Bending Rebar - Oh my aching knees!

The concrete truck will arrive in an hour and you are just finishing up placing the rebar. That’s when you find out you are short by a dozen L bars and a handful of stirrups. What do you do? If you are working with #3 or #4 bar it is easy enough to bend the L bars on your knees. Your knees won’t stay sore for too long right?

Stirrups - now that’s a little harder. With a ruler, magic marker, and hickey bar you might just be able to pull it off before the concrete truck pulls up.

If you’re working with #5 bar it’s time to find some pipe wrenches or maybe that truck bumper will work. But wait – the drawings call for #6 grade 60! Number 6 is three quarter inch diameter and is next to impossible to bend by hand. No inspectors are around so you get out the torch and heat the bar up until it is cherry red. Now it bends easy but this whole operation is taking way too much time. Plus you have ruined the structural integrity of the rebar with all that heat.

Bending rebar with your knees, truck bumper, hickey bar or torch waists time and money. The fastest and easiest way to bend rebar is with a portable hydraulic rebar bender. The best ones plug into standard 110-volts or can be run off a generator. Some have handles and can be easily carried by two people. You can even get benders that are combined with a cutter so you can bend and cut with one machine.

Your knees will love you for it!