TPi October 2008

Photo – Jansen Ltd (page 52)

Tube products Fabr icated Because products which began as tubing are so numerous and varied, they tend to suggest custom design and individualised treatment. This is not to be wondered at, since so many fabricated tube products, built for long life in hard service, are objects of incidental but very genuine beauty. The website of one manufacturer features a photo-montage in which images of the company’s robust industrial wares — workmen’s hand-trucks, collection bins, display cases — dissolve into one another, beguiling the eye like works of art. The display is identified as a photo gallery; one splendid piece, a fire-screen, may be viewed and admired from no fewer than 24 angles. The reference to art is not altogether far-fetched, given the broad array of materials, finishes, and processes from which tube components, assemblies, and products may be fashioned. Carbon steel; stainless steel; galvanised; aluminium; copper alloy: one of these — one only — is the ideal choice for a particular object. Zinc; nickel; chrome; electropolish; powder: one of these, and not another, is the best plating or coating for a given application. Bending; notching; slotting; end forming; swaging; cutting: each must be performed with the precision demanded by the job in hand. No one who has ever swung a perfectly balanced metal baseball bat will quarrel with the assertion that a fabricated tube product can be a magnificent thing. The companies featured in this section of TPI have built their businesses and staked their reputations on that conviction.

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Tube Products International October 2008

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