Tag: Air Knives

Super Air Knife in the Food Industry: Cheese Blowoff

Published on by Tyler DanielLeave a comment

I was recently contacted by a manufacturer of specialty food products that was looking to increase productivity on one of their packaging lines. In order to do so, they needed a longer Super Air Knife.

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Model 110012SS-316 Super Air Knife

They manufacture a variety of different products, but this application involved small snack-sized blocks of cheese. They’re placed into individual plastic containers, and before they seal the packaging any residual particles must be blown off, or affect the seal. Any residual particles of cheese around the container would allow air to come into contact with the product and affect shelf-life.

In the current setup, the customer is using EXAIR’s Model 110012SS-316 a 12” 316 grade Stainless Steel Super Air Knife, and the Model 9060 Universal Mounting System. They wanted to add in an additional two rows of cheese to help increase throughput. To do so, he needed an overall width of 18”. We do have an 18” available from stock, but rather than having a spare 12” model lying around, he wanted to try and utilize what he had without having to purchase an entirely new knife.

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Model 9060 Universal Mounting System

Fortunately, EXAIR’s Super Air Knives can be coupled together to create a wide variety of different lengths. From stock, the Super Air Knife is available from 3”-108”. With the help of a Super Air Knife Coupling kit, we can achieve much longer lengths. In this case, although we did have an 18” knife available, we could also couple the existing 110012SS-316 (12”) with our Model 110006SS-316 (6”). This option was a bit cheaper than going with a new knife, and still allowed them to utilize the 12” that they already had.

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Coupling Kit for Aluminum Super Air Knives

While this isn’t the typical application we’d recommend a coupling kit, it was an option that allowed the customer to save a bit of money but still get the same effect that they’d achieve with the 18”, single piece Air Knife. We also manufacture a wide variety of custom knives per customer specifications. If you’ve got an odd application that you don’t think is best served by a stock offering, give us a call. An Application Engineer will be happy to take a look at your application and help recommend the most suitable product.

Tyler Daniel, CCASS

Application Engineer
E-mail: TylerDaniel@exair.com
Twitter: @EXAIR_TD

EXAIR Case Study: Chicken Wings, Super Air Knives, and Saving Money

Published on by Jordan T ShouseLeave a comment

EXAIR keeps a library of Case Studies for your reference. The library is also organized by product, so you can easily find the information and product you are interested in. These case studies summarize how our customers have purchased, used, and benefited from our products and their implementation. These studies focus on our products and our customers’ projects. We keep our customers anonymous and only use photos, details and data that are approved to be shared.

Here is an example of my latest case study!

APPLICATION GOAL:  A frozen chicken wing manufacturer was having issues with a drilled and slotted tube blowoff not evenly removing excess sauce from the wings and belt prior to it going into a spiral freezer.  They also had concerns about the volume of air the pipe was consuming and how loud it was, so they wanted to reduce both of these features.

Drilled and Slotted tube in location
Drilled and slotted tube

BEFORE EXAIR:  A new sauce applicator had been installed at the customer’s plant. A drilled and slotted tube was provided with the equipment. This tube ran approximately 14 hours per day at a pressure of 16 PSIG to remove excess sauce on chicken wings. Due to the lack of performance, they temporally installed another drilled and slotted tube to remove excess sauce. The header pressure on these knives was 60 PSIG, but due to the large volume of air they were consuming, they were only able to run them at 16 PSIG. And at 16 PSIG they produced a sound level well over 90 dBA.

AFTER EXAIR:  The customer installed a 110030SS-316PKI 30’’ 316 Stainless Steel Super Air Knife on the sauce applicator and a 110024SS-316PKI 24’’ 316 Stainless Steel Super Air Knife on the Spiral Freezer. (Both with plumbing kits installed) They reduced the noise to 65 dBA. The old drilled and slotted tubes consumed 484.2 SCFM each at the 16 PSIG. For a total consumption of 968.4 SCFM with both tubes. The Super air knives combined consume 124.2 SCFM at 60 PSIG. And the Super Air Knives laminar flow provided better sauce removal, over the turbulent nature of the drilled and slotted tube.

30″ 316 Super Air Knife with plumbing kit installed

SUMMARY:  The sauce removal process performance increased dramatically, reducing the rejected product. Sound levels dropped from over 90 dBA to 65 dBA, a reduction of 25 dBA. Air consumption went from 968.4 SCFM to 124.2 SCFM. When you factor in the 14 hours these knives are running, that is 709,128 SCF of air per day saved. Based on a compressed air cost of $0.25 per 1000 SCF of air, that calculates out to over $177.28 in compressed air cost saved every day. ($46,092.80 saved per year, 260 working days) The ROI on these two knives is just under 30 days.

EXAIR appreciates a good success story. We encourage you to share your successes in using one or more of our products in your application. EXAIR believes in case studies so much, we incentivize our customers’ participation. We will offer a discount to any company who will provide enough information to produce a case study. If you are interested in creating a case study (and saving money) on your next project, please contact one of our Application Engineers. We would be happy to explain the details of working through this process with you.

Jordan Shouse, Application Engineer

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Why Do We Guarantee?

Published on by Al WooffittLeave a comment

We hear about all kinds of applications when working with customers. For many of them, there is an obvious solution. Your electrical panel is overheating – an EXAIR Cabinet Cooler is what you are looking for. If you’re experiencing static on an assembly line – a Gen4 static elimination product is what you need. If you’re trying to blowoff excess water from an extruded pipe, then a Super Air Wipe is the right solution.

There are many applications however, where the solution isn’t as obvious. We know that our products can help, but with the sheer number of variables there isn’t a way to plug everything into a formula and say that this will be the outcome. The end result needs to be found through testing. This is where EXAIR’s 30-day unconditional guarantee comes in. All of our stock, catalog products come with this guarantee. After purchasing one of these products, you have a month to put it through its paces; adjust the angle, adjust the operating pressure, swap out shims. If you are able to find the right conditions to solve your problem, then great! If not, we’ll take it back and issue full credit! You’re only responsible for the shipping to get it back to us.

Line Vac test

A popular application where testing is essential is with our Line Vacs. There are multiple variables at play: the bulk density of the material, the size of the material, is it abrasive?, the rate of conveyance desired, the distance needed to convey – both vertical and horizontal. We’re pretty good at getting you in the ballpark of which model will work best using the data we’ve found from our controlled in-house testing. But ultimately, to know exactly how our Line Vac will perform with your material, it needs to be hooked up. When you purchase from us, you have 30 days to do that risk-free.

At EXAIR, we want to ensure you are getting the best possible solution. Our 30-day unconditional guarantee is one way that we make that a reality. If you would like to discuss how our products can help with your application, give us a call!

Al Wooffitt
Application Engineer

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Daniel Bernoulli and His Effect on EXAIR Products

Published on by Al WooffittLeave a comment

Daniel Bernoulli was born on February 8, 1700, in Groningen in the Netherlands. He is the son of Mathematician Johann Bernoulli, who was an early developer of Calculus. Daniel took an interest in mathematics when he was just 7 years old. Although his father tried to dissuade him from focusing on mathematics due to the limited financial gain, Johann did tutor his son in calculus and theories of kinetic energy.

Daniel continued to show promise, attending Basel University at the age of 13, where he studied logic and philosophy. By the time he was 15 years old, he had completed his bachelor’s degree, and earned his master’s degree a year later. At the age of 23, he moved to Venice, Italy to learn medicine, but he couldn’t get away from mathematics, becoming a professor of a university in Venice a year later.

In 1738, Bernoulli published the book Hydrodynamica, where he first explained what we know as Bernoulli’s Principle. This is of particular interest to us at EXAIR, as many of our products operate off of this principle. It states that an increase in the speed of a fluid occurs simultaneously with a decrease in pressure. This is derived from the conservation of energy, where an increase in kinetic energy (speed) requires a corresponding reduction in potential energy (pressure).

When compressed air exits the precise slotted nozzle of our Super Air Knife, this induces a low pressure area, which speeds up and draws in ambient air. This air entrainment (at a ratio of 40:1) is what makes our Super Air Knives so efficient. This same effect can be witnessed with our Super Air Amplifiers, Super Air Nozzles, Super Air Wipes, as well as many other products.

The high speed of the air exiting the (left to right) the Air Wipe, Super Air Knife, Super Air Nozzle, and Air Amplifier creates a low pressure (just like Daniel Bernoulli said) that causes entrainment of an enormous amount of air from the surrounding environment.  This maximizes flow while minimizing consumption of your compressed air.

If you would like to discuss your application, and how the Bernoulli Principle may be beneficial, feel free to give us a call!

Al Wooffitt
Application Engineer

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