Tag: furnace

Air Amplifiers – Vent, Exhaust, Cool, Dry, Clean – With No Moving Parts!

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As an Application Engineer, one of the interesting aspects of working with customers on applications is the varied types of solutions an EXAIR product can provide.  The Air Amplifier family – Super Air Amplifier, Adjustable Air Amplifier, and the special High Temperature Air Amplifier can be used in a wide variety of process and applications.  Below highlights several of those from past experiences.

A defense contractor was performing maintenance service on a Navy ship, and the ventilation system had to be shut down.  To keep the personnel cool and safe, an auxiliary ventilation was to be supplied.  Rather than use a cumbersome blower assembly, which has to mounted on the top deck, and ducted down to the lower decks, they chose to utilize (2) 4″ Super Air Amplifiers.  They are very portable and can be set up in minutes.  This solution provided the necessary air flow, providing a safe environment for the maintenance crew.

Super Air Amplifier
EXAIR Air Amplifiers use a small amount of compressed air to create a tremendous amount of air flow.

A light bulb manufacturer needed a better solution for a cooling operation.  During manufacturing of a mercury lamp, the bulb must be cooled from 700°C to 600°C in just 15 seconds.  The current method, an open brass pipe, was working but the noise level was too high (95 dBA.) The goal was to maintain the 15 second cooling time, but reduce sound levels to 85 dBA.  By utilizing (2) of 3/4″ Adjustable Air Amplifiers, the customer was able to maintain the cooling rate, and reduce the noise level down to 80 dBA, a 15 dBA reduction.

adjustable Air Amplifier
Adjustable Air Amplifier

A garbage collector presented a problem that needed a solution.  The garbage was incinerated and when the furnaces were first started up, there tended to be issues with getting the flue to draft properly.  Using the High Temperature Air Amplifier, the high velocity air flow and draw provided the needed draft until the stack warmed up and the natural draft would be established.  Since the unit is capable of handling temperatures up to 700°F, it was able to withstand the heat of the process after the compressed air was turned off.

These and other Applications for the Air Amplifiers and all other EXAIR products can be found on the EXAIR website on the Products page, under the Related Info section toward the bottom of each page.

If you have questions regarding Air Amplifiers or any EXAIR Intelligent Compressed Air® Product, feel free to contact EXAIR and myself or one of our Application Engineers can help you determine the best solution.

Brian Bergmann
Application Engineer

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EXAIR Manufactures Cabinet Cooler Systems to Combat Heat

Published on by Neal RakerLeave a comment

IMG_20160329_103754

The photo above depicts an autoclave with its computer control panel situated just above the opening. This particular customer uses their autoclave to process fish in a very controlled manner so they do not damage the meat while processing. The problem is that the controls for such equipment become overheated due to the simple process of the machinery to which they are attached. There are also critical times during the processing when the door is opened and heat as well as steam in this case waft out and up into the control box above, thus heating the components inside to a level that can cause intermittent or permanent failure.

Autoclaves are pressure chambers used within industrial processes needing higher temperatures and pressures than ambient air. They are only one example of machinery that associates the use of electronics on or near the heated portion of the “machine”. Other such examples are ovens, furnaces, steam turbines, metal casting machines, injection molding machines, extrusion lines and web processing lines.

Cabinet Cooler in steel mill
This Cabinet Cooler is installed above a hot steel processing line.

The thing that makes these kinds of applications sometimes difficult is the original decisions taken by the designer to locate the control panel in what they feel is the most appropriate and convenient place on the machine for the operators. However, as the photo above demonstrates, the heat generated by the process is sometimes the last consideration when trying to package everything in a nice, tidy package as well as to keep the machine foot-print of an already large item to be as small as possible. I’m working with the mindset that having a remote mounted control cabinet to keep the sensitive electronics away from the heat source would be the ideal situation. But as we all know, ideal isn’t always and most likely will not be what you are left to deal with.

So, when confronted with a similar situation, what is a controls engineer to do? That’s where EXAIR Cabinet Cooler system comes into play. EXAIR makes Cabinet Coolers to keep the temperature of those sensitive electronics down at a reasonable operating level for issues such as high process heat load as given above, or perhaps it is just a really hot summer and you are in a facility without air conditioning. We manufacture Cabinet Cooler Systems in NEMA 12, 4 and 4X configurations to cover a wide variety of application variables.

In the application above, we have recommended our Model 4825SS (NEMA 4X Cabinet Cooler System, 1700 Btu/hr., with thermostat control). The customer’s calculated heat load was approximately 600 Btu/hr. according to the data they provided. When I made the recommendation, I did take into account the periods where the heat will be billowing out of the autoclave as well, thus the reason for the recommendation of a unit one size larger than I would normally recommend. Not to worry though. The included thermostat control will maintain the cabinet temperature at 95°F (35°C) at all times without wasting precious compressed air.

If you have an application where computer controls for a hot process are overheating on you, kindly consider contacting one of our Application Engineers or check out our handy Case Studies today to have a better understanding of how an EXAIR Cabinet Cooler System can help take away the heat and keep your processes humming along nicely.

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

 

Sometimes it can be too hot for a Robot

Published on by johnball2014Leave a comment

Robots are awesome for repetitive operations in harsh environments.

In this instance, a manufacturing plant was using a robot arm to remove parts from a molding machine. They were having issues with the electronics overheating.  They decided to do a thermal imaging scan, and they found that the heat was coming from their treatment furnace.  As you can tell with the image below, the high temperature (light orange color) was radiating onto the robot enclosure.  The temperature at the cover was at 60.6 deg. C (141 deg. F).  This was too hot for proper operations.  So, they contacted us to see if we could suggest a product to help keep their robot cool.

Thermal Image Temp = 60.6 deg C (141 deg. F)
Thermal Image
Temp = 60.6 deg C (141 deg. F)

In reviewing the elevated ambient temperature and the dimensions of the enclosure, I determined that our HT4215 High Temperature Cabinet Cooler would work great in this application. Our HT Cabinet Coolers are designed to handle ambient temperatures from 52 to 93 deg. C (125 – 200 deg. F).  They can be mounted easily onto the enclosure, and the internal profile is small as not to contact any of the components inside.  The Cold Air Distribution Kit (included with this model) can maneuver the cool air to the hotter areas and to the more sensitive electronics.

High Temperature Cabinet Cooler
High Temperature  Cabinet Cooler

Once it was installed, the robot was functioning without issues or shut downs. If you have issues in a harsh environments, please do not hesitate to contact one of our Application Engineers at 800-903-9247.  We may have something that can keep your operation running smoothly.

 

John Ball

Application Engineer

Email: johnball@exair.com

Twitter: @EXAIR_jb

Super Air Knives Used To Deflect Fumes and Smoke from Furnace

Published on by Neal Raker1 Comment

One of our overseas distributors had an interesting application in a foundry. Their customer has a large furnace that opens at various times for a variety of reasons. When the furnace doors open, smoke and fumes come rolling out of the furnace. The customer has a large vent hood type system to aid in removal of these fumes and smoke. Unfortunately the vent does not capture all the smoke when released. So, the customer devised a plan to mount (4) model 110042SS 42” Stainless Steel Super Air knives onto large masts to get them up high enough to create a “ceiling” of air that would deflect the smoke into the vent hood for removal. Following are a couple of photos of the set up.

SAK2 sak1

Below is a photo of the control cabinet housing the filter and regulator equipment.

SAK3

Previously, the customer had nothing in place to assist the vent hood. Now they do and are quite happy with the result.  There were some small system adjustments that needed to be made, but once fully operational, the Super Air Knifes performed well to help reduce the overall pollution seen within the area.

Neal Raker, Application Engineer
nealraker@exair.com