Best tip I have for running threaded pipe for air in any kind of shop or manufacturing space, Use a Tee or union instead of straight couplings at every joint. Makes it much easier to add on or make changes later. Thanks for the great content, I always learn something watching your videos !
I’ve made these for a customer that does a lot of on site work on fire trucks and pump trucks. They are almost always threaded on the opposite end when I make them. He refers to them as “groove lock fittings”, but that may be a local term. Always learn something from your videos. I’m a semi retired one horse operation and have a few manual machines.
I've done loads of fire protection. I deal with groove locked on sprinkler systems. Btw, This guys's brilliant. I really enjoy his videos Nd encourage my Juniors to watch his channel too.
I did a bunch of those years ago at a nuke plant. Field setup with a clamshell weld prep machine. We got the appropriate width parting tools with the machine and took about ten minutes apiece.
Plumber in Ontario Canada here, I regularly install this ranging from 2-4". Whats neat is that you can use the system in both copper and black steel, you just need to spend the money on two seperate types of roll groovers. On site we use a threader with the roll groover and the victaulic tape to determine depth, a micrometer wouldnt survive on site. Smallest nipple ive had to make was 2 1/2" of 3" black steel, unlike threading you can make your own nipples without a seperate chuck. On heating lines it has an issue, as when you turn the system off you need to drain it or you will find leaks as the rubber which has expanded by both heat and pressure suddenly has neither and no longer holds as tight as it should. Its perfect for the larger sizes as assembling 4" copper vic is infinitely faster than soldering 4". Love working with it, the new lube even smells nice
I've done hundreds of them, usually in 4" schd 40 pipe. 1/8" wide carbide grooving tool at much higher speed, working from either edge in toward the center is much faster. DRO in this is a great help.
Victaulic connections are very forgiving. You just need to get the ends close and you’re good to go. We use them on our mud mix rigs. “Gruvlock” is the other manufacturer.
Every video like this makes me realize more and more how much i need to step up from my little 9" south bend. Being able to machine bigger things would be cool, but the ability to run super slow with decent chuck torque would be pretty nice.
Terex made cement pumpers. I did maintenance on an outdoor aircompressor. I was surprised to see pvc schedule 40 for the air supply. The heat and oil coming from the compressor had softened it to the point it would squish if stepped on. It's probably cheaper, but I would never trust it with a piston compressor.
Try an Iscar 'cut-grip" style grooving insert. They are very fast. I usually have good luck on carbon steel grooving by turning very fast. Often you can get away with grooving at a fast speed and eliminating chatter by having the groove cut before the resonant frequencies are able to establish themselves. Sometimes I will groove the edges of the groove with a thin grooving bit, then move to the center with a thicker bit. I have found the oil of great benefit when grooving as it lubricates the path for the chip to escape the groove so it doesn't get all balled up. With the 'CutGrip' insert I can cut the edges of the groove and then move horizontally to cut the center rather than plunge cut it. I do agree that grooving tool deflection, especially on thinner grooving tools, can be an issue. I have made 4" (2" on the radius) deep grooves with the 5MM wide Iscar grooving tools on 1018 cold rolled steel. I used it to part off a hundred or so plugs I had to make for boiler feed tubes after a disaster with one of our boilers. The plugs were welded in place. I would stick a few inches of mat'l. out of the chuck, turn the OD, use a DRO to make 1/2" deep grooves, index the Aloris holder and plunge a weld bevel on one side of the plug, then go back to the DRO and part off several pieces. Rinse and repeat ad nauseum.
The factory I did my apprenticeship at was full of victaulic pipe work. It was good stuff, I could never understand why the places I worked subsequently had few if any of them.
These are great for quickly opening up slurry lines in a mill/concentrator when they plug up and you need to get in there and hose them out. Mill I worked at had lines with these fed by peristaltic pumps. That wasn’t so great. The pulsation of that kind of pump causes the groove and clamps to wear out after a while and fail, especially with slurry running through them.
Years ago we used victaulic to connect lengths of concrete pump hose and pipe but moved away because as the pipe and hose wore from the concrete abrading the interior eventually the cut for the clamp would burst.
Some of use just enjoy hearing the gears in the machine. When it comes to dimension with no given tolerances I was taught, generally, that the tolerance was half of the last digit place. So 3.06" would be +/- 0.005 and if fractional treat everything listed as less than 16ths as 16ths +/- 1/32, after that the tolerance is the next fraction down so 3 3/32" is +/- 1/64. That's all pretty open tolerance, but if those dimensions were critical they'd have the spec on the print.
That's a very practical way of setting your own tolerances. If the customer wrote 3.06 on the drawing he probably doesn't have a micrometer and will be happy as long as his cheap digital calipers show 3.06.
I quiet like the system its fairly easy to use, Get the book it has all the tables you need, I found the sales people cry about the cost of giving you the book , but it is off set by the thousands of dollars of fittings you may buy, get the victaulic tape measure when you begin.
Victory + hydraulic = victaulic. Been around since ww1. I am currently looking for a 20 and a 24 inch victauloc cap. Supply shop wants 8000 and 3 months to ship. I just ordered 2 slugs of aluminum to make mu own
Work pretty good on 3" pipe and bigger. Threading and wrenching 3" pipe is tough work compared to 2" and smaller. Not good for systems that may be under suction though.
Honestly, given how easy it is to thread pipe, vs sending pipe out to get groves cut in it, it seems threaded sonnections would be easier in most rougher(i.e. mining) situations.
In use for a comparable installation, you would need to add unions at every connection. You can get groove cutting tools for common pipe threading machines. Pipe over 4" is very tough to thread together, most mines are using lots of 8" up to 48" pipe 12" is very common. The cheap threaded connections for small pipe are not the same as the more expensive higher pressure fittings, and larger sizes. I have used overhead cranes to tighten 8" & 10" pipe, in a mine you learn to hate threaded pipe because it is a lot of work.
Xh needs to be cut grooved, you have girnell, grulok, and many others. The flex groove only shortens the length to the end of the pipe, the groove is the same.
used victaulic coupling type non grove joining uk 1387 4 nb red band heavyweight pipe joiningends 48inch radius 90 degree bends which we hot fire bent on bending block pulled round on winch in90/s
Sometimes I do, I think I mentioned that method also. I have found the The single full width bit method is slightly quicker overall, no need to move for width, the cut-off tool can be used, however My micrometer will not fit until the grove is 2 parting tools wide, so the extra measuring/stopping slows the overall progress.
Can you do the machine work for a 2007 Cummins 6bt reman. Bored 40 over. Deck block and head. I have pistons and all parts. Been sitting at a machine shop in the valley for 2 years. My truck engine is about toast. I’ll put the engine together myself. Have Done a lot of them. Just need a reputable machine shop. That won’t take 2 years. I can’t do machine work. P.S I voted for ya today.
These videos need way more explanation. Can we go back to "what is machining?" LoL. Or intro to machining for really dumb people who were born in the last 20 - 40 years. Not under 20, I get you can't help them.
