Shop around you. Steel pipe is everywhere! Anywhere you turn or look, you will see some sort of structure or way of conduit, that steel pipe will be used for. And that's not to mention the pipe that's "out of sight, out of mind" that's serving its purpose under the ground.
Standard or nominal pipe sizes can be found on a tube chart that is used through the industry. The Nominal Pipe Size or N.P.S. chart, gives the specific O.D. or Outside Diameter, the Nominal O.D., Wall Thickness and Weight Per Foot of every steel pipe size. If you never know anything about N.P.S., its recommended that you take a look at the chart before buying any or doing any projects with
click now
You will find basically three different types of pipe, and they differ in the direction they were manufactured. There is seamless steel pipe that starts as a good round and after being heated almost to melting point, a gap is pierced through the middle with an instrument and creates the pipe. This really is know as "Hot Finsh Seamless Pipe ".The second and hottest variety called ERW or "Electric Resistance Welded" Pipe, starts out as a reel or cut-to-width coil of steel, referred to as "Skelp ".The Skelp is maneuvered through some rollers which make it round and then since the edges get together, an electrical welder makes the longitudinal seam down the length of the pipe. The past and least used manufacturing method is "Buttweld" steel pipe. It is actually exactly the same process because the ERW pipe, except after being rolled up, the edges are heated up and fused together to create the pipe. Larger O.D. steel pipe can be created by rolling and welding items of steel plate into cylinders or "Cans" and then welding them together end to get rid of to make the pipe.