Tag: pipe

The Versatile Line Vac

Published on by Russ BowmanLeave a comment

Of all the tools that I own, my cordless drill has to be just about my favorite. I’m remodeling a bathroom in my house right now, and last night I was setting the new toilet flange onto the new tile floor. I had to drill some holes for this through the new tile. I’d never done this before, and was definitely feeling some heartburn about it. Especially after finding out just how fragile and brittle ceramic tile is…I cracked two pieces, just trying to cut a hole for the heat & AC vent register. Luckily, that was BEFORE I mortared & grouted it in, so it wasn’t a big deal…they’re about a buck a piece, and I got five extra anyway.

I know how to do this...but I have no idea how to fix this.
I know how to do this                                                 but I have no idea how to fix this.

THIS one, though, was fully installed, and, despite all the internet videos I found & watched on how to install a tile floor, I haven’t yet had the need to find one that shows me how to replace a broken tile. And I don’t really want to, so I went slowly and carefully with the drill, using the special glass & tile bit that I bought. On my first hole, when I got the bit through the tile itself, I changed to a different (smaller) bit to pilot the screw hole through the subfloor. Then, I put a Phillip’s head bit in to drive the screw. It occurred to me that I was performing these three related but separate tasks, with the same tool…I just thought that was very cool.

Over the course of the last couple of days, I’ve talked to three different callers, with three different Line Vac applications:

HDLV

 

*One wants to use a Model 150200 2” Heavy Duty Line Vac to convey cement. They’re currently hauling the bags, by hand, up to a hopper, where they cut them open and dump them in.

 

Heavy Duty Threaded Line Vac

*One needs to move small springs, one at a time, from a hopper to an automated assembly turret machine.  The springs are 5/8″ in diameter, and they’ll be fed through a length of PVC pipe.  Our Model 151100 1″ NPT Heavy Duty Threaded Line Vac will be easily installed in the pipe line using standard threaded fittings, and the springs will pass through the 0.75″ throat nicely.

 

sslv

 

*One has a auger-type chip conveyor that removes machining debris from a lathe, and it’s broken…again. They needed a Model 6066 3” Stainless Steel Line Vac, in a hurry, to use until they get their chip conveyor fixed. In fact, if it works, they may not fix the chip conveyor.

 

With a wide range of sizes and materials of construction, we've got your solution. Call us.
With a wide range of sizes and materials of construction, we’ve got your solution. Call us.

So, kind of like my cordless drill, our Line Vac Air Operated Conveyors have a variety of uses, right out of the box. If you have an application that you think a Line Vac may be able to solve, give me a call.  By the way, if you order one before the end of October, 2014we’ll give you a FREE 2″ Flat Super Air Nozzle.  Really.

Russ Bowman
Application Engineer
EXAIR Corporation
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Compressed Air Calculations, Optimization, and Tips

Published on by Kirk EdwardsLeave a comment

EXAIR uses our blog platform to communicate everything from new product announcements to personal interests to safe and efficient use of compressed air. We have recently passed our 5 year anniversary of posting blogs (hard for us to believe) and I thought it appropriate to share a few of the entries which explain some more of the technical aspects of compressed air.

Here is a good blog explaining EXAIR’s 6 steps to optimization, a useful process for improving your compressed air efficiency:


One of the Above 6 steps is to provide secondary storage, a receiver tank, to eliminate pressure drops from high use intermittent applications. This blog entry addresses how to size a receiver tank properly:

Here are 5 things everyone should know about compressed air, including how to calculate the cost of compressed air:

These next few entries address a common issue we regularly assist customers with, compressed air plumbing:

In a recent blog post we discuss how to improve the efficiency of your point of use applications:

Thanks for supporting our blog over the past 5 years, we appreciate it. If you need any support with your sustainability or safety initiatives, or with your compressed air applications please contact us.  

Have a great day,
Kirk Edwards
@EXAIR_KE

Super Blast Safety Air Gun Blasts Chips Out of Bundles of Pipe

Published on by Neal RakerLeave a comment

This application was a nice and easy one that came in from our Greek Distributor (Technissis Ltd) in Athens.

The end customer produces a variety of copper pipes mainly for export. The diameters range from 6 mm to 105 mm and can be up to 6 meters in length. When cut, chips from the cutting process end up inside the pipes as they are processed into bundles.

Currently, the end customer is using a 2 ft. long piece of ¾” pipe with a valve to blow the chips out from one end to the other. This method proves to be dangerous from health and safety point. The noise produced is quite obnoxious and when in use, the compressed air used is obviously excessive. The pipe is connected to a 25 mm diameter hose. There was no method available to determine how much compressed air was used each time, but the estimate was a rate of about 100 SCFM.

copper pipe blow off

After our distributor made their visit to see the application, they noted that significant improvement in safety, force, flow and noise could be achieved by simply changing out the ¾” pipe with EXAIR model 1213-4 Super Blast Safety Air Gun. The noise dropped to 82 dBA from a previous measurement of 100+ dBA.  The flow required dropped from the estimated 100 SCFM to a known 56 SCFM and the force was regulated to a reasonable 3.2 lbs. of force generated at the target.

1213-4

Part of what the end customer was fighting was an extreme pressure drop over their existing hose. The Super Blast Safety Air Gun was able to resolve this issue to allow for more consistency in the blow off operation.

One last interesting aside was that the 4 individual nozzles of the Super Blast Safety Air Gun would line up nicely with the pipes so 4 pipes at a time could be blown out.

Neal Raker, Application Engineer
nealraker@exair.com

How to Size Pipes for Your Compressed Air System

Published on by 11 Comments

Most facility’s compressed air systems have evolved over time. A spur added here a spur added there. Eventually pressure drop issues develop. Common practice is to increase the air pressure at the compressor. While it may address the symptom it does not address the problem and is very costly. For every 2 PSI increase in pressure requires 1% more energy.

A properly designed system will be a loop with spurs. This will ensure all airsystem

drops will share the air equally. The header loop should be able to carry all the air the compressor is capable of producing.  Best practices suggest the distribution header should be sized to allow an air velocity not to exceed 30 ft/second. The formula to calculate this is:

A =    144 * Q * Pa
       V *60 x (Pd +Pa)

Pipe Diameter = √ (A*4/3.14)

Where:

A = cross sectional area if the pipe bore in square inches or ∏ x diameter squared / 4
Q = Flow rate SCFM
Pa = Prevailing absolute pressure. Sea level is 14.7
Pd = compressor gauge pressure or psig.
V = Design pipe velocity ft/sec

Example: Size a header for 500 SCFM at 100 PSI at an elevation at sea level

A = 144 x 500 x 14.7 / 30 x 60 (100 + 14.7) = 5.13  square inches

Pipe diameter then is square root of  (5.13 * 4) / 3.14 = 2.56″

So an 2.56″  internal diameter pipe would be the proper size header.

The same formula can be used to calculate the sizes of the drops. In this case you would use the demand flow rate for Q.

Joe Panfalone
Application Engineer
Phone (513) 671-3322
Fax (513) 671-3363
Web: http://www.exair.com
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