Rigid Tubing, what do you prefer?

[SinisterHumanoid]

Just a little curious, what do you all prefer, to bend the Acrylic yourself or use fittings for your bends?

[pagani123]

bending looks better imo and cost less although i would go with petg as its more forgiving than acrylic and i would recommend not using it for your first water cooling build unless you have practice doing it for something else.

[ToastyBear]

Sometimes bending can get tricky if you do 2 bends per section, but it looks awesome.

 

It is so much easier with a Miter Saw to cut the tubing than tube cutters or a hacksaw. You can cut very quickly and accurately and take thin slices off the ends to get it just right.

 

I prefer Acrylic because it is more crystal clear and smooth. Its harder to bend but im not doing water cooling because its easy. Just get good, tubes are cheap anyway.

[SonoDanshi]

I prefer petg over acrylic for a start as it's easier to work with although not as "crystal clear". For builds in normal sized cases I'd bend the tubing as it looks nicer (imo). In smaller itx/matx cases where space is tight I'd opt for fittings as it'll be easier to get the tubing where it needs to go.

[Bosco]

I can't speak for clear tubing but for solid white I can't really see the difference between acrylic and petg. I had acrylic originally and now I'm using petg and for me personally I'll stick to petg for any future builds. I had 2 leaks from acrylic one pin hole defect from factory and one hairline crack. I Also managed to break a long run on the 4th bend because I tried to tweak it a little as it was cooling. stupid yes but I feel like petg gives me a little extra flex to play with.

[m_tieu]

I prefer the looks of bending but acrylic is not the easiest material to bend. PETG is more malleable but has issues with chemical compatibility with certain coolants containing glycol.

[Benji_w]

Just a little curious, what do you all prefer, to bend the Acrylic yourself or use fittings for your bends?

 

Its down to personal preference, I've seen amazing builds using one or the other or even both. I'm going to try bending all mine by hand and go from there.

[ToastyBear]

I also use 16mm diameter acrylic which is twice as thick as the standard 12mm you see everyone using. This basically erases all doubts about durability. Unless you go on smashing your tubes with a hammer all these youtube videos do when comparing with PETG.

[vong]

I'm using acrylic at the moment and it takes a while to heat up and be malleable.

 

I prefer bending over fittings because:

- looks much nicer

- way cheaper

 

But it's harder once you've got multiple or difficult bends going on. I had a difficult bend to make but decided it was probably best to use half acrylic, half soft tube and a few 90 degree fittings because only the acrylic part will be seen. One screw up on a single piece of acrylic and it's junk (well maybe use it for reference).