Making a small home shop press

Here's a little 2ton hydraulic press I made for a friend:

I used some 1/2" plate, a couple sections of 7/8" cold rolled rod, and some springs and hooks. Oh, and a 2ton jack (of course).

I'll be making a bigger one for my shop at some point. This little guy will be very useful though. Make up some dies and jigs, and away you go.

With a little press like this and some jigs you can bend metal bar, plate, tubing and such to various angles. It can also be used for pressing on and off bearings, u-joints, and anything else that you can think of that will fit.

There's not really a lot to it, although I did make a couple goofs along the way. That usually happens when I whip something up off the top of my head. For a larger unit I will spend a little more time on the design. Maybe even draw it out.

The first set of springs I used (pictured) were just some springs I had kicking around the shop. They weren't quite as stiff as I would have liked. I had some that I scavenged from a dumpster (I think they are bed springs) that I was going to use to replace these, but instead I ended up installing another set of springs inside the springs pictured here. That worked quite well. When you release the hydraulic pressure, the press plate returns to a resting position with the jack completely collapsed (unless you turn the valve to stop the jack at a desired height).

Just decide what you are going to use it for, and design around that. Some people use threaded rod and nuts instead of solid bar for the uprights (mine are TIG welded). I've seen some that have the jack on the bottom, and others that only have a base plate and a top plate, using the base of the jack as the top press surface. Have some fun with it, and come up with your own design.