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Hi Butch, I personally would look at a box & pan brake. You can get a good 20ga x 4ft for about $600 new from any SM supply company. 36"slip rolls run about $400 but a good shear is expensive, about $1500.
You can find excellant deals on used SM equipment at equipment sellers. In order to change gauge sizes to make a bend or too shear or roll, then you have to set the machine for that gauge thickness. Failure to do so will cause the metal not to form correctly, over/under broke, not shear or roll the correct radius or bust the machine. On a SM brake the means adjusting the nose bar to the correct thickness and adjusting the correct hold down pressure. Both adjustments are fairly quick to make. On a stomp shear you can get about 4 gauge thickness before having to reset the shear blade gap. I would bet this would be very difficult to keep in adjustment on the cheapy equipment. This is a time consuming adjustment that is not easyly done and why SM shears have limited thickness capibilitys. Slip rolls are very easy adjusted and need adjustment every time you use them and while you use them. If any of this equipment gets too far out of adjustment and the user doesn't take the time to adjust, you can pretty well count on something breaking. T_Bone
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