frame material

[tinamcjittles]

Black "iron" pipe is mild steel with a heavy pickled scale coating. It can be welded with any standard steel wire or rod. In this case, 'iron' is just old school slang.

Yes, there is actual iron pipe out there, but your typical threaded plumbing pipe is steel.

That's actually good to know, got tons lying around the garage.

 

[anickode]

There's no question it's real handy to use. Because rigid conduit is sized the same as SCH40 pipe, You can also bend it by hand using a conduit bender of the next size up (so a 3/4" EMT bender for 1/2" and so on), though just like bending rigid conduit, it takes a lot of grunt to get it done.

It's just so blasted heavy compared to tube, especially when you start going up against seamless alloy tube.

And it's also a pain in the butt to paint due to the heavy scale coating that's applied at the Mill to help prevent rusting. LOTS of prep work.