Jig Fixture For Tube Notching

[astroracer]

I have been using a Harbour Freight tubing notcher for a long time. Never had any issues with it. Even doing 2" x 1/4 wall DOM. A drill press will work but I set my notcher up clamped to a 90* angle plate. This is very simple to set up and doesn't require a lot of thought... C-Clamping the angle plate to one of the beams on the jig table only takes a few seconds. For making 90 degree (or any degree) cut this is the berries and it pretty well gaurantees straight notches.

From the backside...

Cutting the first notch is the easy part. No orientation, no length to worry about. Just clamp the tube in the notcher and do the deed.
Cutting the second notch is where some planning needs to be done. Building cross members for a chassis or roll cage requires getting the LENGTH and the notch ORIENTATION correct. This is critical to having a usable part versus something to practice welding on. To do the second notch I bolt a short piece of the mating tubing to another angle plate and use this to nest the "first" notch into while cutting the second notch.

This way I can establish the correct length AND notch orientation in one easy step...
See next post

[astroracer]

Set the tubing length between the outside diameter of the tubing and holesaw, in this case 23 inches, square up the jigs, clamp it all down and cut the second notch. Once it's set up any additional tubes will be identical to the first so measure twice and cut once...

Cutting the second notch...


Thanks for looking
Mark

[kbalch]

Thanks astroracer! I've added your Tube Notching Fixture to our Tube Notchers and Measuring and Marking categories, as well as to your builder page: astroracer's Homemade Tools. Your receipt:

Tube Notching Fixture by astroracer

tags: jig, tube notcher, C-clamp, table, angle, fixture

[acourtjester]

Another method is to clamp a piece of steel parallel to the length of the tube. Mount a magnetic angle gauge to the steel and setup to tube at 90 degrees for the first cut. For the next cut use the gauge to insure your cutting the angle you want. Keep it at 90 if that is what you want or rotate the tube using the gauge to set the correct angle.

[C-Bag]

I know there are those that can do this stuff with a level etc, but I like this empirical method a LOT! I modded my HFT notcher to mount on my drill press but next time I think I'm going to try this. Thanks for posting and for the repost as I wasn't around the first time this was posted.