Custom bead rolling....lotsa pic's

Here's a pic of my triple decker bead roller. I bought the power bead roller close to 20 years ago and mounted it on an engine stand frame to make it mobile. I think it's a JD Squared brand roller. Earlier this year a friend from work gave me the HF manual roller so I mounted it on top of the power roller and added an old metalflake wheel. Then I got the small hand roller in a trade with my buddy Arron so I mounted it above the HF roller. All done to save space. I haven't even used the manual rollers yet but they give me a few dies I didn't have. I have used the power roller ALOT over the years.

 

I had a back yard hot rod fab shop for 12 years and did alot of sheetmetal fab and bead rolling. Here come some pic's of some of the bead rolling I did. It was fun to get creative and add a little style to door panels etc. I worked on street cars and drag cars.

 

WOW! Very cool work!

 

Very cool tinwork! How did you manage to not get tracking marks around your beads? When I did the flames on my altered's interior tins the tracks were so bad I had to hit the panels with a DA just to get rid of them!

Hank

 

I think I will just give up and retire my Hammer now......
Fabulous work man!

 

I have made a couple of sets of custom dies. One set so I can continue the large bead when I recess a Ford firewall....

 

Another set for the bottom edge of a hood top..........

 

Great stuff KK...enjoy sunny Ventura. I miss that place.

 

Hank.... I always bought material with PVC coating on one side. It's a protective coating that can be peeled off when you are done making the panel. It makes it easy to lay out the panels also. I always use a ball point pen. You also need to get to know your bead roller so that you know how much pressure you can use before you leave marks.Practice on a couple of scraps before you start on the actual piece.

 

nice work there kevin.

 

Nice stuff dude!! Good to see someone else being creative with a step roll!

Bangin out John Bigtree's portrait in the morning, in the floor of our Firebird.

 

Your a bead rolling madman.....good stuff...........this would have fit into the Friday art show threads....................just goes to show that we are all limited to our imagination...........Littleman

 

you rule im just a cave man

 

Awesome stuff? Would LOVE to see a tech article on this !!!

 

You got some mad skills dude.

Doc.

 

thats art...amazing.

 

Absolutely incredible!