I'm building an inlet manifold for my bike bodies out out a laser cut flange and 45mm erw steel tube. My question is, how have other people put a lip on their steel tube to stop the rubber tubing connecting bodies to manifold from slipping off? If it was ali, I'd bead roll it, but don't think it will work with steel. Do you reckon a continuous bead of weld around the top of the tube would work ok?

All opinions and advice welcome!

Cheers

Adrian

Tack spots or even bird poo splatter will do. Need something slightly rough for the tube to grip.

N

cut a groove in the tube on a lathe.

I dont do any thing i have made 3 manifolds and had no problems
Jacko

painted manifold

[Edited on 17/2/09 by jacko]

second that! me and my friend made one not long back that seems to be fine without a lip

Have a look in the tools section for beading tool . Someone posted about one from B&Q a while ago

The erw is only 1.5mm thick, so cutting a lip may be tricky. I didn't think the beading tool would work on steel tube. So by the looks of it, it's either weld or don't do anything, unless someone can tell me if the beading tool will work with 1.5mm steel tube.

Cheers

Adrian

why don't you solder a piece of thick-ish wire around the pipe where you want the lip

or even get a thin 3mm long bit of the same tube, cut it so it will slip over the existing tube and weld that on (all be it with a small gap - until you add another little bit).

24 hour heat proof epoxy. Bit of kite string. Glue string around bottom of tube. Done.

I machined a groove in the lathe - but I used aluminium, which was thicker. The ring on the Honda coupling rubber locks in there just nicely.

This is a picture of the test pieces I used to make sure everything was OK.

Id put a couple of spots of weld on. muchos easy and will work well, and your welder will be out when u make the manifold.