Tag: return on investment

Calculating Return On Investment with EXAIR Products

Published on by Russ BowmanLeave a comment

Just because something works, doesn’t necessarily mean it works as well as it could. We talk to folks every day who have compressed air-operated devices that work OK, but they’re loud. Or they’re not compliant with safety regulations. Or they use too much compressed air. EXAIR has solutions to all of those issues, but it’s that last one that I want to spend some time on today.

A caller was using a drilled pipe to clean blow off a conveyor – it was 36″ wide, so the pipe had (72) 1/16″ diameter holes drilled, one every 1/2″ along the pipe length. It used compressed air at a rate of 261 SCFM with a supply pressure of 60psig. We can use a US Department of Energy thumb rule which states that it costs $0.25 to generate 1,000 Standard Cubic Feet of compressed air to determine the annual operating cost of this drilled pipe, which they operate eight hours a day, 250 days a year:

261 SCFM X 60 min/hr X 8 hr/day X 250 days/yr X $0.25/1,000 SCF = $7,830.00 annual cost

Here’s a typical drilled pipe that we tested for a customer in our Efficiency Lab.

A 36″ Super Air Knife only uses 82.8 SCFM @60psig. Using the same math:

82.8 SCFM X 60 min/hr X 8 hr/day X 250 days/yr X $0.25/1,000 SCF = $2,484.00 annual cost

Super Air Knife drying fruits and vegetables

Now we have the data to use our Return on Investment calculation:

Gain from investment: $7,830.00 (drilled pipe cost) – $2,484.00 (Super Air Knife cost) = $5,346.00

Cost of investment: 2024 price for a Model 110036 36″ Aluminum Super Air Knife = $938.00

A 470% annual return is spectacular by any measure. To further put that in perspective, let’s calculate how long it takes for the Air Knife to pay for itself. The 36″ Aluminum Super Air Knife costs $938.00 (2024 price), and the annual savings in compressed air cost are $5,346.00:

$938.00 (spent) ÷ $5,346.00 (saved/yr) = 0.18 years

Since we used 250 days – 5 days/week for 52 weeks, less 10 days for holidays, maintenance, etc.:

0.18 years X 250 days/year = 45 days

So, in about a month and a half, they saved as much as they spent on the Super Air Knife. We’ve worked with customers who have seen their return on investment in just a few days, or as long as a year or so. Regardless, if it costs less to operate, you’re still moving in the right direction. If you’d like to find out how much you can save – and how fast you can pay off your investment – you can do the math above, or you can use our Online Calculators, or you can give me a call.

Oh, and if you don’t have the air consumption data on what you’re using now, we can measure that for you in our Efficiency Lab. It’s a free service we offer, without obligation to purchase anything, for anyone who wants to know the performance level of their air-operated blow off devices.

Russ Bowman, CCASS

Application Engineer
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EXAIR Calculators

Published on by Russ BowmanLeave a comment

I went to grade school in the 1970s and really developed a love of mathematics in the fifth grade (1976-1977), spurred on by a wonderful teacher that I actually still am in touch with today. 1977 was also the year that I got my first handheld calculator. It had an LCD display and would perform basic arithmetic, as long as the 9V battery lasted. If I recall, it set me back almost $10, which was what I earned in two Saturday afternoons of helping a neighbor split firewood (I hauled & stacked; he ran the log splitter).

Pretty soon, all the cool kids were getting them, and, while the teachers couldn’t stop us from doing math homework with them, they DID prohibit them in the classroom, and lectured us CONSTANTLY about the need to do – and show – our work on paper, because we were NEVER going to carry a calculator around in our pockets. The classroom calculator ban continued on through high school, but in Naval Nuclear Power School, and then college, the use of calculators was actually mandated…but only after we’d demonstrated proficiency in doing math on paper. That’s a concept I agree with wholeheartedly.

Fast-forward to the 21st century, and it turns out, just about everybody DOES carry a calculator in their pockets…on the same device that has a built-in camera, video recorder, GPS…oh, and us old timers actually make phone calls on it too. You can also use that smartphone to access websites where you might find online calculators that aid in selecting that particular company’s products. As you might have guessed by now, EXAIR is one of those particular companies, and I’m writing this blog today to let you know about our Calculator Library. Depending on what you want to know, we have several that’ll do the math for you:

Air Savings Calculator: Use this one to determine the potential compressed air savings associated with replacing an existing compressed air blowing device with an efficient EXAIR Intelligent Compressed Air Product. There are two to choose from: one in USD, and one in Euros.

EFC Calculator: Not all blowing applications require continuous operation of the blowing device. EXAIR’s EFC Electronic Flow Control is a standalone system that’ll turn the compressed air flow on & off, as needed, so you don’t waste money on compressed air consumption when it’s not doing anything for you. This calculator will tell you how much you can save on compressed air costs, and your return on investment in the EFC. Like the Air Savings Calculator, we have a USD and a Euro version.

Cabinet Cooler System Calculator: Instead of air consumption & dollars (or Euros), our new Cabinet Cooler System Calculator is all about heat loads and cooling capacities. EXAIR has offered the ability to submit Cabinet Cooler Sizing Guide data for a long time – by fax (THAT’S how long it’s been), email, or straight through the website. For the Do-It-Yourselfers out there, we now have this feature for you to submit your data and get an immediate answer as to which Cabinet Cooler System has the cooling capacity to handle the heat load calculated from your data.

For the record, I’ve only chided my 5th grade teacher for her insistence that nobody would ever be carrying calculators around with them all day. It was on a Facebook post – where we were both using smartphones – and we had a good laugh about it. All’s well that ends well. But if you’ve got questions about EXAIR’s calculators, feel free to give me a call. We can even do the math the old-fashioned way if you prefer.

Russ Bowman, CCASS

Application Engineer
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How To Calculate Your Return On Investment From Using Engineered Compressed Air Products

Published on by Russ BowmanLeave a comment

There’s an old saying that goes “If it isn’t broken, don’t fix it.” Best case, this means it may not be necessary to repair, refurbish, or replace something just because there’s a newer offering on the market. Worst case, it’s used to justify continued use of something when the aforementioned repair, refurbishment, or replacement will result in quantifiable benefits. THAT makes THIS quote all the more applicable:

“The most dangerous phrase in the English language is: We’ve always done it this way. It raises the question, ‘Are we doing this because we always have, or because it’s the right thing to do?’”
-Grace Hopper, Rear Admiral USN & computer pioneer

If you consider “not spending any more than you have to on compressed air” to be “the right thing to do”, then this blog’s for you. Read on, and we’ll calculate not only how much you might save by using engineered compressed air products in place of what you’re using now, but how soon that amount you save will equal how much you spent on those products…that’s called Return On Investment, or ROI. Let’s work through an example:

A popular air gun fitted with a cross-drilled nozzle for OSHA compliance uses 34 SCFM @80psig. These are commonly replaced by our Model 1210 Soft Grip Safety Air Guns fitted with our Super Air Nozzles, which consume only 14 SCFM @80psig. It’s not likely that the trigger on an Air Gun used for blowing, cleaning, drying, etc., will be pulled continuously, but we can assume that two hours of “trigger time” per day (for an eight-hour shift) is reasonable. Here’s how to calculate annual savings:

(34-14 SCFM) X 60 min/hr X 2 hrs/day X 5 days/wk X 50 wks/yr=600,000 Standard Cubic Feet saved

Model 1210 Soft Grip Safety Air is fitted with an EXAIR Super Air Nozzle. We can also supply it with a Rigid Extension and Chip Shield (right).

Now, we need to determine the cost of your compressed air. The calculation for that, per the U.S. Department of Energy, is as follows:

Cost ($) = {bhp X 0.746 X # of operating hours X $/kWh X % time X % full load bhp}/motor efficiency

Where:
bhp = motor full load horsepower
0.746 = conversion from hp to kW
% time = percentage of run time at this operating level
% full load bhp = brake horsepower as percentage of full load bhp at this operating level
Motor efficiency = motor efficiency at this operating level

For simplicity, you could also get a fairly accurate answer by applying an “industry standard” thumb rule which states that a typical industrial air compressor generates ~4 SCFM per HP. If you know your electricity cost ($/kWh), you can calculate the cost of compressed air generation as follows. To keep most of the digits to the left of the decimal point, it’s commonly calculated as $ per 1,000 Standard Cubic Feet:

$/kWh X 0.746 hp/kW ÷ 4 hp/SCFM ÷ 60 min/hr X 1,000 = $ per 1,000 SCF

For EXTRA simplicity, you can use ANOTHER thumb rule, also endorsed by the Department of Energy, which states that compressed air costs about $0.25 per 1,000 SCF. It uses the above formula, and a typical estimate for electricity cost of $0.08 per kWh which my buddy Brian Farno did the math and provided a detailed explanation on that one here. So:

600,000 SCF X $0.25/1,000 SCF = $150.00 saved by switching to the EXAIR Safety Air Gun

Given the cost (current 2023 List Price) of $115.00 for the Model 1210 Soft Grip Safety Air Gun, we can calculate Return On Investment as a function of time…how long it takes before you end up saving the amount you spent:

$115.00 saved ÷ $150.00 spent X 12 months in a year = 9.2 months

At EXAIR (if you hadn’t figured it out already), we LOVE to do the math, but if you don’t (no judgment), we’ve got calculators on our website for that. Just fill in a few blanks, and get your answer. If there’s anything I can help with, though, give me a call.

Russ Bowman, CCASS

Application Engineer
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How Fast Can I Get My Return On Investment

Published on by Brian FarnoLeave a comment

Whenever an EXAIR product is sold to another business there is ultimately a question from a customer whether they know it or not. That question is very often, how fast will this product pay itself back in production gains, air savings, or decrease in downtime. One of the ways we offer this information is through our calculators.

The easiest method to determine how fast an EXAIR Engineered Solution will pay itself back is by knowing a few variables and then plugging them into our simplified Air Savings Calculator on the EXAIR site.

Simple ROI Calculator from EXAIR.comhttps://www.exair.com/knowledgebase/calculator-library/air-savings-calculator-usd.html?pub=28.calc

The Variables:
1. Current Customer Consumption (SCFM) or (SLPM) – We need this to have the baseline, it isn’t always easy to know off the top of your head so we offer items like the Digital Flowmeter or even the ability to send the product to us through the Efficiency Lab for a free diagnosis of consumption.

2. $ Cost of EXAIR Product – This is easy, you can even add in other known project costs to this that you want factored in for the return on investment. The more you add, the less it becomes a simplified ROI. Basic cost of the EXAIR product that is being installed is the best to keep it simplified.

3. EXAIR Product Consumption (SCFM) or (SLPM) – This can easily be obtained from our website or our Brain Trust, I mean Application Engineers who are always eager to talk about air consumption and other technical details. To really determine this we just need to know the operating air pressure and the model number.

4. $ Cost of compressed air/1,000 Cubic Feet – This is a value that may be known by the on-site utilities team, if not a good industry standard for the Midwest is $.25 USD. This has come assumptions on your kWh cost of energy and compressor efficiency. Again, if you want to dive deep into this, reach out to our Application Engineers, we are here for a reason.

That’s it, with those values input you can get a break down on how much air, and money you are saving and a simple payback in days of operation.

If you have questions on the math behind this, or how to determine/factor in some more information, contact one of the team members here and we will walk you through the best options to decrease your payback time and increase your efficiency.

Brian Farno
Application Engineer
BrianFarno@EXAIR.com
@EXAIR_BF