Choose from 4 stock offerings plus custom!

Uni-Directional
Here are a few close-up pictures of our small tubing in different lighting conditions.
Click on the picture to enlarge.
     

Sanded Smooth Uni-directional

Fabric

Sanded Smooth Fabric

NEED A SAMPLE? We listened to what our customers wanted and this is our response. In our sample pack you will get four sections of carbon tubing between sized from .500" ID and 1.00" ID and at least three inches long. Each section has a different outlook so that you can make an informed decision with regard to the visual appearance of our tubes before buying a full length tube. The 4 outlooks are uni-cello, uni-sanded, fabric cello, and fabric sanded. No guarantees are made with regard to sizing other than each tube will be sized within a range of .500" ID and 1.00" ID. If you email us before you order we may be able to make sizing substitutions depending on our current stock of remnants. We do not cut down full length tubes to provide samples but we make every effort to accommodate our customers. Please note we DO NOT offer free samples of our tubing due to the high cost of the materials involved and the number of requests we receive for samples. When it comes to most projects $18 ($28 for international orders) is a small price to pay to make the right decision.

Our tube Q&A is designed to help answer specific questions about our small carbon fiber tubing

What tolerances can I expect from your tubing? Our tubing is manufactured using precision ground mandrels and closely monitored material quality. Our goal is to provide our customers with very high quality tubing balanced with reasonable pricing. All of our small tubing is sold "as molded" and the only machining that is performed on the tubing is cutting to length. A qualified machine shop may be able to help you tighten up your tolerances if needed. We do not sand the outer diameter on all of our tubes because that adds additional cost to the tubing. Not all of our customers require sanding and those that do will want a specific tolerance anyway. Please don't hesitate to email us with any questions about tolerances sales@carbonfibertubeshop.com

OD tolerance applies to as molded tubing. If your tube is a sanded smooth fabric tube the OD tolerance is +/-.005". We sand to a look first and then a dimension on sanded fabric tubing so the OD is usually about .008" smaller than the diameter listed in the ordering charts above. Over sanding a fabric tube will cause the pattern to degrade and under sanding will leave cello lines on the tube so possible tolerances aren't as tight as you might find with our sanded uni tubes. Sanded uni tubes will end up about .008" smaller on the OD than what is listed in the ordering charts above. We can hit a tolerance of +/- .002" on a uni sanded tube.

What texture can I expect on the inner and outer diameter? As you can see in the photos the outer diameter has a slight texture from the manufacturing process. After each tube is laid onto the mandrel and compacted it undergoes a winding process where a proprietary cellophane wrap is carefully wound at a specific pressure around the diameter of the tube. This step is really the key to producing a high quality composite tube. Once the tube is wound it goes into a high temperature oven for curing. As the mandrel is heated it expands slightly while the cellophane is contracted. This provides super compaction pressure to the layup and once cured the cellophane is removed. After the cellophane is removed it leaves a slight stepped texture in the epoxy resin. This imprint is only about .003"-.004" thick and can be removed easily with an additional machining process or even sandpaper if cosmetics are more important. See more about this on our cut & bond page. The inside of our tubing is very smooth because the mandrels used to cure our tubes are machined to a tolerance of +.002" / -.0.00".

What layup is used in these tubes and how strong are they? All of our small tubes are laid up with most of the layers/fibers running axially down the length of the tube. This means that our tubes will display most of their stiffness in bending. All of our small tubes are laid up using uni-directional carbon fiber prepreg. With uni-directional carbon fiber you can design in stiffness exactly where you want it. Using a woven carbon fabric isn't an option when you're designing a tube with the best mechanical properties (stiffness/weight ratio). A major benefit to using composites tubing versus metal tubing is not only the weight savings but the ability to design stiffness where you want it as apposed to a metal tube where the only thing you can do is add wall thickness and weight. Most of our small tubes feature a layer of prepreg glass at both ends which offers some torsional (twisting) stiffness. Many carbon fiber tubes on the market are pultruded. Pultruded tubes are much less expensive and there is a reason for that. The mandrel and the carbon filaments are pulled through a machine and cured at the same time. The downside is that you get very little torsional value from a classic pultruded tube since all of the fibers run in one direction. In real world situations this can be a detriment because with the slightest twist under loading can split the tube. Also pultruded tubes are typically heavier (more resin rich) which degrades the stiffness. More fiber and less resin is always best. All of our tubes are roll wrapped to avoid these problems. Like the old saying goes "you get what you pay for". It is important to note that we refer to classic pultruding in the above text. With a pultrusion process called pull-winding it is possible to include a non axial fiber orientation around the diameter of the tube. Pull winding is an automated process that runs continuously and reduces the per unit cost but also has high start up costs compared to roll wrapped tubing. Pull wound tubing is not generally available off the shelf but instead is typically used in proprietary products.

We do not offer specific load ratings for our tubes for several reasons. The first reason is because there are so many ways to load a tube that any loading data we distributed would not be useful. We offer basic information on our material properties page to calculate how a given tube might perform under your loading scenario. The next reason is legal liability. Some applications may involve threat to life and limb. Since we cannot control how our tubes are used and what safety factors are held to for a given application we do not quote any load ratings for our tubing.