black steel square section stuff?

It's called "hollow square section steel tube" and you'll find it at any steel stockholder (Yellow Pages will give you a local one in any reasonable town). Failing that, Google for a supplier, or use someone like shop4steel.co.uk

It's rarely painted - there's a dark oxide layer on it as new and sometimes it's powder coated to give a more resistant finish (usually after welding and assembly though, so coated plain tube is harder to find). A coat of wax polish on the black oxide is enough to give a usable finish for indoor use.

Steel is dirt cheap to buy, and shipping is often the dominant factor. Price it up in total from several sources before ordering. Some suppliers also deliver in what may be awkwardly long lengths.

Sadly I can't remember what it is called, but I know the stuff you mean

- comes with elbows, castors etc to build up a frame. IIRC it is available in painted steel as well as anodised aluminium, but it's not cheap.

I'm sure we used to buy it from Key Industrial

HTH,

Chris.

My local (agricultural machinery, also sell steel) place would very likely laugh at me if I asked for "hollow square section steel tube" - they much prefer "box profile".

Wonder if they'd laugh even more if asked for "Alfred Hitchcock" profile :-)

IIRC, Speedfit. Made by Dexion. It uses special inserts and simply taps together. Available in black painted and chrome steel and aluminium. Pricey stuff but a quick way to make some things.

Thanks (all) - will check that site in a few days. There's always 2x1 - or maybe it's metric nowadays!

No, they'd set the dogs on you.

You need to find a place that stocks this stuff - square section tubular steel, powder coated.

I've a local place - Mackays of Cambrdge - that does this

You hammer in plastic bits to form corners.

Shouldn't that be the birds?

check out dexion.co.uk and look at construction kits, it's called speedframe. you can also find a stockist nearest to you.

Dave

Didn't they go bust? Taking the pension fund down with them?

I have always known it as box section

There are at least 2 wall thicknesses

The stuff other posters have referred to is thin walled and is almost square on the corners it is fitted together with straight and corner inserts. I have welded this but it really needs a MIG welder as it is a bit thin for arc welding

The other stuff has walls approx 3 mm thick the corners are bevelled and it is normally welded together. Steel stockholders usually stock this. It welds great with 2.5 rods. Perhaps a bit heavy for what you want

Tony

Dexion sell Speedframe in black steel. Handy Tube is available in black, white, red, blue or chromed steel plus natural and black aluminium, although I don't recall seeing their joiners in anything except black and grey. The aluminium tubes are available with a variety of fins extruded onto them, to accept 15mm panels or glazing. For steel, you need to use hanging clips to fit work tops within the frame or add-on extrusions to fit panels.

The corners are made with hammer-in inserts. I recommend a soft-faced dead-blow mallet for that job, if possible. They can be marked during assembly, so make sure you protect them when hammering. The length of the inserts means that you should plan on a minimum tube length of about 150mm.

IMO you would have to have quite specific needs to justify the cost of using one of these systems, as compared to the cost of buying a piece of ready-made self-assembly furniture.

Colin Bignell

Dunno. I made some speaker stands out of the chrome stuff about 30 years ago, and haven't used it since. I remember it being very pricey though.

Thanks to grizzly for the correct name - speedframe.

nightjar IMO you would have to have quite specific needs to justify the cost of using

My experience also.

We used it to make up workbenches for computer testing and software/hardware installtion.

Was useful to get some stuff up higher than deslk level, and benches with shelcves were not easy to come by then.

However people like rapid racking now do almost anything you could want in that area, so take a look at their website

Would be much cheaper to cut the frame parts from square section standard steel stuff and get it welded if you can't do this part yourself.

SHS (square hollow section). Should be pretty cheap. I got some to strengthen the span of granite over my kitchen appliances. You may need to wait if you want them to cut the pieces to length.

Christian.

================= You can buy the thin wall tube from a steel tubing stockholder. It's usually called 'furniture steel' with a wall thickness of about 1/16th". It comes in either Metric or Imperial to accept plastic end fillers.

It's quite easy to weld with either gas or Mig but if you use gas it needs to be held securely to prevent movement. It's best to use some kind of jig to hold it during welding.

Cic.

Speedframe. You're confusing it with plumbing bits.

Works loose easily, so no good for repetitive loads.