Improving a Harbor freight pipe bender

[Frank S]

We all love to hate or hate to love HF tools
My pipe bender is no exception. the rollers are a 1 size fits all for bending the pipes which always mean the pipes wind up with deep indention's in them from the roller contact. The radius of the dies are fine for most pipes as long as sch 40 or thicker. For thinner tubes I usually seal 1 end and pound them full of fine sand then seal the other end this helps a lot, but there is still the issue of the rollers gouging deep divots into the pipes.
So today I needed to bend 2 90° bends in 1 1/2" sch 40 pipe I located a pair of sleeves aI had made for something else a long time ago since they fit the OD of the pipe and had a thick enough wall so they would not deform I used them as guide dies
I have other sleeves with various ID's to fit other size pipes
So the next time you need to bend some pipe and don't want the divots use guide dies like these