Tag: chain conveyor

Let’s Keep Things Clean: Advantages of the Flat Super Air Nozzle

Published on by John BallLeave a comment
Flat Super Air Nozzles have replaceable shims to vary performance.

A panel manufacturer was having some issues with black contamination affecting the powder coat paint.  They were using an overhead chain conveyor that would move the panels from the paint booth to the oven for curing.  At the end, the panel would be offloaded to a conveyor belt to move into storage for later assembly.  They were having quality issues with black specs that showed up on the gray paint.  They found out it was coming from the links from the overhead chain conveyor.  They contacted EXAIR to see if we had a solution for them. 

We reviewed the specifics of what was occurring in their application so I could understand better the nature of the problem. After evaluating a couple of options, I recommended two pieces of our model 1122, 2” Flat Super Air Nozzles.  This nozzle blows a 2” wide airstream with a powerful force to cover the width and depth of the chain links.  They were able to cut the flashing for the guard around the chain conveyor to blow the air.  One was located on the side of the conveyor, and the other was placed at the top of the conveyor.  The 2” Flat Super Air Nozzles were installed and oriented at a point along the travel, where there weren’t any panels on the hook supports.  This ensured that the debris was removed before the painting process began.  The issue was that debris mixed with the powder paint during application and then baked into the finish. The panels then had to be reworked or scrapped.  Once they installed the EXAIR Flat Nozzles, the quality improved immensely as they were able to remove the loose debris before raw panels were added to the conveyor.

To expand more on the EXAIR Flat Super Air Nozzles, they have a wide range of uses.  Their unique design utilizes a patented shim for improved efficiency, safety, and force range.   EXAIR has an easy way to change the shim to better suit different applications.  You can increase or decrease the force of the nozzle by just removing two screws and changing the thickness of the shim inside.  EXAIR offers a Shim Set to allow for adjustment to a range of forces to meet your needs and without overusing the compressed air.  Many times our Flat Nozzles are compared to plastic flat nozzles. Those nozzles do not have this capacity. They also tend to break when installed within harsh, abrasive or otherwise rough, industrial processes. 

If you have a “dirty” process, and you wish to blow it away in a safe and effective manner, EXAIR will have a nozzle for you.  We offer a variety of sizes, materials, and designs to best fit your application.  You can speak with an Application Engineer if you need more details.  The company above was glad that they did. 

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

Replacing Blowers with Super Air Knives

Published on by Lee EvansLeave a comment

Chain conveyor application in need of a blow off solution

The image above shows a chain conveyor with coated handles travelling along a production line. At this stage in their production, these handles have just left a washing station and need to be dried.  In order to finalize the drying process, some form of blow off is needed.

The existing blow off solution which could not effectively remove the water.

The existing blow off setup is shown above. This system utilizes two blower driven air knives to remove any excess water from the handles, but it is proving to be ineffective due to the turbulent nature of the airstream from a blower.  To combat this ineffectiveness, this production facility has placed an employee in front of the existing setup, using a compressed air blow off as a pretreatment procedure.

Personnel were added to this stage of production to provide a pre-blow off treatment.

Having a line operator stationed at this point was undesirable for this customer.  What this application needed was an efficient, productive, and repeatable blow off solution that would eliminate the need for redundant personnel at this stage of production and make the process fully automated. That solution was the EXAIR Super Air Knife.

By utilizing Super Air Knives, this customer was able to create an even and laminar sheet of air to dry these handles. The smooth profile of the airflow allows maximum velocity to be maintained at a further distance from the knife than the existing setup.  This translates to higher force at further distances, which in turn translates to proper part blow off and full automation of the process (the line worker was removed from the application), thus saving cost and eliminating an unnecessary safety risk.

With a required blow off width of ~40” in this application, using (2) model 110042 42” Aluminum Super Air Knives was a perfect fit. If you have a similar, redundant blow off operation in place and would like to make it more effective in terms of results and costs, contact an EXAIR Application Engineer.

Lee Evans
Application Engineer
LeeEvans@EXAIR.com
@EXAIR_LE

Using Air Amplifiers to Clean a Conveyor Rail

Published on by Lee EvansLeave a comment

 

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EXAIR Adjustable Air Amplifiers used to clean a conveyor rail

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As the rig moves along the rail the Air Amplifiers move too

The phone rang in the Application Engineering department earlier this week and on the other end of the phone was a user of EXAIR products.  They were searching for a way to move a bulk quantity of sand from one location to another, and they recognized our Line Vacs.

After discussing the specifics of the application (the material to be conveyed, material size, bulk density, conveying distance and height, required conveyance rate, and available compressed air supply), we settled on a 3” Stainless Steel Line Vac, model 6066.

However, that wasn’t the intriguing part of the call.  What was more interesting is that this particular end user had an installation of EXAIR Adjustable Air Amplifiers keeping a conveyor rail dry and clear of water.  An Air Amplifier is an effective means of moving large volumes of air to dry, clean, or cool.  However, normally when such a blow off need is required, a Super Air Nozzle will be utilized.

I came to understand that the Air Amplifiers were working wonderfully in keeping the conveyor rain clean and dry, but the water contaminants were spilling off into other processes.  The end user was curious if EXAIR made any vacuum systems for industrial clean up, preferably with accessories to possibly use in this application.  We discussed the merits of a Reversible Drum Vac, the available accessories, performance specifications, availability from stock, and the cost.

Today we received an order for two Reversible Drum Vac systems and a 6066 Line Vac.  It was great to help a repeat user of EXAIR products, but would’ve been just as rewarding for a new customer.

If you have an application with a process disturbance and think an EXAIR solution may help, contact an EXAIR Application Engineer.

Lee Evans
Application Engineer
LeeEvans@EXAIR.com
EXAIR_LE