Unbraced Short Bending

Unbraced Short Bending

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Why would you bend a perfectly good nail?

Unbraced short bending is the most popular form of bending for grip strength. It consists of bending a short metal bar into a U shape with the hands, without bracing the bar on any other part of the body. This allows for a range of bending styles, including double overhand, double underhand, reverse, and palms down style. All bending styles can be broken into three distinct phases - the initial kink, the sweep, and the crushdown.

Bars five to seven inches in length are typically bent. Bar diameters range from 3/16” to 3/8”. In most cases, some sort of padding is wrapped around the bar prior to performing the bend. This padding serves to protect the hands and may be used to gain additional leverage on the bar.

Unbraced short bending relies heavily upon strong hands and wrists. The wrists are used to transfer strength from the upper body into the hands for the bend. The hands serve to transfer the strength from the wrists into the bar and act as a fulcrum in the center of the bend. Regardless of style, crushing the bar as hard as possible while bending is critical to successfully kinking big steel.

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