Tubing notchers...

I haven't found that to be the case, remember that 5/8" is the smallest hole saw that is available for the " joint jiggers".

I set up a grinder at each end of the fuselage with 1/2" wide wheels that have been rounded.  After a few tubes it is pretty automatic.    Also visit the Eaa video section and watch Earl Luce notch tubing with a 4" grinder and a set of snips.

LO&SLO    John

Dave,

I have a inexpensive mill (which others may not have available), and I tried cutting tubing with end mills and other methods.  Chromoloy just doesn't appreciate that approach.  I bent several pieces when the cutters would engage the tubing edge. 

I ended up going to what some might consider an extreme.. I used three different grinding wheels each with a radius for the different sized tubing I was using to build my Bellaire SE fuse.  Each was chucked into the mill on high speed. My jig table was laid out with all the center lines, so it was easy to measure for the appropriate angles.  I'd swivel my mill vice around to the angle, run the tubing back and forth across the spinning grinding wheel a few times, while advancing it, and ended up with a perfect fit.  It's not necessary  (or desirable) to go too far, to avoid a very thin edge.  Any burrs were removed with a light touch on a belt sander with a fine grit. Others just do it by hand.. but I planned on TIG welding so I wanted them fit fairly close, with minimal voids.  It went together very quickly.

Jerry

I purchaced a notcher that fastens to a drill press table

 from Harbor Freight. Uses hole saw to cut notch. it will

cut 4 or 5 notches before it might break a tooth or two, 

depending on the cutting angle.

Larry 

Take a look at the "Hints for Homebuilders" videos regarding cutting tubes.  It is so very easy that you don't need anything expensive.  I used a 4-1/2" craftsman angle grinder, my snips, and a bench grinder.  Each joint took me about two or three minutes.  I tried a Joint Jigger type setup and it just took too long.  Try it the old school way, you wil find it is easy and actualy kind of fun.

Marty

Thanks to all who contributed.

It's unanimous; tubing notchers are more of an inconvenience.  The one builder on the BreezyBuilders Yahoo! group who does use one successfully, says he only uses his for 90º notches.  Everything else is snips and grinder.

But, he suggested a wonderful little freeware tube coping utility called Tubemiter, that allows you to use your computer printer to print out a flat "pattern."  Available here: http://www.ozhpv.org.au/shed/files/tubemiter.exe  If you prefer not to do metric conversions, an online SAE version can be found here: http://www.metalgeek.com/static/cope.pcgi

For clusters where a compound angle is required, he offered a particularly clever technique:

"Here's a little trick I found with Tubemiter- say you have a cluster where a tube meets a 90 deg joint at, say, 30 deg to one tube (thus 60 deg to the other.)  What you can do it set up Tubemiter for the 30 deg joint and print it out.  Now, take that piece of paper and feed it back into your printer, so that the next one will print on top of the first.  Go back into tubemiter and set it up for a 120 deg joint (or 90 deg added to whatever the first angle was.)  This will produce, essentially a 60 deg miter turned around 180 deg.  Now, print this one on top of the first one.  Take your scissors and cut out the template, cutting out the areas that are common to both.  Viola, you have a perfect template for the angle."

I hope someone finds this info as useful as I did.

--Dave