Your Premier Source for Hydraulic Cylinder Tubing

AC Honed Tube is one of the largest suppliers of hydraulic cylinder tubing in Africa, we understand the critical importance of using the right materials for your high-performance applications. Two fundamental products in our stock holding is honed and unhoned tubing. Our material is sourced from reputable suppliers all over the world. We ensure that all imported tubing conform to our high-quality standard. This ensures that our customers receives the best possible quality material.

Honed Tube (Ready to Use - RTU)

Honed tube is a tube that has gone through a precision finishing process called honing. During honing, abrasive stones are used to machine the internal surface of the tube. This process removes imperfections and achieves a highly precise internal diameter with a very smooth surface finish. This makes the tube "Ready to Use" (RTU) for hydraulic cylinder barrels without any further ID processing

• ID Tolerance: Honed tubes are manufactured to a standard H8 tolerance. This tight tolerance ensures a consistent and reliable seal fit, preventing internal leakage and optimizing cylinder performance.

• Surface Roughness (Ra): The internal surface finish is exceptionally smooth, typically Ra≤0.4μm. This smooth surface is vital for extending seal life and ensuring smooth, stick-free movement of the piston.

Unhoned Tube (Ready to Honed - RTH)

An unhoned tube, often called a "Ready to Honed" (RTH) tube, is a seamless cold-drawn tube that serves as the raw material for a finished cylinder barrel. Its internal surface has not yet undergone the final finishing process. While it meets standard chemical and mechanical properties, its internal diameter (ID) is rougher and less dimensionally precise.

Why Start with Unhoned? The Welding Advantage

Welding ports, flanges, or mounting brackets onto a tube generates significant heat. This heat can easily distort and warp the tube's internal bore, destroying the precise tolerance and smooth surface finish of a pre-honed tube.

By starting with an unhoned tube, you can perform all necessary welding and fabrication before the final, critical honing process. This approach completely eliminates the risk of post-welding distortion affecting the cylinder's performance.

Our Partnership in Your Process (Hone After Weld)

We've designed our service to work seamlessly with your manufacturing needs. The process is simple and effective:

• Supply: We provide you with our high-quality unhoned (RTH) tubing, which has enough material on the inner diameter for precision finishing.

• Fabrication: Your team performs all the required machining and welds on the necessary components.
  
  Note: We can also perform the complete fabrication process on behalf of the customer.

• Return & Final Hone: The fabricated tube is returned to our state-of-the-art facility..

• Perfection: We then perform the final honing, correcting any distortion from the welding process and machining the internal bore to a precise ISO H8 tolerance and a mirror-smooth surface finish (Ra≤0.4μm).

The result is a fully customized hydraulic cylinder barrel that meets the most exacting standards, ensuring exceptional performance and long seal life. This partnership approach guarantees that your custom fabrications are built on a foundation of precision.

Large Tube Make-Up

We have the capability to manufacture large bore tubes up to 1m in diameter up to any length. We can supply the tube in Honed or Unhoned condition, all depends on the customer’s requirements.

Common Applications

The application directly relates to whether the tube is ready for immediate use in a hydraulic system.

• Construction Equipment (Excavators, Dozers, Loaders)

• Agricultural Machinery (Tractors, Harvesters)

• Mining and Earthmoving Equipment

• Industrial Presses and Manufacturing Machinery

• Food industry machinery

• Defense – armory

• Etc.

For all your honed and unhoned tubing needs across Africa, trust AC Honed Tube to deliver the quality and precision your hydraulic systems demand.