Un-Tweaking Aluminum Chassis / Nose

[lmw94002]

Often the back "curl" of an RC10 tub gets the corner tweaked. Also on a DS, I have 4 of 6 nose plates with tweaked corners. Even some RC10 Nose plates can get a bad tweak from a hard it. But especially for my DS nose plates that are so hard to find a replacement for, I'd like to straighten them out a bit.

Anyone have experience straightening them out? I was thinking getting some steel angle iron for over the vice jaws for a smooth surface, heating up the aluminum and then clamping it and letting it cool. Or would cold/clamp pressure be enough? Or clamp it and then heat it? Or am I missing another idea? Thanks.

[Lonestar]

nothing a good rubber hammer (not sure how they're called in proper English) can't fix

[jwscab]

Yes a plastic hammer works great. Something like hardwood or plastic works as a backer to prevent gouging on the back side. For bent chassis, you can use a combination of vise, wood blocks or even suspending across some boards and applying some foot weight to reverse the damage.

[Dadio]

I'd avoid using heat on alloy as it could un temper it , aluminium needs to be accurately heated to a temp then cooled slowly to retemper it after heating , it's kind of the opposite to steel and you don't want to end up with it soft as cheese .