"Q" wrote in message
om...
Anyone know how aluminum pipe sizes work? Is there some kind of
industry standard that manufacturers follow and you can look up (for
finding wall thickness, telecoping lengths, etc)?

I've seen a couple of tables with specifications, however those seem
to always jump from 1/2" to 3/4" to 1"... at my local hardware store I
can get the 1/8"'s sizes in between (3/8, 5/8, 7/8, etc) which has me
confused. Are those 1/8" based sizes standard, or some kind of non
standard product?

first a nit... most of what you see is aluminum tubing not pipe... a minor
but very important point. pipe is usually specified by the inside diameter
and a 'schedule' number that determines how thick the wall is. it is
usually not rated for structural strength. tubing is described by outside
diameter and wall thickness. it is usually rated for structural use and is
available in a much wider variety of sizes and materials.

now, as for sizes that are available. that will depend on the manufacturer.
if you look at a typical supplier like texas towers
http://www.texastowers.com/aluminum.htm you will see sizes in 1/8"
increments with .058" wall thicknes. this combination makes for nicely
telescoping sections for building antennas.

beware of hardware store aluminum. unless they are a very good store the
stuff they sell is probably relatively soft and weak, mostly good for tent
poles and stuff like that. for antennas you want to get something like
6061-t6 or 6063-t832 materials that are basically aircraft quality material.