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If I wanted to add heating elements to a bending pipe so I don't need to mess with gas, what do I do?

I was thinking maybe take 5 100 watt soldering irons, and mount them in a circular configuration around the steel pipe, so that the heating is even... Will that work? What's the best way to bond heating element to a pipe to promote good heat transfer?

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Cat-gut strings are made from kitten guts, stretched out to near breaking point and then hardened with grue saliva. As a result these give a feeling of Pain and anguish whenever played, and often end up playing themselves backwards as part of satanic rituals.

Typhoon Guitars
http://www.typhoon-guitars.com

I used an electric charcoal starter and just shoved it in a pipe. It's cheap and worked well. You can hook a dimmer switch in the line for heat control.

Check this out:
http://www.kitguitarsforum.com/archives ... 32_0_5_0_c

I thought of that, I just thought I could use something available locally since nobody seems to sell electric charcoal starters in Taiwan, means I have to order it. However there is a seller in hong kong selling cheap cartridge heaters on ebay, with cheap shipping. The problem is how do I mount cartridge heaters to a pipe and still get good heat transfer?

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Cat-gut strings are made from kitten guts, stretched out to near breaking point and then hardened with grue saliva. As a result these give a feeling of Pain and anguish whenever played, and often end up playing themselves backwards as part of satanic rituals.

Typhoon Guitars
http://www.typhoon-guitars.com

My pipe is rigged with a single 500 watt Halogen bulb and works just fine. The pipe is 1/4" wall aluminum, sealed at both ends with cans that the fit the inside diameter, and temperature is controlled with a dimmer switch. Full blast will reach ~500 F. Leads on the inside of the pipe are high temp, and were additionally insulated with high temp sheathing (fiberglass IIRC).

I use one of these http://www.ebay.com/itm/Vintage-Eagle-C ... 20de084519 in a piece of aluminium aircraft strut. It works very well. This one looks used but they're not hard to find new.

Courtesy for my buddy Daniel Minard.

I tried that, suspended the cartridge in tightly packed metal scouring pads inside the pipe - burnt out first time I tried it, even with a controller fitted.
Now use electric BBQ starter.

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The name catgut is confusing. There are two explanations for the mix up.

Catgut is an abbreviation of the word cattle gut. Gut strings are made from sheep or goat intestines, in the past even from horse, mule or donkey intestines.

Otherwise it could be from the word kitgut or kitstring. Kit meant fiddle, not kitten.

I just used a solid block of aluminium and bored a hole in it and inserted a cartridge heater into it. This was then wired up through a dimmer for control. It works really well, I bought the heating cartridge on Ebay, and it was shipped from your area of the world, so you should be able to get hold of all the parts easily.

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Nick

Follow my musings on getting started in luthiery http://www.tredwellinstruments.co.uk

I use a heat gun instead of a torch. Its like a really hot hair dryer. You should be able to find one at a hardware store.

I used bits from a broken 500w linear halogen flood light. The ceramic "globe" holders from the flood light can be mounted in an aluminium tube, then load up the linear "globe" (or bulb in other parts of the world) and you're away. Temp control is via a domestic 500 watt dimmer.

I've also used bits from a cheap two bar 2kW radiant heater. Wire the "bars" in series instead of parallel and you have a 500w heater that can be inserted in a piece of aluminium tube and controlled from the same 500w domestic dimmer.

Electric charcoal starters don't exist in this part of the world, either.

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Trevor Gore, Luthier. Australian hand made acoustic guitars, classical guitars; custom guitar design and build; guitar design instruction.

http://www.goreguitars.com.au

I built my bending irons using cartridge heaters that I ordered from McMaster-Carr. They are 110v and are 6'' long. I mounted them centered in the pipes, sealed both ends and ran them through a dimmer switch to control temp. Works great and was very affordable.

While I'm sure the other solutions here are more elegant and less noisy, I did build 5 guitars like that earlier on.

I too use a heat gun but I'm fed-up with the noise. Sometime I'll change it to one of the above. I'll just bend one more side first....

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We are all in the gutter but some of us are looking at guitars.