Category: Vortex Tubes

One Assembly Line, Two Problems, Two Solutions

Published on by Lee EvansLeave a comment

One of the great benefits of technology is the ease with which we can take and share photos or videos.  A domestic engineering firm contacted me earlier this month in search of a suitable cooling method with their application.  They provided excellent details about the application, but there were still a few discrepancies between what was described, and what I thought was being described.

So, I asked for a photo, and thanks to the ubiquity of camera phones, I received the image below.

CAM00272
Soldered connection of harness which needed to be cooled

In this application a soldering process is performed at pin connections of an electrical harness.  The harness is then inserted into a plastic housing, and the heat remaining within the soldered joint was posing problems for the next step in production of an electronic module.  So, the end user, and the engineering firm, ultimately needed a suitable way to remove the heat from the soldering process.

And, in addition to this problem, the soldered assemblies were experiencing defects due to static as they were fed down the conveyor line shown below.

CAM00268
Module exit point onto conveyor
CAM00270
End of the conveyor. When the modules would reach the end of the conveyor, they would be statically charged.

While we knew the heat from the soldering process needed to be removed, we were not 100% certain as to how much cooling (exactly) was needed.  So, we opted to use the model 3930 EXAIR Cooling Kit which includes a medium sized Vortex Tube and all related generators to configure up to 10 different Vortex Tube models.  With this kit we were certain that a suitable cooling capacity could be reached with the minimum amount of compressed air.

To remedy the static problem, an 18” Super Ion Air Knife was installed over the width of the conveyor.  The Super Ion Air Knife was mounted with the exhausting airflow at a low, 30° angle of attack, opposite the direction of module travel.  By blowing ionized air over the full width of the conveyor, the static was removed, thereby removing the process disturbance and solving the static problem.

What started as a simple email compounded into multiple applications with problems that were all solved using EXAIR products.  If you have a similar application, whether for cooling, cleaning, static removal, conveying, or material coating, contact an EXAIR Application Engineer.

Lee Evans
Application Engineer
LeeEvans@EXAIR.com
@EXAIR_LE

Consider Longevity of Product Life When Making a Purchase

Published on by John BallLeave a comment

In some instances, we have customers that will call and tell us about their EXAIR products. They tell us about how well they work and how long they have been in service. As a manufacture, this is great to hear. In this instance, the customer had 14 EXAIR Vortex Tubes in his laser inspection system. He uses them to keep the lens cool during operation. He was extremely happy with the longevity designed into the EXAIR product, and he wanted to contact us to let us know.

He stated that the Vortex Tubes have been in service for over 10 years without any problems, and they still are going strong.  EXAIR manufactures their Vortex Tubes out of stainless steel.  They can have a cooling capacity that ranges from 135 BTU/hr to 10,200 BTU/hr.  We also can produce a high temperature (HT) version for applications within elevated ambient temperatures.    What is unique with this product is that there is no moving parts – there are no bearings or slides to wear out, no coolant to refill or no compressor to fail.  We incorporate this same principle with our Cabinet Coolers, Air Amplifiers, Industrial Housekeeping Products, Air Nozzles and Air Knives.  With the quality engineering and design of our products, longevity is a norm, not an exception.

Vortex Tube
Vortex Tube

The reason for this blog is to explain longevity, and longevity can be a factor in ownership. When you look at items like refrigeration systems, the compressor will wear out, the system can leak Freon, the continuous PM to keep the condenser clean and filters changed requires close attention. When replacing or fixing the product regularly, you can see how this will add up in costs for repairs and costs due to downtime. Finding a solution for your production or application problem is easy with EXAIR’s huge variety of products, sizes and materials. With the exceptional design and engineering behind EXAIR products, you can rely on the product for years to come, with little to no maintenance. That is the longevity EXAIR products possess, with longevity comes dollar and air savings, and best of all it comes with peace of mind.

John Ball
Application Engineer
Email: johnball@exair.com
Twitter: @EXAIR_jb

A Picture Is Worth A Thousand Words

Published on by Russ BowmanLeave a comment

I’m old enough to remember doing business before we had the internet, but I swear I don’t remember how I (or anyone else) ever got anything done. The ability to share details and information, in real time, is a hallmark of the way business is conducted in the 21st Century.

Now, to be fair, we’ve been able to immediately send written data (spec sheets, operation instructions, etc.) for a long time, via fax machines. Curiously, this technology predates the invention of the telephone, believe it or not. It just didn’t work well at all with photographs, though…I recall trying it several times, and actually having it work once: someone put a small part directly on the glass of the copier (much to the chagrin of the office manager) and faxed the resultant image to me.

Nowadays, we just snap a picture with a smart phone camera and email it. In fact, EXAIR Application Engineers do this at least a couple of times a day. In fact, just this morning, I had the pleasure of helping a customer get a replacement muffler for one of our Vortex Tube Spot Cooling Products…one that they purchased about 25 years ago. I was a little curious to know, however, what condition of the rest of the device was in. The customer sent me an email with photos, which showed a 25 year old EXAIR Component Cooler in REMARKABLE condition…except for the muffler, which was showing some corrosion due to recent operation with some moisture in the air supply (due to the undetected failure of an upstream dryer.) The nice thing about digital photos is, I could also tell that the o-ring used to install the muffler was also in need of replacement…something we’d have never been able to tell from a fax of an image, taken from a copier.

As you can see, the o-ring had seen better days too...back in the 1990's!
As you can see, the o-ring had seen better days too…back in the 1990’s!

Within about a half an hour, we were processing an order for a muffler and o-ring that they’ll have tomorrow, and their 25 year old Vortex Tube product will be running like new. Just like the ones shown near the end of this video (you will see that back in the day, we used two x’s in our name):

Every day, EXAIR Application Engineers prove that a picture is, indeed, worth a thousand words…and videos might just be worth a thousand pictures.  If you’d like help with a compressed air product application, or an existing compressed air product, let us know.

Russ Bowman
Application Engineer
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Adjustable Spot Cooler Increases Production Output in a Medical Application

Published on by exaircorpLeave a comment

I was recently contacted by a plastics manufacturer who specializes in producing precision medical components. In this particular application they were pushing an ETFE tube onto a heated, flared forming pin. Once the tube is set onto the pin, they placed the assembly into a shroud where they used their shop compressed air running through a manifold split into separate lines to cool the part. This process was working but it takes approximately 1 minute so they called EXAIR looking for a way to reduce their cooling cycle time and increase their daily production.

I recommend they use our Adjustable Spot Cooler and plumb the cold air exhaust to their existing manifold. The Adjustable Spot Cooler incorporates a Vortex Tube to provide a specific temperature drop from the compressed air supply temperature. The output temperature and cold airflow can be easily adjusted using the control valve on the unit. Ducting the output flow would allow the cold air to distribute evenly, not only reducing the cooling cycle but also providing more dimensional stability to the finished product.

Please note, that we do not always recommend running cold air through a manifold because many times these manifolds are metal and simply act as a heat sink, which removes the cold temperature from the air stream. In this case, however, the manifold was made of plastic and the air lines to the formed tube assembly were short. The plastic material insulated the cold air and the short air lines running to the tube assembly also decrease the time the cold air has to lose heat. Applications with typical metal manifolds and longer air distribution lines are best served by using the Adjustable Spot Cooler directly on to the application and eliminating the manifold.

Adjustable Spot Cooler
Maintenance free, spot cooling device providing up to 2,000 Btu/hr. of cooling capacity.

This is just one example of how incorporating a Spot Cooling device into an existing application provided a more favorable end result. Don’t hesitate to give us a call and see how we can help improve your process too.

Justin Nicholl
Application Engineer
justinnicholl@exair.com
@EXAIR_JN