8mm Rod From McMaster-Carr

Just noticed it's not in 1000mm lengths. It's 3 feet (914mm). That means you can't get, say, 500mm + 452mm from a single length. Looks like I'll need to order 3 more.

It's so expensive from McMaster-Carr. Fasco Fasteners has the 8mm threaded in stainless steel, meter lengths. If you're in the US, you might want to call them and ask them who is a local distributor for you (in my case it was a marine supply store that did it as a special order). I think they have the smooth rod too, but since 5/16" is practically the same thing, in LA I was able to get a better deal on that from a local metal supply company.

Maybe I could have gotten away with 5/16" for the threaded rod too, but the threading is different, so I didn't want to risk it.

With meter long threaded rods you have just enough to do the 384mm studding idlers on the same rod as 3 of the 610mm side diagonals. I just made one cut in those since the idlers can be a few mm over with no problems.

Kyle

Just to clarify: I got the threaded rod from J&L Industrial Supply and it was the correct length. The smooth rod came from McMaster-Carr and was 3 feet long.

I suppose I could see if the local hardware store has 5/16" rod. I can't imagine 0.0625mm will make much difference.

I got my 5/16" smooth rod and threaded rod from a place listed under "Steel Distributors" in my yellow pages. These are the guys that supply building contractors, but they'll deal with you, too.

Somewhat cheaper than a hardware store, and they'll have enough for the project. (Hardware stores rarely do.)

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/26/2008 02:19PM by SebastienBailard.

As it turns out, Home Depot had 3' lengths of 5/16" rod in stock. I bought 3, realized I needed more, went back and bought the remaining 4. Unfortunately, 3' lengths don't divide up nearly as well 1m lengths, so you end up using 16 rods instead of 9. I *think* that's right. I'll have to go over my receipts and make sure it was 7 that I bought from Home Depot.