Hey all,
I've been tinkering again lately.
One image I found the I have not posted was how my flanges look with a standard seal and ferrule, so here is that one:
A while ago I was re-thinking my water connections, at the time my method was to just have them poke through a same sized hole in my PC/RC.
but after dropping my RC and not only dinting the end of the water connection but also snapping it off I thought I could make it stronger.
After the success of my branch connection I figured I would try the same method for my water connections, but instead of making a mandrel this time I would just buy one.
So off to the big green shed I went and purchased a cheap flaring tool.
Insert the pipe you want to flare like so with about 4mm overhang:
Wind it in:
Till it is like this:
Then I took it out and put it back in backwards so I can flatten it:
And then flatten it (duh):
This gives me about a 22mm flange OD:
Then gave it a gentle hammering so that it would suit my pipe OD:
Prep the join, lead pencil circle around the join to help contain the solder:
and here is the finished join with enough length that the hose fitting has clearance:
So I did that for my PC and RC connections :handgestures-thumbupleft:
With all this still work I’ve been doing I have been neglecting my keg boiler, which I have been avoiding because i didn’t have a TIG.
But now I have one, and my element ferrules I made so why not stick them together.
First step is to mark out and drill your holes, 7 Sutton bi-metal hole saw teeth were sacrificed for these holes, but luckily, they decided to tear off at the end of the 2nd hole:
My first idea was to transfer the ferrule ID onto the keg:
This was a
terrible idea, too hard to work on.
So I went looking for an online layout template maker and found one at
https://cq.cx/tubejoin.pl.
Fiddled around until I got it looking correct and printed it out, and then adjusted it and re-printed, like 4 more times to allow for my printer and other such silly things.
Keg OD is roughly 396mm (well mine is anyway) for those playing at home, my holes were spaced 100mm apart (centre distance) to allow room for clamps:
The good thing about this site is it gives you all the templates you need in separate lines:
So, after I cut that one out and checked it on my keg:
I welded them on:
With that end of my keg sorted I needed to do the still mount now.
Fun fact:
Just because this keg has been mass produced do not assume that the indent is actually in the center of the keg, mine was not.
Whic is why i need to make a 102mm hole in my keg to sit my ferrule through instead of just welding it to the top and cutting out the middle like I did with my 2" block head branch.
So, I marked the centre of the keg, scribed a 102mm diameter circle.
I started drilling 4mm holes but snapped a drill after hole 2, stepped up to 5mm and snapped that so settled on 1/4" for strength and reground the point to be shallower to stop it grabbing so much as it breaks through
Then I had a proper think about what I wanted to do and scribed a ~97mm circle and centre punched every 7.5mm so my holes would not wander as much.
This allowed me to drill 1/4" holes around the 97mm circle:
I was able to cut through the remaining lid between the holes with a pair of tin snips except for a few spots (marked with texta):
I had to use a hacksaw blade to get through those points.
And then I gave it a quick touch with a grinder to remove the jagged edges:
So hopefully either "today or Tuesday" I will get to fitting the 4" ferrule, but I will need time with my 4" grinder or die grinder.