Air Wipes, which provide 360 degree blowoff, are typically used to remove heat, liquid, debris or static from wire, cable, pipe, tube, or extrusions.

We had a customer that was using a block type Air Wipe from a competitor to remove water from an extrusion.  These air wipes are built using a plastic material, typically with some additional ceramic insert to resist abrasion of the wire, the halves are hinged with air holes drilled into each half which carries air through the block and on to the wire. They were using these block air wipes on several lines. The interesting point of this blog is that it required 5 block type air wipes to equal the results of 1 EXAIR Super Air Wipe.

Since EXAIR’s Super Air Wipe equaled the performance of 5 of the competitors it consumed less air was less expensive and produced less noise.  Also in space sensitive applications the EXAIR Super Air Wipe is much thinner than the block type.  To highlight this the Super Air Wipe is 1.13″ thick on all 11 models that range from 3/8″ to 11″ throat diameter.   The performance of the block air wipe can only be changed by altering the inlet air pressure while the EXAIR Super Air Wipe can also be changed by adusting the inlet air pressure OR by adding an additional shim the force can be nearly doubled!

Many of these block type air wipes use a series of holes to direct the compressed air supply at an angle over the material that needs to be cleaned off.  EXAIR’s Super Air Wipe being an engineered compressed air product use’s fluid dynamic’s to create more force as demonstrated below. The air from EXAIR’s Super Air Wipes is a continuous 360 degrees, without the gaps a series of holes creates.

Compressed air flows through the inlet (1) of the Air Wipe into the annular chamber (2).  It is then throttled through a small ring nozzle (3) at high velocity.  This primary airstream adheres to the Coanda profile (4), which directs down the angled surface of the Air Wipe.  A low pressure is created at the center (5) inducing a high volume flow of surrounding air into the primary airstream.  As the airflow leaves the wipe, it creates a conical 360° ring of air that attaches itself to the surface of the material running through it (6) uniformly wiping the entire surface with the high velocity airflow.

Block type air wipes are generally available in standard sizes up to 7″ in diameter while EXAIR’s Super Air Wipes are available in stock diameters up to 11″ and we also offer custom sizes to suit many other applications.

If you have any items that need to have a 360 degree blowing pattern, I would enjoy hearing from you…give me a call.

Steve Harrison
Application Engineer
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