EXAIR makes a wide variety of Intelligent Compressed Air Products that can be used for blowoff applications. The first step is to consider what size, and shape, the airflow pattern needs to be. If it’s a smooth, flat surface, our Air Knives are ideal for that. If a more directed, focused stream of air is required, we have Air Nozzles, Air Jets, and Air Amplifiers. And if it’s for statically charged debris, we can put Ionizers on Air Knives (Super Ion Air Knives), Air Nozzles (Intellistat Ion Air Nozzles), Air Jets (Gen4 Ion Air Jets) and Air Amplifiers (Gen4 Ion Air Cannons.)
If you navigate the EXAIR website to our Blowoff Kits, you’ll see that we can provide a number of our quiet, safe, and efficient Air Nozzles with Magnetic Bases and/or Stay Set Hoses for a quick & easy Blowoff System. In addition to the half dozen or so systems that are specifically called out, you can also put together your own setup that best suits your application. Here’s how:
Example: Model 1100-9412 is two Super Air Nozzles on a Dual Outlet Magnetic Base with 12″ Stay Set Hoses.
If you’d like to discuss a blowoff application – regardless of size or shape – give me a call.
Russ Bowman, CCASS
Application Engineer Visit us on the Web Follow me on Twitter Like us on Facebook
My drive to work involves passing through a growing neighborhood in the northeast suburbs of Cincinnati, Ohio. Over the past few weeks, I’ve seen a wooded lot get cleared & graded for construction of a new house. A week or so ago, heavy earth-moving equipment was digging the basement foundation…and adding to the traffic as huge dump trucks carried the dirt away. Fast-forward to this morning, when I saw that the 2×4 framing of the walls and the placement of the roof joists were almost complete. The backhoes and dump trucks on the lot have been replaced by a small fleet of carpenter’s work trucks, a ‘porta-potty’ (a real plus, considering the number of workers spending 8–10 hours a day on a site that was the utility equivalent of a primitive campsite)…and an air compressor.
Compressed air has been used in construction since ancient times, when manually operated bellows devices were used to stoke fires to increase the temperature inside furnaces that were used to make metal tools and building materials. The first large scale industrial use of compressed air on a construction project was the building of the Mt. Cenis tunnel in Switzerland. Tunnel construction began in 1857 and was expected to take at least 25 years, with some estimates projecting a timeline of over 70 years. However, technical innovations – like the development of pneumatic drills that replaced steam-operated machinery – allowed them to complete it in only 14 years.
In addition to the pneumatic nail guns and impact drivers being used at the new home site along my daily commute, compressed air has a number of other uses in the construction trades. It’s used for excavation, to power de-watering & sludge pumps, hoists, and even material conveyors. For example, a contractor that was building a large fence on sandy terrain used a Model 150200 2″ Heavy Duty Line Vac to remove sand from the hollow fence posts after using hammer drills (which are also air operated, so you know) to anchor them in place. Another user got a Model 151250 2-1/2 NPT Threaded Heavy Duty Line Vac to remove light dirt & sand from holes they dig to set posts in. Both power their Line Vacs with diesel-fueled 185 CFM tow-behind compressors.
Heavy Duty Line Vac: Hardened Alloy Construction and High Performance
EXAIR Air Knives are also used by construction companies. One of our customers bought a Model 110218 18″ Aluminum Super Air Knife Kit to blow an air curtain onto a conveyor to separate filter fabric out of recycled asphalt. Many lumber & building material manufacturers use them to blow off sawdust and loose debris from plywood, OSB board, roofing shingles, etc.
Top: 108″ Super Air Knife is supported & aimed via an array of Model 9060 Universal Air Knife Mounting Systems. Bottom: Mounting Systems can be ‘overkill’ for some smaller applications, especially when the user is creative. Yes, that’s a door hinge. No, it wasn’t my idea, but I kind of wish it was.
The EXAIR Reversible Drum Vac System converts a drum and dolly into a mobile pumping system.
And back to the Line Vacs, an electrical contractor uses a Model 6086 3″ Aluminum Line Vac to pull wire through stretches of underground conduit that are too long for standard fish tapes. They can pull the fish line through 120 feet of conduit in about 30 seconds. The Line Vac also removes any debris that might have accumulated inside the conduit between installation and wire pulling.
If you’re in the construction industry – or any industry, really – and would like to discuss a potential application for engineered compressed air products, give me a call.
Russ Bowman, CCASS
Application Engineer Visit us on the Web Follow me on Twitter Like us on Facebook
I have mentioned before that my undergrad degree is from the University of Cincinnati. The Combat Robotics Team was not a thing back then; in fact, robot fighting was still high-level and just coming around to the mainstream. Well, this past weekend, I had the chance to attend my first-ever PLANT at UC’s 1819 Innovation Hub.
What is PLANT, you ask? It is a class of combat robots restricted to PLA, ABS, or PETG construction materials. The bots cannot weigh more than 1 pound and have some other guidelines generally set forth by SPARC. The teams generally design these bots as scaled-down versions of the bots they plan to build and take on larger battles. In addition, they must weigh no more than 1 pound. They are mostly 3D printed, and the benefit is that they are a cost savings to manufacture and then test against other similar-sized bots to try and see how a design may work out in a larger form.
Because these bots are all 3D printed, they can test complex geometries without the cost of the machining hours. This also helps them to see the value a complex part may add or helps them to come up with other methods to manufacture the product. The entire point is for them to test on a small scale with lower impact/risk, then scale up.
Super Air Knife installed
When talking with customers here at EXAIR about projects that may require long Super Air Knives to blow off an entire conveyor belt, we will often suggest doing a scaled test. Use a 12″ Super Air Knife to test an edge or a dedicated section of the belt. If a stock EXAIR product is tested, it can be returned within 30 days of the date of the order. This means you can take a small test section, with low risk, put it in place, and test it under production scenarios for nearly a month, and then contact us to let us know whether it works or not. Get a sales return order for the shorter length, and then scale up for the full demand of the application.
EXAIR’s offering a 30-day guarantee on stock products truly reduces the risk of testing out even a full-length Super Air Knife if you want to. This can sometimes give the decision makers the last little bit of confidence that EXAIR is the correct team to work with. If you want to discuss how we can help your production lines, contact an Application Engineer today.
EXAIR proves often that we’re able to work with you to create a customized solution that best serves your application. Recently I had the pleasure of working with a customer who wanted a better solution on their tissue paper converting machine. What they currently had was too loud, too inefficient, and they knew there was a better way.
The machine was an old rewinder used to convert webs of tissue paper ranging from 99-115” in width. Installed on the old machine was a 115” drilled pipe with 1/16” drilled holes spaced out every ½” along the length of the pipe. This was using a substantial amount of compressed air and was significantly louder than they would’ve liked. They purchased a new machine that had an EXAIR Super Air Knife already installed and working great, so they reached out to us for some help.
The customer conducted some time studies to determine exactly how much air this application required. The air blast ran for 500 seconds per hour, equating to 8.3min/hr of air usage. The operation runs 24/7, but with time spent doing changeovers the actual run time is closer to 20hrs.
20hrs x 8.2min = 166 min/day of air usage
166min x 365 = 60,590 min per year
A 1/16” unpolished, drilled hole will consume 2.58 SCFM at a pressure of 60 PSIG. With a total of 228 holes across the full pipe, this is quite a bit of compressed air.
2.58 SCFM x 228 = 588 SCFM of compressed air
588 x 60,590 min = 35,626,920 SCF
Considering the lightweight nature of the material, we recommended that the customer use our .001” shim to cut the flow from our stock Super Air Knives to their minimum. We recommended our Model 110054-.001 and Model 110060-.001. At 60 PSIG, a Super Air Knife with .001 shim installed will consume 1.15 SCFM/inch of knife length.
114 x 1.15 SCFM = 131 SCFM of compressed air
131 x 60,590 min = 7,937,290 SCF
Installing the Super Air Knives with .001” shim reduced their air consumption by 77% for a total airsavings of 27,689,630 SCF each year. But, what does this mean in terms of money? To determine the cost of compressed air, we use the approximate value of $0.25/1000 SCF.
27,689,630 SCF x $0.25/1000 = $6,922.41
In just one year, on this one single machine, this customer was able to save almost $7k per year. These knives quickly pay for themselves, then begin to contribute to your bottom line. All of this in addition to lowering the sound level and providing a safer working environment for their operators. So how quickly did this customer end up seeing the payback on their two knives?
2025 list prices are:
Model 110054-.001 – $1,554.00
Model 110060-.001 – $1,667.00
Total investment: $3,221
Based on an operation of 166 min, the customer was saving $18.90 per day. To recoup the initial purchase costs, these would only need to be operated for 171 days. On the 171st day, they’ve already saved enough compressed air to account for their initial costs. Moving forward, that savings does not go away but continues to add to the bottom line.
If you have areas in your facility that are using air inefficiently, contact an EXAIR Application Engineer today.
