I have taken all my blank ends to a fabricator, who drilled them out and attached a 1" nipple to them. some of them did crack at the welds though. I was told that the density of the blank is hard to weld to and the fact that they are SS makes it even more difficult. Most of the ones that cracked I fixed with JB Weld but the last one the neighbor took it home and silver soldered it. It works better than any of them.