Month: May 2014

Memorial Day 2014 – Thank You

Published on by Lee EvansLeave a comment

Marine Memorial

In a conversation with one of my sisters recently, I was informed how elated she is that Memorial Day is approaching so she can soon wear white. There is, or maybe there was at some point, a fashion rule dictating that white only be worn between Memorial Day and Labor Day. As I understand, this was done by the opulent to set themselves aside from the working class, who often wore dark clothes for work.

When she told me this, I of course asked if she knew Memorial Day was originally called Decoration Day. “Accessoriiiiize!”, she said, as if her brain was assembling the ensemble she MUST wear as soon as possible.

This sister is a stark contrast to my other sister who is married to a retired Marine and veteran of the war in Afghanistan. For their family, Memorial Day takes on a much more somber, appreciative tone, as it does with me.
We are fortunate to live as we do, and regardless of a person’s political beliefs, we ALL appreciate the dedication and sacrifice of those in our armed forces.

I was recently told by a foreign national that they admire the culture of America. How we as a people do not fight for land territory, but for ideals and principles of fair living.
Let’s remember that, and remember those who have fallen in defense of our ideals.

Many of our EXAIR Families will watch their Boy Scouts walk in a parade or help decorate veteran’s gravestones with their 4H club, or remember their family members who have died serving the US military. EXAIR supports all of these activities and has the utmost respect and gratitude for those who have died serving our country so we may have opportunity and freedom. Please take a moment to think of our fallen, brave U.S. military people today.

Lee Evans
Application Engineer
LeeEvans@EXAIR.com
@EXAIR_LE

Think You’re Too Busy? Think Again.

Published on by Russ BowmanLeave a comment

The first half of Knothole Baseball season is drawing to a close this weekend.  This means that teams are in a mad scramble to make up all the rained out games that are par for the course, when you schedule springtime outdoor events in the more temperate climate regions of the American Midwest.  If the weather holds, that means eight games in six days, between the two baseball players that live in my house.  Now, I LIKE baseball, so, when their mother pointed this out to me with a dire look of frustration in her eyes, I thought it best to hide my excitement…lest I incur her wrath, along with Mother Nature and a couple of coaches.  By the way,Todd & Ryan: you should know it’s nothing personal, and she thinks the world of both of you.

So, we’re busy right now.  I mean, do the math: Eight games in six days means we’re unlikely to both be able to attend them all.  I’m going to try, of course…because of the divisions they play in and the layout of our local ballpark, they very likely could be playing on adjacent fields Saturday afternoon.  That’s MY kind of double-header!

I know we’re not the only ones who are busy right now either, personally or professionally.  Of course, professionally, busy-ness is kind of the goal, right?  That’s why it’s important to be as efficient as possible.  I had the pleasure of discussing an application with the operator of a fabrication shop this morning: After drilling & tapping a series of blind holes in a part, it gets washed & rinsed, and then blown off to remove the residual rinse water.  Problem is, it’s time consuming to blow out a couple dozen irregularly spaced holes on a couple hundred parts, each and every day, by hand.  And frankly, the tedium associated with the process means that holes are likely going to be missed, and even the ones that get blown out might not get 100% dry.

Their idea is to use a Super Air Knife to blow a high velocity “curtain” of air over the entire area where the holes are located…their maximum spacing is only about 8” from side to side, and they thought a 12” wide air flow pattern would be ideal, since they might have an inch or so “play” in the way the parts will pass through.  I recommended our Model 110212 12” Aluminum Super Air Knife Kit.

Like I said, though, they’re busy right now, so they don’t want to throw a bunch of time and labor at coming up with a way to install and test equipment that they have no experience with.  That’s where the total engineering of our Intelligent Compressed Air Products comes in:

Our Super Air Knives are designed to be the most efficient and quietest in the industry…we back that up with our Efficiency Lab (where your existing products can be tested by our experts, using our precision calibrated instrumentation) and our 30 Day Unconditional Guarantee (where you can see for yourself, in real time, how EXAIR’s Intelligent Compressed Air Products are better, quieter, and safer than what you’re using right now.)  Not only that, but our Engineering and Production folks have combined their knowledge and resources to also make them easy to install and operate:  They’re compact and lightweight.  They have multiple ports to plumb compressed air to, and tapped holes running their entire length to use for easy mounting.  We’ve got Universal Air Knife Mounting Systems that require only one hole to secure a ½”-13 bolt, and installation is done…you can position and reposition it all via two thumbscrews.  Longer length Super Air Knives are available with Plumbing Kits Installed, so your compressed air supply lines are simplified.  And we keep it all in stock, so you can try it out, right now.

How Air Knife Works90609076

 

 

 

 

 

I won’t lie to you…blowing water out of blind holes is a tough application.  But they already know that.  After our conversation this morning, they also know how “low impact” (their words) a trial of the Super Air Knife will be.  I thought you should know too.

Do you have something in mind for a compressed air application that you don’t think you have time for?  Give us a call – you might be pleasantly surprised.

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

 

 

(Im)Proper Infeed Pipe Size For The Super Air Knife

Published on by exaircorpLeave a comment

Last week I took a call from a customer stating their 54” Super Air Knife was, “Barely producing any output flow or increase in velocity”, thus they wanted to adjust the gap in the air knife by adding shims to try and increase their output. I explained that by adding more shims, they were only going to increase their air demand (which was already exceeding supply) and lessen the output velocity.

I decided to take another approach, so instead of just taking the sale for more shims, we began to troubleshoot the issues they were experiencing. 

After a brief discussion with the customer, I asked if they could take a picture of the process application and send via email. Below is the image that was sent…

 Hudson Ranch SAK 54inch installation

After reviewing the image it was determined there were a few issues with the installation of the Super Air Knife, with the main concern being the in-feed pipe size and connection. The customer was using ¼” O.D. tubing and a quick disconnect which was actually “starving” the Super Air Knife and causing severe pressure drops. You can also explain in this way, it’s like feeding a fire hose with a garden hose, the smaller hose just can’t provide enough volume of water for the larger hose to spray the water out at a high volume and velocity. 

 

Super Air Knife recommended input air line size

 

EXAIR provides a chart explaining what size we recommend for compressed air supply lines into our products within our installation and maintenance guides. Per the above chart, for our 54” Super Air Knife we recommend a 3/4” in-feed pipe size for a 10’ length of run, 1” pipe size for 50’ and 1-1/4” pipe size for 100’. Also, you should not use restrictive fittings, such as quick disconnects, which will cause excessive air volume lost, resulting in pressure loss through the Knife.

If you are having a similar issue or believe you are getting sub par performance from your EXAIR product, please do not hesitate to contact an Application Engineer at 1-800-903-9247 for assistance, we are confident that we can get it up and running to solve your application. 

Justin Nicholl
Application Engineer
justinnicholl@EXAIR.com
@EXAIR_JN

 

 

 

How EXAIR is Helping Restore a Vintage Mustang

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Last year, I took on a new project – restoring a 1973 Mustang Mach 1.  Ain’t she beautiful? Well, she will be some day anyway…

My Mach 1

It’s been a busy year (arent’ they all?!?), so when I got a few free hours to work on it the other night, I jumped at the chance.  As anyone who’s ever worked on an old car knows, getting all the dirt, rust, grime, opossum residue, etc. off the car so you can see what you’re working on is one of the first things you do.  Imagine my surprise when I grabbed my trusty Model 1210 Soft Grip Super Air Gun to start blowing off some of the aforementioned debris, only to discover a paltry breeze was all it had to offer.  A quick check of my compressed air system (including making sure it was turned on – I speak from experience…) revealed I should have close to 90 PSIG at the gun. I decided to take the Model 1210 in to work the next day for evaluation (We can do this for YOU too, our Efficiency Lab service will test  your product for air consumption, noise and force to determine what engineered solution EXAIR can provide to help you save air, increase safety and lower noise levels).

Making sure I had 80 psig at the inlet, I checked the flow and force.  As I suspected, something was seriously wrong.  I was still only getting a week breeze from the gun, as bourne out by the fact the blowing force was down to 1.3 oz, or 1/10th of the 13 oz it should have had.  Flow was similarly low – 3.6 SCFM as opposed to the 14 SCFM we stand behind as the published figure.  Something was amiss in the gun itself.  Fortunately, it didn’t take long to figure out.  I took off the nozzle to discover this:

IMG_4064

On the left was the Model 1100 Super Air Nozzle that was installed in the gun.  On the right is a new Model 1100 off the shelf.  Dirty air much?

Using my favorite nozzle cleaning tool, I was able to quickly remove the dirt, rust and miscellaneous garbage that had been clogging up the nozzle.

IMG_4066

Back to the flowbench for a quick check and it was good as new!  Even the engineers here at EXAIR are not immune to the effects of dirty air.  Now, back home to check my air lines and replace the filter element on my compressed air system!

As engineers, we often find ourselves asking why something doesn’t work the way it used to.  The first question I’ve learned to ask over the years is simple – ‘What changed?’  In this case, it was a dirty compressed air supply.  If you have one of our products that doesn’t work the way you think it should, PLEASE DO NOT HESITATE to call me or any of our Application Engineers to talk about it.  We can discuss your symptoms and get them resolved so your system is operating efficiently. A good cleaning, replacing a filter element, installing properly sized air supply lines or fittings could be the key to getting top performance from your EXAIR product.

Dan Preston
Engineering Manager
EXAIR Corporation