Month: January 2016

Helping A Customer Get Their Installation Setup Just Right

Published on by Lee EvansLeave a comment
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Staggered Super Air Knife setup used to solve blow off problem

With the amount of applications capable of benefiting from a Super Air Knife we tend to field a lot of questions about the product.  How much force does the Super Air Knife produce?  (2.5 oz of force for every inch of knife length.) What is the noise level at various operating pressures?  (57-69 dBA at operating pressures from 20-80 PSIG.)  Is an Air Knife right for my application?  (Possibly!  Our Application Engineers can help answer that question definitively.)

Another common question we have from existing customers and prospective customers alike, is in regards to the proper mounting of an Air Knife solution in a conveyor blowoff application.  As a standard practice we recommend to install the air knife/knives at a 45° angle of attack, opposite the direction of material travel.  (We refer to this as counterflow.)  And, if the knives are mounted vertically for a side-based blow off, we normally recommend to install the knives directly opposed to each other.  This type of setup creates a nice chevron pattern in the blow off, removing water, dirt, or whatever other undesirables are at play.

Recently, though, I went through a troubleshooting exercise with an end user unable to achieve adequate blow off with our go-to type of setup.  No matter the pressure or angle, we just couldn’t get the setup dialed in to remove the undesirable (in this case, water) while still allowing material flow.  In this application the force from the two knives hitting simultaneously was too great to allow the lighter products through the blow off curtain.  So I requested some sample product be sent in and ran some in-house tests.

What we found was identical to the results from the field, which were a bit puzzling.  We could blow off the water from the product, but not to the degree of dryness necessary.  This was because the weight of the product was too low to keep the product in place when in contact with the high force blow off from a set of two Super Air Knives.  We could force the product through by hand, but that wasn’t a real or repeatable option.

But, after trying various configurations we found the solution!  Two Super Air Knives mounted directly parallel produced too much force.  BUT, two Super Air Knives mounted in a staggered pattern separated our blow off air flows just a bit.  This setup allowed the product to pass through one air stream, then into the combined air stream of two knives, and then again through one air stream.

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Another view of the staggered setup used in this application

This solution, show above, brought the level of dryness to the needed level and allowed our customer to get back on track.  Without a solution to this problem workflow slowed, production reduced, and defects increased.  With the combination of an EXAIR product and our product support, we were able to increase workflow and production while eliminating defects due to excess water o the product.

If you have an application with a similar need, contact an EXAIR Application Engineer.

Lee Evans
Application Engineer
LeeEvans@EXAIR.com
@EXAIR_LE

Oil And Water Don’t Mix, But Oil And Air Sure Do

Published on by Russ BowmanLeave a comment

Do you have oil in your compressed air system? It may be there on purpose…air operated tools require it, and there are a number of devices on the market that provide a precise amount of oil to keep the moving parts in these tools well lubricated and properly operating.

If it’s not there on purpose, it’s not necessarily a problem, though, and it’s hardly uncommon. Many air compressors are oil lubricated, which means there’s oil being pumped at a constant rate, directly towards the piston rings, and a little bit is always going to end up in the air. As the rings wear, even more makes it past…this is impossible to prevent, but, with proper maintenance, it’s kept to a very minimal amount. There are, of course, oil-less compressor designs, which can eliminate this entirely, but they’ve been known to carry a little heavier price tag. Some situations, though, make them worth every penny.

Trace amounts of oil like this don’t affect a lot of compressed air applications, including the performance of most of our products. There are times, however, when oil needs to be addressed…for instance:

*Blow off prior to painting or coating. Even trace amounts of oil on a surface to be painted can cause big problems.
*Electrical enclosure cooling. Oil won’t affect the heat removal performance of an EXAIR Cabinet Cooler System, but it can indeed cause serious issues with electrical/electronic components and devices if it’s present in the cold air that’s blowing on them.
*Air operated conveyors. Likewise, oil won’t hurt the performance of a Line Vac, but keep in mind that anything in the air supply will get on the material or product you’re conveying.
*Static Eliminators. Here’s a situation where oil in the air WILL have an effect on product performance…the emitter points of your EXAIR Static Eliminator need to be kept clean (including oil free) for proper operation. And, again, anything in your air is going to get onto your product.

This is where proper filtration comes in: properly installed downstream of a Filter Separator, EXAIR’s coalescing Oil Removal Filters take out even trace amounts of oil from the air flow, ensuring your process doesn’t see anything but clean, dry air.

EXAIR Model 9027 Oil Removal Filter, installed between Model 9004 Filter Separator and 9008 Pressure Regulator, using our Modular Coupling Kits
EXAIR Model 9027 Oil Removal Filter, installed between Model 9004 Automatic Drain Filter Separator and 9008 Pressure Regulator, using our Modular Coupling Kits.

Again, oil in your air isn’t always a problem. If you have questions about your application, though, give us a call…if it IS a problem, we’ve got a solution.

Russ Bowman
Application Engineer
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Super Ion Air Knife Assists Brewery with Can Filling Operation

Published on by exaircorpLeave a comment

A small brewery called looking for a static removal solution for their can filling, conveyor line. The empty cans are fed from a stacked palletizer that raises up and then an arm pushes the cans over to a large feeder tray where they are then funneled down a chute that narrows until the cans are in a single row. They run 2 separate cans on the same line at different times. The first can is painted and seems to feed fine to the conveyor. The second can is shrink wrapped with a film label. As the wrapped cans are fed down the chute, they rub against the guide rails of the conveyor and each other generating a static charge, causing them to corral at the opening to the conveyor, 2 – 3 cans wide, which restricts the flow of the cans. The customer then has to halt production and manually clear the line and feed the conveyor.

The area where they are seeing the most problem is right at the narrow opening that takes the cans down to a single row. The width of this opening is roughly 8.5″ wide, so I recommended they mount a 9″ Super Ion Air Knife about 12″ above the opening, flooding the area with ionized air. The Super Ion Air Knife is our Super Air Knife with an Ionizing Bar attached to provide a laminar sheet of ionized airflow across the entire length of the knife. The customer was concerned that their compressed air supply was close to being at max capacity so I suggested they operate the unit at a lower supply pressure. This would not only reduce the air consumption but also control the output flow and velocity so the cans are not disrupted, while still allowing for effective static dissipation.

Super Ion Air Knife
Super Ion Air Knife – delivers a sheet of ionized air to eliminate surface static up to 20′ away.

Static electricity is a common nuisance in canning and bottling applications. If you are experiencing similar problems with your process, please contact one of our application engineers for assistance.

Justin Nicholl
Application Engineer
justinnicholl@exair.com
@EXAIR_JN

Compressed Air Accessories – Filters and Regulators – The Rest of the Solution

Published on by Neal RakerLeave a comment
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EXAIR Regulator with gauge and Filter/Separator

Many times in the stories that are written in our daily blogs, we espouse the many benefits of installing and using EXAIR made products into our many customers’ compressed air-based applications. From the guy who has a small shop in his home garage using our Atto Super Air Nozzle to much larger applications where customers use our 84” Long Super Air Knives to do such things as drying cast Acrylic Sheets used in tub and shower surrounds, the message is a very consistent one. Customers benefit by saving money, increasing the safety level of an application, reducing sound levels and improving productivity.  There’s no doubt that our customers will excel in these areas.

Knowing there is much more to a compressed air system than just point of use products, lets shed a little light on the other “parts” of a typical system set-up. Those would be the compressed air filter / separators and the pressure regulators that are a highly recommended part of a good installation. But why are they so highly recommended? What exactly is their role and why would anyone want or need to install them?

First, the blunt realities of compressed air and its relative “un-clean” condition once it arrives at the point of use. Since compressed air a utility that is produced in-house, the quality and quantity available will vary widely from facility to facility. And since it is not a regulated utility such as gas or electricity are, there are no universal minimums of quality that compressed air must meet before sent out to the distribution system. Yes, of course, companies are all the time getting better at this part, but many still operate with older, iron pipe systems that produce rust and scale which wreak havoc on the components within mechanical products that use compressed air as their power source. The point is that you are never sure of the quality of the air you will get at the point of use, so install a compressed air filter near that point to keep the debris out of your Air Knife, Nozzle, Line Vac or even other components like solenoid valves, air motors and the like. Believe me when I say it is much easier to un-screw a bowl from a filter housing and change an element than it is to disassemble an air motor or an 84” long Super Air Knife because rust migrated in from the pipes. So it is quite safe to say that an ounce of prevention in this case is worth a pound of cure!

Second, the discussion turns to the Regulator part of the equation. As many know, our products and those of other pneumatic product manufacturers have a certain set of specifications regarding performance at stated input pressures. But what if your application doesn’t require that “full, rated performance”? Maybe instead of needing two pounds of force, you only need one pound? In fact, if you provided two pounds of blowing force, you would end up “over-blowing” your target. By that, I mean you cause damage to the target or other surrounding items in the application. Or, perhaps blowing to hard (or sucking too hard in the case of a Line Vac or E-vac) might cause the vessel or the material you are picking up to collapse or deform (due to too much power).  There is also the concern about using more energy than one really needs to in order to achieve the desired effect in an application. In other words, if you can achieve your goals with only 40 PSIG, then why would you ever use 80 PSIG to accomplish the goal? By reducing your compressed air from 80 down to 40 PSIG, you can easily reduce the air consumption of the “engineered” solution by another 40% + …………that’s the cherry on top of the cake when you compare the benefits of simply “bolting on” the solution of an engineered air nozzle vs. an open pipe in the first place. Then there is the issue of taking advantage of the pressure differential (from 80 down to 40 PSIG) that creates a little bit more air volume capacity. At 80 PSIG, your compressed air to free air volume ratio is 6.4:1. At 40 PSIG, it is only 3.7:1. The net effect is you effectively have an overall larger volume of air at the disposal of the application which is always a good thing.

Regulating pressure is definitely warranted given the benefits that compliment the operation of the core EXAIR products.

If you need a deeper understanding about how EXAIR’s products can help your application, feel free to contact us and we will do our best to give you a clear understanding of all the benefits that can be had by our products’ use as well as proper implementation of accessory items such as compressed air filters and regulators.

Neal Raker, International Sales Manager
nealraker@exair.com
@EXAIR_NR
www.EXAIR.com