Installing Fintube

Fred Rappuhn

I am in the process of installing fintube along a bow window, with sections that will be 2' or less. What is the best procedure, purchase each length to fit or a long length and cut tube/case to fix. I understand this will entail removing fins and cutting to make work in either case.

Bob Vennerbeck

cutting baseboard fintube & enclosure

I've had good success, after a handful of trials & errors, in cutting SlantFin FineLine 30 enclosure and fintube down to fit short walls or fill out odd length walls.



I use an abrasive metal cutting blade in a second-best Skilsaw to cut the enclosure back, front and damper separately, using a square to guide the saw, cutting from the back with cardboard padding under the show face, and cleaning up the razor-sharp edges with a hand file.



The element is easy enough to cut shorter, but cutting two useful pieces from one long element is a bit trickier - you'll need to remove at least 4" of fins from the middle of a run to make room for a tubing cutter and to leave solderable stubs. I first tried twisting a few fins out with needle-nose pliers - the fins broke out OK, but the tubing ended up dimpling from the pressure, and did not then cut or solder nicely...

I then used good sharp narrow diagonal cutters to score the fins from edge to as close to the tubing as possible, and they broke out cleanly without damaging the tubing. Even with a good sharp tubing cutter, the thin soft copper tubing rolled in quite a bit at the cut, and required more reaming than usual to end up with a clean non-restricted cut.



Then you realize you don't get enough brackets to put at least two into each short section - and extra brackets are 'available' but pretty hard to actually get.



But it can be done nicely...



Vbob

STEVEusaPA

portable band saw.....

and a helper.  Everything last poster said, but portable band saw instead of skill saw.

Fred Rappuhn

Already thought about the brackets

Didn't know they were hard to find. And the band saw is a good idea.

I knew my sawzall would rip it up, knew I would have to clean the cut up with a file.

I have some odd sizes to wrap inside this window area.

Thanks.

Fred Rappuhn

Already thought about the brackets

Didn't know they were hard to find. And the band saw is a good idea.

I knew my sawzall would rip it up, knew I would have to clean the cut up with a file.

I have some odd sizes to wrap inside this window area.

Thanks.

bob_46

Depends

Depends if you are trying to make money or not. It shouldn't take more than 2 to 3 min.

to make a cut. I use 2 aviation snips,one red one green. Just eye-ball the cut, none of the

edges show. The aviation snips will also remove the fins.