Stainless Steel Rod Sculpture

HELP PLEASE.
Hi all. New to site trying to find answers on what guage of stailess to use for a wind sculpture for outdoors.

We are wamting to use stainless rod between 4 and 8 mm Im thinking in lengths up to 4- 5 mtrs high.
What would be the ideal size does anyone know that will not bend over totally under its own weight? We want it to flex and sway without failing. It will be fixed to the ground vertically in numbers to flow and move with breeze. It needs to be able to withstand quite high winds at times. Imagine grasses in a breeze. Flexing and flowing.
Any comments and advise welcome please.
Regards
Mark

Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 08/23/2015 04:41AM by Waterfront.

If you can´t figure it out yourself, do you believe someone else would take the responsibility to give advice? ( I know, we have skilled people here )
Imagine, the project fails and people get hurt....
-Olaf

I suggest you invest in a single rod and see how it behaves. A single SS rod won't cost much and will answer all your questions and more.

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Ultra MegaMax Dominator 3D printer: [drmrehorst.blogspot.com]

It is totally depending on the geometry of whatever you are intending to do. Without a full drawing or model no one can give a meaningful answer.

Offhand, I'd say 4mm dia rod, 5m long would fail. 8mm might be OK but it would sway a lot. 10mm or larger might be a better choice. Whether it fails or not would depend a lot on what alloy and temper you pick. Yield strength of different stainless alloys can vary from ~30,000 PSI to 300,000 PSI. I'd try prototyping with re-bar which is cheap and available. The stiffness of plain steel re-bar is about the same as stainless so the swaying properties will be about the same. However, re-bar won't be as strong, so in high winds, it will fail more easily.

Hi All,
Thanks for the comments and thoughts.

I was not trying to put anyone on the spot or hold in any way responsible I was just hoping to get some ideas which I have now gained.

The idea that I sample a few sizes is good which I will try as I really had no idea how it might react. Clearly too small wont work. As will too big not work obviously.

Thanks to all for your thoughts.

Regards
Mark