Month: January 2012

Introducing….Our Continued Commitment to New Products

Published on by Lee EvansLeave a comment

There’s a lot of flutter this week about the Consumer Electronics Show going on and all the latest gadgets.  I’ve seen numerous Twitter posts and feeds updating those of us not present in Las Vegas about all the latest creations from top electronics producers, and the products are quite inviting.  (Something that has stood out to me amongst these posts is the presence of celebrities and some of their aggressive Twitter campaigns to launch products.)

With all this discussion about new products, I thought it’d be a shame not to mention a few of ours.  For anyone who uses EXAIR products, our Atomizing Nozzles have quickly become a familiar product.  With the diligent work of Professor Penurious and the rest of the staff at EXAIR, we’ve positioned ourselves to launch even more Atomizing Nozzles!  We have an external mix line of nozzles, and a siphon fed nozzle line that have recently been added, look for their official debut soon.

Application photos and full web pages are in the works, but you fellow blog readers have the inside track on product availability!  If you have a potential need for a liquid spray nozzle, give us a call.  We’d love to work through the application with you.

And what celebrity should we get to plug our new stuff from their Twitter account?

Lee Evans
Application Engineer
leeevans@exair.com
@EXAIR_LE

Principles of Operation

Published on by Russ BowmanLeave a comment

Last week, I wrote about frequently-asked-questions.  I really enjoy opportunities to engage in technical discussions with folks who want to know how a certain EXAIR product works, and, more importantly, how it will work for them.

Occasionally, we’ll get asked questions about the principle of operation, and, especially with our vacuum products, people will assume they operate on the Venturi principle (a constriction to fluid flow within a tube causes the velocity to increase and the pressure to fall), which is a very popular, tried-and-true method to create a vacuum.

Another way to do it, though, is to rely on the Coanda effect, which is the tendency of a stream of fluid flowing near a surface to follow the line of that surface, rather than its original course.  This is how our Air Knives turn a relatively small amount of compressed air into a tremendous amount of flow.  It’s also the way our Air Amplifiers work – when the compressed air leaves the internal nozzle and follows the internal surface (the Coanda profile) towards the outlet, it entrains a bunch of the existing air inside the product and takes it along, and a low pressure area (aka “vacuum”) is created.

Yet another way to do it is simply direct a high velocity of air towards the outlet.  The forceful exit of the air then entrains the air inside the item, creating a vacuum.  That’s how the Line Vacs, Chip Vacs, Heavy Duty Dry Vacs, and Vac-u-Guns work.  Fancy scientific principles aside, never underestimate the value of simple brute force!

That said, all of these products are quite similar in their basic construction.  The Air Amplifiers’ low pressure area allows it to pull an enormous amount of air through (albeit at a lower vacuum level), which is good for moving large quantities of air and airborne particulate.  The Line Vacs, Chip Vacs and Heavy Duty Dry Vacs don’t have as much vacuum flow, but are capable of pulling a pretty strong vacuum – as much as 144” H2O (-36 kPa), which is great if you’re vacuuming up, or conveying, solid materials.

For the record, our E-Vac Vacuum Generators use the Venturi principle to pull a strong vacuum of up to 27”Hg.  They’re ideally suited for a wide variety of applications such as: pick-and-place lifting, vacuum forming, mold evacuation, clamping/chucking, “hands-off” liquid sampling, and vacuum filling, just to name a few.

Strictly speaking, the Reversible Drum Vac operates on the Venturi principle as well, although the air path isn’t as straight forward as your plain old run-of-the-mill eductor type product.  That’s how it generates the vacuum to fill a drum with liquid.  Of course, to pump it out, with a simple turn of the knob, we’re back to good old brute force.

Regardless of the scientific principle behind the operation, if you have an application that requires pulling a vacuum, we can help…give us a call!

Russ Bowman
Application Engineer
EXAIR Corporation
(513)671-3322 local
(800)923-9247 toll free
(513)671-3363 fax
Web: http://www.exair.com
Blog: http://blog.exair.com/
Twitter: twitter.com/exair_rb
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/exair

Origins of Names: Buffalo Wings, Air Knives

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As far as I know there is no evidence that there has ever been any buffalo mutations which resulted in sprouting wings. So how did deep-fried chicken wings come about with the moniker of Buffalo wings? As the story goes, it started on a friday night at the Anchor Bar owned by Frank and Teressa Bellissimo located in Buffalo NY.

It was a Friday night, and since people were buying a lot of drinks,  they wanted to do something nice for them at midnight when the mostly Catholic  patrons would be able to eat meat again. Being overstocked with chicken wings which normally are thrown away or reserved for stock, Teressa’s husband Frank had told her to do something with them and that is when she came up with the idea of deep-frying them and tossing them in cayenne hot sauce.

They were initially offered for free and were served with blue cheese dip as hors d’oeuvre at the bar. The locals were simply refered to them as wings. Outside the area they called them Buffalo Wings. And that is where the moniker Buffalo Wings came about.

In the industrial world we have curious monikers of our own.

  • Tote pans – these are hand carried parts containers. Tote is a southern expression for carry. Thus a pan that can be carried.
  • Towmotor – name associated with a lift truck. Towmotor is the name of a manufacturer most prevalent in the early days of lift trucks.
  • Monkey wrench – adjustable wrench patented by Charles Moncky
  • Crescent wrench – An adjustable spanner or adjustable wrench trademarked by the Crescent Tool Company now owned by the Apex Tool Group, LLC
  • Air Knife – initially termed an air doctor or air blade used for non contact removal of ink from the non-printing surfaces of an intaglio printing plate. Doctor blades where typically used for this application hence came the term air doctor or air blade. Eventually the term evolved into air knife since it produces a blade of air.

Joe Panfalone, Application Engineer
joepanfalone@exair.com
Phone (513) 671-3322
Fax   (513) 671-3363
Web: www.exair.com
Twitter: www.twitter.com/exair_jp
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/exair

With the new year comes new products

Published on by Brian FarnoLeave a comment

So, we are less than a week into the new year and here at EXAIR we are already releasing new products. That’s right folks, we have released the first product of the year. This product is an accessory for an existing product line. I present to you the EXAIR Chip Shield.

The Chip Shield can be purchased already installed on most of our Safety Air Guns and can also be retrofitted to existing EXAIR Safety Air Guns that you are already using.  The Chip Shield helps to protect your operator from harmful debris blowing back at them from the part that’s being blown off.  The shield is a polycarbonate construction and when used with an extension can be positioned at any point along the extension to meet individual application needs.

If you have any questions please feel free to contact an application engineer for help outfitting your Safety Air Gun with a Chip Shield.

Brian Farno
Application Engineer
BDFarno@exair.com
@EXAIR_BF