Curving a Piece of Pipe for a Corral Project

[Broccoli1]

There were several posts that didn't involve a bunch of complicated equations to solve the situation.

The equations are NOT complicated.

Showdog proposed in Post #2

"Once I layed out the radius I welded some large angle on the inside of the radius to form the pipe to."

FDC proposed a Bending Jig in post #4
"take a piece of plywood cut it so that it follows the arc and projects about one inch out."

Black Wolf proposed the same idea in Post #13
"If it were me Gary, I would either bend it around a form similiar to what Showdog proposed, OR whip up a couple of dies (that you mentioned) and use your log splitter like a BIG pipe bender."


Miami talked about making a Jig and only presented that the jig could be cut using math- how else would one cut the jig or figger the Arc

[Blondie_486]

Broccoli,

I agree with your statement of making up some dies and using the log splitter as a pipe bender. It's exactly what I'd do!

There is an old saying KISS (keep it simple stupid (I'm not calling anyone here stupid so don't get any ideas that I am)) Make up some simple dies for the log splitter and do the job and set them aside in case the customer wants more of them.

[ivans]

Miami talked about making a Jig and only presented that the jig could be cut using math- how else would one cut the jig or figger the Arc

There are several ways to "figure" the arc or cut the jig with out using math. Well OK; simple math like dividing by 2 is required. A piece of rope, chain, wire or even a tape measure or a long board. Simply use the aforementioned as a "chord" from a fixed point (center of the circle). Use a pencil or marker to draw the arc full scale on your jig or shop floor. 10 feet from the pivot point to your marking device - presto - a 20 foot diameter circle.

This is a thread I swore I was not going to get involved with, but now I did it anyway

There are so many ways to skin a cat when it comes to something like this. Like others I could do the math (probably have to look it up, I'm getting old) or I could draw it in CAD and get a answer to the nth degree, but for a cow pen I would probably use the quickest solution to come to mind. Grab a tape and pencil and go to town.

[Blondie_486]

There are several ways to "figure" the arc or cut the jig with out using math. Well OK; simple math like dividing by 2 is required. A piece of rope, chain, wire or even a tape measure or a long board. Simply use the aforementioned as a "chord" from a fixed point (center of the circle). Use a pencil or marker to draw the arc full scale on your jig or shop floor. 10 feet from the pivot point to your marking device - presto - a 20 foot diameter circle.

This is a thread I swore I was not going to get involved with, but now I did it anyway

There are so many ways to skin a cat when it comes to something like this. Like others I could do the math (probably have to look it up, I'm getting old) or I could draw it in CAD and get a answer to the nth degree, but for a cow pen I would probably use the quickest solution to come to mind. Grab a tape and pencil and go to town.

EXACTLY!!!!!

Well said my friend!

[Sonora Iron]

I don't know any reggie other than the character in the old Archie comics.

That be him, but he acts more like Jughead!

[Blondie_486]

Some of the younger guys may not know who Reggie is. I haven't seen Archie in the Sunday comics in a long time. I don't know when the author quit making the comics but about the only place I've seen Archie comics is in one of those stores that has the old comic books for sale at outrageous prices.

[fdcmiami]

reggie:

Mathmatics have their place - but all this calculations mumbo jumbo isn't getting anything done, and time IS money.

My apologies to the members whose feathers I have ruffled... Realize that my post is merely one man's opinion... I just think you two are making a mountain out of a mole hill.

If every job in industry was approached your way - NOTHING would get done

if you want to see who contributed what to this thread you might take a look at my posts and reggie's. there have been 1660 views to this thread and i am hoping that some of those viewing benefited in some way to some of the things i have written.

as i have said i was a layout guy for years, worked for some major blowpipe co's that were also general contractors. i was frequently given the big things, because i enjoyed doing them. about 25 years ago i was laying out some large right frustrums; aka cones, or reducers. also offset cones and conical sections. they used to do this on the floor. one day i got a drawing of a cone that was 20 feet tall but reduction from large end to small was only 8 inches. the apex of the cone would have been across the street if i tried laying it out the old way. but i knew a better one. with a scratch pad, ((napking if you will) and my calculator i developed the flat pattern dimensions and laid it out without having to do it the traditional way. which was, incidentally to lay the elevation view out, run your lines up from the sides at the base and snap a line where the lines intersected was the apex, or radius point. from here we would calculate stretchout of top and bottom openings and proceed.

in this case i had to split the cone because our rollers could only handle app 10' of material.

the owner of the company asked if i would teach some of the other layour guys some of the methods i was using. others brushed it off as useless info and not worth their time; you know the type. they attack what they don't understand.

i am not an engineer; i have been working my ass off all my life, not so much today because i am getting older. i've also worked all over the us, lots of companies lots of people and i can spot problem workers a mile away. i've been on my own for 20 years, had a shop doing miscellaneous metals, but now i work only portable and only for three people.

how many of those viewing knew how a helix was laid out. even if you don't understand the math it's easy to grasp the concept. once you look at the dwg in elevation you can visualize it in plan and see the stairs coming up. knowing how many degrees in a circle and how not knowing the difference between chord and arc length will get you into trouble.

a couple of weeks ago a poster was asking about a pipe tee. since i have laid out a ton of them i volunteered an answer. talked about parallel line development, how to cut back on your pipe that is being dropped into place to get a good fit. mentioned radial line development and triangulation. take what you want i don't care.

but reggie says it's a waste of time, they have all their stuff cut. is that so. well let me tell you there will always be a place for the guy who can measure and fabricate the final fitting. and besides that a knowledge of those methods of layout will enable you to understand a lot of other things that are happening in three dimension. like the true length of a line in space.

this guy may have only been building a corral but it still has to be positioned between two points (i assume) and welded into place. i mean the pieces formed to an arc. so it would be a good idea to try to make your parts as alike as possible to save yourself from a nightmare when you are installing.

ivan, thanks for that post. i tried to go there from the beginning but people were more focused on the part of what i was saying that they didn't understand. did anyone happen to take a look at the properties of a circle and try to learn what a tangent point is, radius, mean diameter, arc, chord, h, for the **** of it i am going to scan and post some layout info, do with it what you want. it is from a package i used years ago.

[wroughtnharv]

what happened to harv's post "been there, done that" about helical layout.

I deleted it. It was for you from me. You saw it, no need for it anymore.

Back on topic: The oil tubing that Gary is working with has more carbon and a greater wall thickness than the 2" (2 3/8" O.D.) that most of us deal with.

With normal two inch pipe welding a top rail on saddled (notched/coped) pipe posts there will always be a deflection or sag caused by the welding process. Looking down a fence line you will see a dip in the finished welded top rail between posts.

Oil field tubing has enough carbon and wall thickness where this doesn't happen. The heat of the weld doesn't cause deflection. That's one of the ways you can tell at a glance if the top rail on a pipe fence is oil field pipe or regular schedule forty. Unless of course the weldor does like I've done sometimes, go back afterwards with a torch and normalize the weld area by duplicating the heat of the weld with a torch, suck it up if you will.

If Gary was using regular schedule forty pipe then the jig and or torch methods would probably work just fine. I don't think so with oil field pipe. I've bent a lot of schedule forty two inch with my Hossfield making unique gates etc. I've never even attempted to bend a piece of oil field pipe with it because I like my Hossfield. We're buds. I wouldn't put it through such difficulty knowingly.

[fdcmiami]

we'll let that go, but i want you to know that i looked at your 540 deg. dbl helix closely... nice job.

[wroughtnharv]

we'll let that go, but i want you to know that i looked at your 540 deg. dbl helix closely... nice job.

Thank you.

I apologize for getting my back up on the mathematics thing. Sometimes I'm accused, correctly of course, of doing things differently just to be doing things differently.