Bending Rebar

[Doug Kanter]

OK...here's a project I'm planning for the next two weeks. Moved to a new neighborhood back in September, and other vegetable gardeners here tell me that the deer bring shopping carts and pruning shears when they target a garden. So, I'm resurrecting an old idea I used at another place. I'm going to make U-shaped tunnels (like quonset huts) made of galvanized fence wire, and place them over certain rows. Previously, I've only had to deal with rabbits, so I've held the tunnels in place by bending some of the wire outward and putting bricks on them. I suspect that deer will laugh at this arrangement. So, I want to use some sort of heavy metal stakes instead. My first thought was to use u-shaped pieces of rebar, placed over each end of the tunnels and pressed into the ground. My theory for bending the rebar: Tie a blanket around an appropriately shaped tree (to protect the bark), and my son and I will pull the rebar into a U shape, using the tree as a form.

But...I've never handled rebar. Does the bending idea sound practical?

[Drifter]

I'd just buy a bunch of the heavier tent stakes (the kind that are big enough to need to be pounded in with a hammer.

Drifter "I've been here, I've been there..."

[Doug Kanter]

OK, but the rebar solution is so much more complicated and expensive. Doesn't that count for anything? :-)

[m Ransley]

Bend rebar, maybe, if, you are real strong. Why not a 1/8-1/4" piece of wire-stock. How about a motion detector sprinkler made for animals, they use batteries to trigger the unit and shoot a sharp stream

[Doug Kanter]

Those water things work for about a week, until the animals get over the joke.

[SQLit]

rebar can be bent with a bender called a "hicky". It is really designed to do tight bends on GRC or IMC conduit. Should be available at any electrical supply store. I have never seen them at the box stores. Not that I have looked. A regular GRC bender will work, larger radii and you run the risk of making the bender useless for conduit. Using this method stand on the rebar and bend. Then cut.

[kato]

Only #3 rebar (3/8 inch) can be bent by hand without a bending machine. Just don't bend it over your knee, try wrapping it around a tree or post. Anything thicker like #4 (1/2 inch) will probably need a bending machine. There are electric and manual ones for rent depending on how much bending is involved. If there are 90 degree bends, a manual bending machine at the rental shop would be my choice.

[gfretwell]

You beat me to it. Yes #3 is what they use for swimming pools because you can bend fairly complex shapes by hand. Just use long pieces and get out on the end of them for leverage. If you are making a tunnel that is not a problem. Wear gloves. If you are making a bunch of identical ones you could make a bending jig with some plywood and wood blocks screwed to it defining the arc.

[Doug Kanter]

Thanks. Furiously making mental notes which I might even remember when I get to the store. :-)

[Goedjn]

I bend rebar by sticking it into a 4' chunk of black-pipe with 6" sticking out, sliding the remainder into a 6' chunk of black-pipe, standing on the former, and pulling up on the latter. The rebar naturally bends to about a 4" diameter curve.

Once I got a bundle of short re-bar rods from Lowes that was so stiff that it would hardly bend, and which snapped abruptly at around 90d.. That was exciting, and I don't know if it was because I got defective rebar, or there's more than one type.

If you leave that rebar staple in the ground through a season, you may well need a pickaxe to pry it out again.

--Goedjn

[kato]

You were probably using an ungraded rebar for it to snap. A graded bar like Gr.40 is softer and easier to bend than a Gr.60 bar and should never snap bending it to 90 degrees. If you got it at Lowes then I would complain, it can be very dangerous to work with.

[Doug Kanter]

It'll be lifted out probably once a week so I can weed under the tunnel.

[Andy Asberry]

I got some full lengths of that once. If you bent it, it would break. I didn't use it for re-inforcing. I forged BBQ forks from it. The tines would not bend. I could pick up a stack of briskets on a 3 foot fork.

[Kim]

[Doug Kanter]

That link doesn't work. How about a brief description of what you're suggesting?

[Kim]

>

typ "bender" under keyword

[Goedjn]

Oh... I was thinking you were making the canopy out of something else, and just wanted the rebar for stakes, to hold it down. If you're talking about 30" diameter hoops, I'd use a pair of 10' 2x4s for spines, drilled for short lengths of EMT, fiberglass rod, or black-pipe, depending on how durable you wanted it. (thus making a block-letter 'U' with right-angle corners.)

Of course, you realize that by the time you're done with this, you'll be well on your way to having built a set of cold-frames, right? If you replace the wire mesh with lucite panels that you can latch part-way open, you'll be able to start your growing season earlier, end it later, and for a $20 extra equipment investment, get a couple light-fixtures and one of those termostatic-control plug-adapters they were talking about in the well-house thread a week or so ago, and get some frost-protection too. Then of course, you can string hose along either the top or the bottom or both, and get a mister and/or trickle irrigation... and then.... oh, never mind.

--Goedjn

[Michael Daly]

Can't you rent a rebar bender at a rent-everything store?

Mike

[Doug Kanter]

Dunno....haven't checked yet.

[BinaryBillTheSailor]

>>>

Maybe you could develop it into a hobby!

BB