plunge cut it. But perhaps a drill press would work too.
I think you’ll find more room with drill press to move stuff around. But then it becomes an issue of how big a hole, wall thickness, and power/speed settings.
The tricky part of notching pipe is when you break through the walls and the tendency to “grab” when it first breaks through - at least this is my experience with notchers that have saw like teeth. (Dune buggy building days of '60’s and 70’s out tube frames and old Vee-dubs). If it can clamp firmly, it’s not a problem if you can control feed rate.
I’ve seen large dedicated machines that use mills but they were for larger pieces of pipe or higher production rates where there is coolant flooding.
But when weld prepping tubular stock, nothing beats a notched tube for mating surfaces and alignment. You’ll also learn a whole new skill of measuring of where to center the notch cut so it ends up with the right length (thinking when you notch both ends). For wood workers, think Crown molding cutting corners where they meet.
I have seen folks create custom bike frames, using paper templates made from CAD models. Then they use a hacksaw and a few files to bring the end to shape.
Pipe notchers and such are for production work. You can jury rig prototypes with the proper fixtures on a mill or drill press; however, I suggest you would find the paper template and hack saw/file approach to be both quicker and more efficient.
I know several custom bicycle builders who use exactly that approach after spending much time with the machine approaches and deciding they weren’t worth the extra effort for the small quantity they produce.
This guy is obviously a pro, and makes it look easy, but he does a nice job of showing how HE notches pipe for roll bars and suspesion components, and his preference is NOT using a tubing notcher.
EDIT: I’m pretty sure this is the method Tim was referencing.
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You could set a jig in the Bridgeport. Then travel it into the mill. Use the table to make your cut, not the plunge.
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Haha - we built a dune buggy form a 67 dual port 1600 bug, that had rolled. In one night we stripped the body off, cut the tunnel re-welded it to shorten the wheel span. Over a months time, we built a roll cage and tricked it out. Over the next year ported it out to 2100cc!! It screamed. I gotta find the pics and post them. We actually cut the tubes with a drill press using a jig we fabricated. Worked great.
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This is what everyone who mills the notches seems to do
That’s nice work. Made it look easy.
Yep that’s the chop saw method.
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I believe I was using this method when I made these in 2008
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Thanks for all the great info! @jast, that video is excellent. I love/hate watching pro’s do their thing. Guarantee I won’t have that smooth a time my first go at it.
So, no tube notcher, and I’ll give it a shot. Now to haul up my stock…
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