[DeTomaso] main water tubes

[SOBill at aol.com]

Paul,
 
Here's what I think I know about bead rolling on  tubing:
 
Bead rollers for are designed to roll beads on soft tube material  with a 
wall thickness of around 1/16 (0.0625) of an inch or less.
 
Commonly available copper pipe is hardened and has a wall  thickness of 1/8 
(0.125) of an inch.
 
I have a very nice, high quality tubing bead roller.  Tightening the roller a 
very small amount each revolution and making several  revolutions, I was able 
to put nice beads on in 1 1/4 ID (1 3/8 OD) hard copper  pipe.
 
Had I annealed the area of the copper pipe where the beads  were to go, the 
bead rolling would have been a piece of cake.
 
If you don't have a $400 bead roller, the next best thing is  soldering a 
14GA copper electrical house wire to the tube. The wire beads work  just fine, 
are fast to make, and are cheap.
 
Have fun,
 
SOBill  Taylor
sobill at aol.com  

 
In a message dated 6/20/2008 6:19:12 A.M. Pacific Daylight Time,  
rimov at charter.net writes:

Why go  to all that work to solder beads on the tubes when you can beg, 
borrow or  rent  tube beadering tools to make perfect beads in the material 
in  the first place.  
http://www.aircraftspruce.com/catalog/topages/parkerbead.php

Paul






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