Tag: intermediate storage

Air compressors depend on electricity to generate compressed air, making it essential to enhance the efficiency of your compressed air system. EXAIR offers six straightforward steps that can assist in lowering electrical expenses, minimizing overhead, and boosting profitability. This blog will focus on the fifth step, which involves the intermediate storage of compressed air close to the point of use.

Intermediate storage plays a vital role in managing pressure variations that can arise during production processes. When materials are transferred from one stage to another, sudden changes in pressure can negatively affect the quality of the product. By incorporating intermediate storage, manufacturers can create a buffer that helps stabilize pressure fluctuations. This stabilization ensures that the materials remain consistent before they move on to the next stage, thereby preserving their quality and integrity. Ultimately, this careful handling supports better overall outcomes in the final product, leading to higher customer satisfaction.

In some cases when only one or a few applications need air sporadically, using a properly sized storage receiver can be very helpful. Placing this storage receiver near the point where air is needed most can improve efficiency. It is essential to include a check valve and metering valve with the storage receiver. The check valve ensures that air does not flow back, while the metering valve controls the rate of refilling which is another strategy for reducing overall load on a compressor.

Receiver tanks play an important role in providing compressed air for tasks that require a lot of air for a short time. By placing these tanks in the right locations, users can ensure a steady supply of air without always depending on the compressor. This setup allows for more efficient operations during peak demand periods. Properly sizing the tanks is crucial, as it ensures they can deliver the right amount of air when needed. Overall, receiver tanks enhance the performance of compressed air systems and help meet varying demands effectively, and with a more consistent result.

EXAIR provides a 60-gallon receiver tank that is ready for immediate use. This tank is designed for applications that require a lot of air for short periods. The model 9500-60 can be placed close to where you need extra compressed air. By having this tank nearby, you can ensure that there is enough air supply when demand increases. This setup helps maintain efficiency and performance in your operations.

If you have any questions about intermediate storage, or you need assistance with any of EXAIR‘s products, please do not hesitate to reach out.

Jason Kirby
Application Engineer
Email: jasonkirby@exair.com
Twitter: @EXAIR_jk

If you use compressed air, you may have encountered this issue:

• An operator hooks up a new compressed air operated device.
• When they start using it, your compressed air header pressure drops.
• This affects the operation of one, several, or ALL air-operated devices in the facility.
• You might have gotten lucky, and it ONLY affected the operation of only one device in that particular area.

The simple solution – and one adopted by many users – is to increase header pressure. Let’s say the header pressure was 100psig, and the sudden startup of the new device caused it to drop to 85psig, when one (or several, or ALL) of the other loads needed at least 90psig. Sometimes algebra is required for calculations involving compressed air operations, but this isn’t one of them. If a 15psi drop caused the problem, adding 15psi to your header pressure will solve it. That’s just basic arithmetic.

Since most industrial air compressors are capable of generating pressures well above the 100psig you’re currently running at, all you need to do is turn up the pressure, right? Depending on the control scheme of your compressed air system, there are a number of ways to do that. So that solves your problem, and everything will be just fine…until someone checks the electricity bill. Thing is, increasing the discharge pressure makes the compressor work harder, meaning it’ll cost more to operate. There are formulas for that – all you need is your electricity bill and some compressor performance data – but there’s a fairly accurate thumb-rule which states that, for every 2psi change in compressor discharge pressure, there’s a change in power consumption of approximately 1%. Let’s say you increased discharge pressure to 120psig, just to be safe. That’s a 20psi increase, so you just increased the power consumption (and hence the operating cost) of your compressor by about 10%. To add insult to injury, you also just increased the flow out of those leaks in your system…you may have even started some new ones…and THAT’S costly as well.

Another solution is intermediate storage. Placing a properly sized Receiver Tank in the vicinity of critical loads on your compressed air system will prevent the adverse effects of those pressure drops upon energizing, by making sure they don’t happen in that particular part of the compressed air system. And, you don’t have to raise your header pressure (and compressed air costs) to do it. So, there’s the case for intermediate storage – now let’s do the math, and figure out how much we need, using this equation:

Let’s calculate the receiver size needed to protect a critical load that uses 5 SCFM @90psig, minimum. Because it’s critical, we want to ensure the Receiver Tank alone can keep system pressure above 90psig for at least one minute:

An EXAIR 60 Gallon Receiver Tank (Model 9500-60) would provide this level of protection. It’s 20″ in diameter and just over 50″ tall, so it doesn’t take up a lot of floor space. It comes with a drain valve and connections for compressed air flow in & out, a pressure gauge, a relief valve, etc.

Compressed air isn’t free. It isn’t even cheap. There are some very interesting methods for improving performance without adding cost to produce compressed air as described above. If you’d like to find out how EXAIR can help you get the most out of your compressed air system, give me a call.

Russ Bowman, CCASS

Application Engineer
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