What Is Stainless Steel Elbow

In stainless-steel piping system, stainless steel elbow is used to change the flow direction in the pipe. According to its angle, the most commonly-used ones are 45°, 90° and 180°. And in some engineering projects, 60° elbow or other unconventional angle elbow are also required. Except for stainless steel, the materials of elbow also include cast iron, alloy steel, malleable iron, carbon steel, non-ferrous metals and plastics.

Classification of Elbow

The connection of stainless steel elbow includes: butt-welding (the most common way), flanged connection, tri-clover, threaded and socket welding. And based on its production process, it can be divided into: welding elbow, stamping elbow, push elbow, casting elbow, forged elbow and so on. For some peoples, elbow is also known as bend pipe.

Materials of Stainless Elbow

The materials of elbow we can offer include:

• Stainless steel elbow: 304/304L,316/316L,310S,321,347H, 321H,317/317L, 904l, 254 SMO;
• Duplex steel and super duplex elbow: SAF 2205, SDSS 2507;

Required Techniques of Elbow

a).  Generally, the main system of industrial pipelines is mainly connected through butt welding. To improve the welding quality, the end will be beveled to form an angle and edge based on standard requirements. ASME B16.25 Standard has specified for the beveled angle, and the allowable deviation and detection method. For stainless steel elbow, its surface quality and mechanical properties are basically the same as pipes. Due to the performance requirements and ease of welding, the materials of stainless-steel fittings are usually required to be of the same as the connected pipes.

b).  All our butt-welded stainless steel pipe fittings including stainless steel elbow are treated with shot blasting and pickling passivation or sand-blasting, so that the surface of the pipe fittings will become clean, beautiful, and its corrosion resistance can be guaranteed. For those large pipe fittings which cannot be shot blasted, we usually use sand blasting to clean their surface. Besides, our factory also provides surface polishing or oscillating treatment to meet the requirements of different projects.

c).  For stainless steel weld elbow, we will test their size and mechanical performance based on EN 10253-4 / EN 10253-3 and ASME B16.9. Our factory can also do other tests based on the requirements of our clients.

Packing Requirements of Elbow

For those elbows or pipe fittings without special packing requirement, if their size is 2” or below, we usually seal with plastic and then put them into plywood case. However, for the elbows of large size, we normally pack with pallets and give a protection for the beveled end. As for the pallets number, it will depend on the actual size of elbow. Undoubtedly, we will also mark the details in the packing, not limited to the size, materials, trademark, etc. We can also do color labeling for products according to customer requirements, so that they can rapidly distinguish the materials when the products arrive.