Cooling Pipes

[Brett James-McCall]

Pat,
Have a look at a site in the UK called www.frost.co.uk and search for a product called Ezi-Beader. I think they do them in the US as well. However, at 400 Uk green backs, I think there is a better way to spend the money, like a radiator...

Brett

 

[Geoff Deakin]

Try A. H. Fabrications in Hereford. Tel: 01432 354 704.
They made up flared water pipes for some rally cars we were building. Very helpful.
Best of luck,
Geoff

 

[Dave Gibbins]

Brett,

There is a place in Worthing called Pipecraft. They will do one off bends to your requirements. I think they charged me £25 to a bit of stainless steel with 2 bends in it. As the angles were very close together, they had to make it as 2 bits and then welded it up. It’s so good you can’t see the weld! I have the number somewhere - let me know if you need it.

 

[Keith]

If you'll pardon the expression just "bell end" the pipe slightly /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/shocked.gif and slip at least 6" of hose over the tube with double opposing jubilee clips.

 

[Howard Jones]

Pat, yes it will work. I would do a couple of test pieces first but all you really need is something around the end of the tube that will prevent the hoseclamp from slipping over the "flare". Make sure the silver solder completely flows all the way around the joint between the tube and the wire. Also all must be very clean, tube and wire, and use flux. Lighty sand end of tube and full lenght of wire. 200 grit or so.

 

[Bill D]

I would like to hear more about using copper pipe for the cooling pipes. Would there be any problem with the anti-freeze with copper?

 

[Phil]

Bill
Copper is a good choice, it will last a very long time, and the fitting choices are almost limitless. I have never seen a problem with Glycol anti-freeze with copper, the only problem I would think would be electrolytic action from dissimilar metals in the block, heads etc. Zinc is a problem with copper. If you do decide on copper I would also silver braze it instead of soldering as this has a much higher mechanical strength, and look for "K" type tubing, this is the heavier wall of the three types. The L and M are for general plumbing and have much thinner wall schedules. One last bit, K type tubing can be bent on a good tubing bender if you want to avoid a lot of fittings and joints with a seamless look this is the ticket.
Hope this helps
Regards
Phil

 

[Bill D]

Thanks Phil. Your infofrmation is very useful.

Cheers
Bill D

 

[Mark Clapp]

Bill, as a thought to your question, you might want to stay with stainless piping. There would be no dissimilar metal problems and you wouldn't have to polish off the tarnish on the exposed pipe sections to keep things bright.

 

[Scott]

As an aside, copper weighs significantly more than stainless by volume, and a whole lot more by equivalent strength. It is easier to work with, though...

Scott

 

[Garrett Clark]

Howard,

I'm really intrigued by your suggestion to silver solder copper wire to the tubes to form a "bead". I've been building custom steel lugged bicycles with silver solder, and the conventional wisdom among the bike guys is that the silver doesn't stick to aluminum. I've done a lot with regular carbon steel, high alloy "chromoly" steels, stainless, and I think I even did some brass stuff, but I've never tried aluminum.

Can you silver braze aluminum?

For those of you worried about the strength of the silver soldered joint, I can assure you that they are very strong. In fact, I remember learning about silver soldering of steel in engineering school--evidently if you use a thin silver joint, the silver does some magical thing where it becomes as strong as the surrounding steel when pulled in tension. Of course this type of joint is always better loaded in shear where you can get a lot more area involved.

Anyway, I've tried to straighten some silver brazed bike joints that came out a tad off. Those suckers don't move easily! Basically, I regularly ride a silver-brazed bike of my own construction, and I am not at all worried about the frame failing.

For a look at what I'm doing with the bikes, there are some pictures here:
http://www.sscycleworks.net/Gallery/Frame%20Project/slides/IM001240.html

Garrett

 

Try supper glue on Al to hold the hose on, cheep fast works