has anyone had any experience with a track bender that has roller guides that are adjustable to make
different radius bends to track made by Norms model supply bends gargraves and atlas
thanks tom
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First I have heard of it. Does the track have to be disassembled and each rail bent?
Generally I used wood templates.
Ffffreddd passed along this info in another thread. I haven't used one myself.
Regarding the rail bender.
I got mine from Richard Reichard.
I think he may have mentioned it in this forum that he was going to York.
I can also send you his email or if you Google his name with you can find an article he wrote describing his switch making technique. and sometimes his ordering list.
It is made of different round profile dies with bearings depending on the track you are using.
Based on concept of three roller sheet metal roller/former.
Nicely made and well worth the $50.00.
You might be able to modify a hand held plier type tubing former / bender because they use aluminum dies but I like to support my fellow hobbyists and I could not make if for less money even if I had a metal lathe.
I also prefer rolling to bending because it is more smother curve.
With a helper adjusting the roller as you bend. Might take a little practice 
It is possible to make compound curves.
One note: It does require dismanteling and rea assembling the track.
He also gives you a full set of templates for O27, O31 & Standard gauge, Super-O and AF-S track with dimensions for making:
Manual includes templates for: O27 profile - O27, O50, O58, O66 & O74
O31 profile - O31, O64, O75 & O86
Super-O profile - O36, O48, O60 & O72
Standard Gauge - O42, O57, O72 & O87
AF-S profile - S38, S46, S54, S62, S70 & S78
Very detailed instructions with lots of tips.
Originally Posted by xferyard:
First I have heard of it. Does the track have to be disassembled and each rail bent?
Generally I used wood templates.
the track does not have to be disassembled the jig fits over all rails and adjust rollers to radius needed
So it at York, looks like it is just what is needed for Gargraves track.
Can someone please make a video of how to use this thing and post it on YouTube. I might actually buy one if I could see how it worked.
Check out this post about half way down. Lou bought one of these at York and has nothing but praise for it.
If it can bend 5 rail Gargraves track I'll buy one in a heartbeat! That I would like to see!
I have been bending all kinds of 0 gauge track with this fantastic tool.
It works great. I have some MTH scale tracks in perfect 8" radius for a traction action.
It bends Micro Engineering weathered 2 rail track perfectly. Just rolled about five boxes of Atlas track to almost perfect radius.
Norm Pullen has used this for all his M/E weathered flex track for his big layout.
Any two or three rail track can be curved to any radius. It takes about one minute for each section to be done perfectly.
Finally GG can be done w/o kinks. Can not imagine why guys still insist on bending around jigs?????
