TPi October 2012

products & developments

Tight tolerance tubing

Small diameter, high precision, seamless tubes must begin as high precision tube hollows. The demand for tight tolerance, uniform wall tubing is understood by Tube Hollows International (THI), a provider of deep hole drilling services that have been utilised by the tube reducing, tube producing and tube providing industries for over 50 years. THI’s proprietary drilling process allows for ID, OD and wall tolerances custom machined to fit the varied market requirements of its customers. The company states that standard off- the-shelf gundrilling machines cannot offer this range of tolerances and will produce a hollow that must be further machined (OD turning, for example) to get closer to the spec. Turning to the hole does not always guarantee a

THI uses a proprietary drilling process

company’s borecentric process allows it to recondition drilled or extruded hollows to improve size, wall variation (concentricity), and ID surface finish. Tube Hollows International – USA info@tubehollows.com www.tubehollows.com

consistent, favourable outcome, and there is the additional cost for material that will be turned into chips. THI has the capability to drill bars in mill lengths while maintaining consistent uniformity of the wall thickness throughout and to close tolerances. The

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October 2012 Tube Products International