I resisted changing to Blender 2.5 and up for a long time as a very important feature was missing until about v2.70. This is the ability to bevel a vertex which comes in very handy when making pipes and handrails.
If the pipe for handrail has bends in X, Y or Z then there are other possibilities, but this method works even if the pipe bends in some other direction. The idea is to first sketch the centreline of the pipe with sharp corners and then to use the bevel tool to create the bends themselves. Finally, the pipe can be created by 'thickening' the line.
To illustrate this, I'll just create a pipe in a new blend file. Starting with the default cube select it with the right mouse button and enter Edit mode by pressing TAB. Then press W and choose 'Merge - Collapse' from the menu.
The cube will collapse down to a single vertex. This is a very handy way of creating a new object with just a single vertex. There are addons available add a vertex as a new object (and it is possible that this functionality will be added to Blender at some point), but the method shown here is quick and easy to do anyway.
Make sure you are in Vertex edit mode:
Press E and then Z to extrude the vertex upwards by moving the mouse and then left clicking with the mouse to set the position. Repeat in the X and Y directions to produce the pipe centreline as shown here:
Now select the vertices where the bends should appear:
If the pipe for handrail has bends in X, Y or Z then there are other possibilities, but this method works even if the pipe bends in some other direction. The idea is to first sketch the centreline of the pipe with sharp corners and then to use the bevel tool to create the bends themselves. Finally, the pipe can be created by 'thickening' the line.
To illustrate this, I'll just create a pipe in a new blend file. Starting with the default cube select it with the right mouse button and enter Edit mode by pressing TAB. Then press W and choose 'Merge - Collapse' from the menu.
Press E and then Z to extrude the vertex upwards by moving the mouse and then left clicking with the mouse to set the position. Repeat in the X and Y directions to produce the pipe centreline as shown here:
Now select the vertices where the bends should appear: