Top 5 in 365—Articles about tube and pipe fabrication

Richards Sheet Metal Works uses its tube laser to bevel and cut features in the same pass at angles, shapes, and contours and with speed and precision previously unachievable.

The last installment of “Top 5 in 365” showcased the five most-popular articles on thefabricator.com published within the last year about stamping. Previous installments have focused on bending and folding, laser cutting, arc welding, assembly and joining, automation and robotics, consumables, cutting and welding prep, finishing, manufacturing software, materials handling, metals and materials, plasma cutting, safety, and shop management. This post is about the tube and pipe fabrication category on the website.

The tube and pipe fabrication technology area covers sawing (band, circular, and friction) and other cutting processes, such as abrasive, flame, laser, oxyfuel, plasma, and waterjet. It also discusses forming processes, including bending and end forming. Finally, it includes a handful of miscellaneous processes, such as trimming, beveling, finning, grooving, threading, and spinning. Here are the top five articles about tube and pipe fabrication published on thefabricator.com within the past year.

5. Optimizing tube bender tooling to improve results
Excess bender force cannot overcome a poor setup or worn tools

It could be argued that overuse of a machine means underuse of the tooling. This often is the case in many bending situations. In some cases, the application is difficult; it’s as simple as that. However, in many cases, worn and inadequate tooling are the most common causes of setup difficulty, especially with routine bending jobs. Since even the most experienced setup technician struggles without proper tools, this is the main cause of setup challenges.

4. Using a single machine to drill, thread, polish for making tube and pipe preparations the lean way
Programmability, 20-tool library open up fabrication possibilities for manufacturing and plumbing applications

For anyone who has embraced lean manufacturing, it’s unlikely that any phase causes more angst than batch processing. The notion of performing several steps on several machines, each requiring some amount of setup—interspersed with loading, unloading, and moving materials from place to place—is the antithesis of the one-piece flow that lean manufacturing strives to achieve.

The ultimate lean process is a matter of loading raw material into a machine and unloading a finished assembly from the same machine. Although for most products this notion is preposterous, for some fabricators, it is a reality.

3. Laser cutting update: Tube and pipe
Product introductions, progress in technology point the way to the future

Metal cutting lasers are nothing new. Introduced to the metal fabrication industry decades ago, their use is so widespread that seeing a concentrated and focused light beam slicing through metal with ease—a phenomenal feat of physics—is essentially commonplace. However, this doesn’t mean that the innovations have stopped. Indeed, laser technology continues to advance, as do the machine options and software that contribute to laser cutting capability and versatility.

2. Good looks aren’t everything—especially in welding
A good combination of tool, process, and technique for weld preparation contributes to making robust, defect-free welds

Millions of miles of pipelines will be built in the coming decades, both in replacement and new construction. Most of the available pipelines around the world will reach replacement age if they haven’t gotten there already, and the world needs additional pipelines, too. These projects will require countless welds.

Furthermore, essentially every branch of industry has embraced welding, and many have been using welding in metal assembly work for almost 100 years. Techniques and materials are improved every year in the search for increasing efficiency, and the growing skill of many welders has raised this industrial process to an art form. However, in welding, an attractive appearance can hide a defective weld. This concerns not just the welding process, but weld preparation steps.

1. Tube laser cuts beveling, weld prep time
Precision, speed help Utah fabricator broaden customer base

Since its difficult beginnings in 1928—point-blank in the middle of the Prohibition and heading into the Great Depression—metal fabricator Richards Sheet Metal Works Inc., Ogden, Utah, has relied on its ingenuity, uniqueness, and enterprising spirit to survive rugged circumstances and formidable economics.Legend has it, in the 1920s, the rough-and-tumble railroad town was too dangerous for Al Capone to do business there. Not for gritty Richards, though. The manufacturer managed to stand toe to toe with other enterprises in Ogden, manufacturing stills for bootleggers, among other fabrications, according to a local newspaper article.So, when an opportunity arose two years ago to gain a competitive advantage by installing a 128-foot-long, 3-D tube laser machine that bevels and cuts up to 16-inch-diameter, 45-ft.-long tube, it was in the company’s grain to act on it.

Next up? Waterjet cutting.