Hey guys, been lurking here and finally decided to pull the trigger and have ordered the MPCNC stuff. Ive been shopping around for tubing and had some questions. I’m planning on building roughly a 20"x30" build area. Of coarse I have the option of the 3/4" conduit but was wanting to go with a thicker tube anticipating the ability to do some aluminum. The only SS 25.4 tubing I can find locally is only like .034" wall and still pretty pricy. My other option is some 25.4 16 gauge mild steel tubing (have not went to tractor supply and actually measured yet but probably .06 -.065 wall). Or I can drive about an hour to summit racing and buy some 25.4 in .083" wall for pretty cheap. Is it worth spending the extra cash and time on the thicker tubing? anyone have a good vendor online for some reasonable SS tubing?
I’m defiantly going to have the tubing in hand before I start printing.
For regular steel I thought summit had the best pricing. I have a local steel supplier down the road from my shop and they wanted $150 for regular 1" .065 steel. 20’ length.
I went with stainless and got it from fisheries supply a supplier of mine. I built my machine with 3 6ft sticks of 1" polished .065 wall. My work area is about 17.5x19.5". Those 3 sticks retail are about $160 and I think they have free shipping at that price
I used Metals Supermarket and I am not sure if it was a fluke but when I called the local store direct it was almost 50% less then using the online web ordering service. I guess they get a cut.
May pay to call local shop direct? Or maybe my local shop was a little more aggressive?
Some chains/stores sold the rights to their online business, and the online version is a totally different business. I am not sure if that is happening at metal SM. But they definitely seem like they offer different prices in person.
I used JEGS, bought their mild steel tubes in 4" lengths and polished them myself using a drill motor and a mandrel in the ends. Sanded them progressively finer and then polished with rubbing compound and finishing polish. Look great, no rust and way cheaper than SS if you don’t mind doing the polishing work yourself.
Update: I called the closest metal supermarket and they have 16 gauge (.065) 20’ for $115. do yall think this is a better option then the .083 regular steel from Summit Racing?
Hey @Henslee, thanks for your posts. Curious how your build turned out, happy with the SS? Worth the extra $$ ? Did you end up getting 16 gauge (.065) 20’ from Metal Supermarket, or different spec/wall-thickness? Cheers!
yeah i have not had any issues with it, but i don’t really have anything to compare it to. I did go with the .065 304 SS. I went back and checked my emails, I’m sure its more than 54 cents now.
