Has anyone here tried (or know someone who's tried) successfully to build a hoop house/greenhouse frame out of used oilfield sucker rod? I've been exploring options for a little while now, and this seems like it could be a cost-effective option, even with the cost of transporting it to me. There's two sizes: 7/8" or 1", both 25' long, weighing 54 or 72lbs, respectively. I'm mostly concerned about whether I'd be able to bend it...I don't think I need to worry about it going anywhere if I can get it bent, anchored, and upright.
I'm hoping to use this for winter housing for chickens and (eventually) sheep (following Joel Salatin's designs), and starting/growing plants in the non-winter months.
I think it would work just fine. You might have better luck bending the 3/4" or 5/8" than the bigger stuff though. Try a stick of the bigger stuff though before you count it out. If you are welding it together it would be a good idea to put a pass of low hydrogen over the mild steel to keep it from cracking out. Those guides on the rod in your picture look to be the hard type that are easier to remove. you can lay a sledge hammer under the guide on the ground and then hit it with a shop hammer and they will normally split off. (Safety Glasses definitely!!)
If you have access to a bar roller you can easily roll them to you preferred shape easily.
If you have a lot to make it may be worth getting or making one.
John - I've been looking at benders in various configurations online today, but it looks like most of them have an upper limit of 5/8" for solid rods, unless you're looking at the big industrial ones. I might call a local machinist and see if I could hire him to do it.
Bryan - I haven't gotten into welding yet (though this project might be a start). What do you mean about low hydrogen? I'm guessing something to the effect of preheat the metal first, but I don't really know.
The seller I'm currently looking at has 3/4" as the smallest size he has available. I'm going to watch local ads (since I have a few months before it will be warm enough to start working on this anyway) and see if anyone closer has it - I'd like to handle it and see what it's like before I drop a ton of money on it. Given what I'm seeing about bender capacities, I suspect the smaller diameters would work just fine..there's a lot more strength in the solid rod than a pipe.
Low hydrogen, LH 70 or 7018 number. It is has a lot of strength but handles flex and vibration better and also handles the steel used in oil field pipe and rod better. I do like a first pass of mild steel (6010) to penetrate. A second pass helps prevent cracking out. If you have time, a little preheat that you mentioned is a good thing.
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