[DanP]

I need to make the assembly shown in the picture. As you can see it telescopes out each end and has a crimp in the center. It's 35" closed and 63" extended, tube od is .625 and .500 aluminum. All of the crimps appear to have been rolled into the tube. The inner tube has a bead that keeps it from falling out past the crimps in the outer tube. What type of machine do I need and who makes it. I have spoken with a couple of manufacturers and the ends are not the problem its the crimp in the center that can not be done on the end forming machines I am finding. I only need to make about a thousand pieces a month so I don't want to invest 100 grand on equipment. Ideas or suggestions of any kind on a method of doing this would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you

[Exsecratio]

Roll swager Dan?

Like a twin wheel pipe cutter but with radiussed rolls instead of cutters?



Should be possible to devise something along these lines that will do the job. I've done similar with roll crimped canon shells some years ago and it worked so maybe worth a try and pretty cheap to test (if it didn't work it's cost you under 20 bucks) if it does, then maybe think about mechanising it via a lathe?

If no luck with the tube cutter then maybe a mod to a bearing 3 point steady fitted to the lathe?

Just some ideas that sprang to mind

best wishes

Dave

[Kevin45]

I've done things like this in the past by making a small arbor press die. Here is a quick and dirty sketch. Note that you would need some dowel pins for alignments of the top and bottom form block (not shown) This is just an idea that you could use