How to bend the handrailing on the side for new installation?

[akintosyali]

My 1964 41DC has a wire that goes on top of the stanchions. Because it is more of a lifeline and not a handrail, I keep running into a few issues: In winter time, each stanchion top becomes a source of a hole on the cover. Second, when someone pulls or pushes the the stanchion, all the force is applied directly to the base of a single stanchion rather than being distributed to other stanchions.

I am thinking about replacing the wire top with an actual grab rail, 1". West marine actually has 1" OD Stainless Tubing that is 20ft long, so I could use that and buy some stainless 1" tees to hold it. It would be one piece from the beginning to the end to provide the highest amount of structural stability.

The problem is, I dont know how you can bend the hand rail to match the curve of the rubrail/edge of the boat. Where do you start? (Start in the furthest out section and bend start bending it towards the edges?? The stanchions are about 2 ft apart and I am worried that if I use small sections, the transition from one stanchion top to the other one wont be very smooth..

[q240z]

A buddy of mine had to replace a handrail that was bent during a hurricane. He used a harbor Freight tubing roller. It was apparently very difficult to control twist--the tubing wanted to make itself into a very large corkscrew. But he did get the smooth curve he needed and was able to thread it through the stanchions. Since the stanchions were all lined up, they eliminated the twist.

[dsharp]

You need to find a fab shop with a 3 roll pipe roller. You can do it on a work bench with blocks of wood but that would be a last resort. 7/8 stainless is hard to bend and 1" is twice as stiff. I would make a template of the curve and have it rolled.