EXAIR’s Heavy Duty Safety Air Gun is designed to provide powerful blasts of compressed air for use in rugged, industrial environments. With a larger 3/8 NPT air inlet compared to our other Safety Air Guns, it allows for higher force and flow values. It comes with a durable cast aluminum body and ergonomic composite rubber grip. The wide curved trigger allows for continuous use for hours without operators experiencing fatigue.
1350-6-CS – Heavy Duty Safety Air Gun with Model 1104 Air Nozzle, 6″ Alum. Ext Pipe & Chip Shield
All of EXAIR’s Safety Air Guns come with an engineered compressed air nozzle at the tip. This allows you to remain OSHA compliant while still getting the force you need to get the job done. EXAIR’s Super Air Nozzles utilize the coanda effect to entrain large amounts of ambient air from the environment. This ambient air mixes with the primary airstream and is projected towards the target with more force and flow than the supplied compressed air could deliver alone.
Compressed air goes in the back, as it exits the front ambient air is entrained in the total flow of air you are getting.
Each of the Safety Air Guns is available with extensions fully assembled ranging from 6”-72”. You can simply add a “-“ and the required length, in inches, to the end of any Safety Air Gun Model number.
Safety Air Gun Extensions
In addition, they’re also available with a Chip Shield to prevent any chips or debris from coming back toward your operators. Effective chip guarding is another component of OSHA 1910.242(b) in addition to the concerns of dead-end pressure. To add a Chip Shield onto the gun as well, a “-CS” to the standard Model number. For example, a Model 1310-12-CS would be a 1310 gun with 12” extension and a Chip Shield installed. If the application involves blowing off metal chips or shavings, your operators will certainly appreciate this Chip Shield preventing the debris from blowing back over them.
With EXAIR’s Heavy Duty Safety Air Gun, you can still achieve the high forces required for tough applications without the risk of injuries to personnel. Do yourselves and your operators a favor and get one on order today!
If you look at operating costs alone, compressed air can be just about the most inefficient method there is for cleaning parts. If you just look at the risks, it’s potentially very dangerous too. Don’t even get me started on the insufferable noise it can make.
For cleaning parts, most folks are familiar with the use of an air gun. You can find the simplest of these in many industrial settings: a valve (often in the form of a handheld trigger device) fitted with a nozzle of some sort (often in the form of an open ended tube, pipe, or fitting to focus or direct the air flow). These have all three of the “downsides” I opened this blog with. Of course, these concerns can be mitigated to a high degree by using the right tool for the job. That’s where engineered products like EXAIR Safety Air Guns come in. Let’s look at how we can address these three “downsides”:
Efficiency: This is all about compressed air consumption. In the simplest of air guns mentioned above, consumption is only limited by the passages in the valve (or trigger) and the discharge fitting…and those limits are usually negligible. Modifying the ends (see examples below) to focus the air flow usually has minimal effect, because you’re not appreciably changing the total cross sectional area of the discharge opening:
Here are a few modified thumb trigger air guns that were sent in for Efficiency Lab testing. Left to right, compressed air consumption at 80psig supply pressure was 34.2 SCFM, 30.9 SCFM, and 28.2 SCFM. For comparison (more on this later,) EXAIR Model 1210 Soft Grip Safety Air Gun uses only 14 SCFM and generates a very similar flow pattern.
Safety: Remember learning about kinetic and potential energy in grade school? Well, when you compress air to 100psig, fitting all that air into a much smaller space creates a TREMENDOUS amount of potential energy:
The block on the left represents a cubic foot of air at atmospheric pressure. The one on the right represents how much space the first one takes up when compressed to 100psig. The energy imparted by this process HAS to be handled with care.
One problem with the thumb guns above is, if you were to jam into the palm of your hand and pull the trigger, a large component of that potential energy (pressure) turns into kinetic energy (force)…more than enough to break the skin and cause a potentially fatal condition known as an air embolism. In the United States, OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) regulates compressed air devices used for cleaning purposes. All EXAIR Safety Air Guns comply with Standard 1910.242(b) by providing a relief path to ensure that it cannot be dead ended, and thus never create over 30psi measurable at the outlet)
EXAIR Super Air Nozzles cannot be dead ended, ensuring the outlet pressure won’t reach OSHA limits, regardless of supply pressure.
Noise: Another problem is, another component is turned into sound pressure…discharging air from a direct opening is quite loud. OSHA standards address these with limitations on outlet pressure and sound level. All EXAIR Safety Air Guns comply with Standard 1910.242(b), which limits the outlet pressure (by providing a relief path to ensure that it cannot be dead ended, and thus never create over 30psi measurable at the outlet) and all but our largest Super Blast Safety Air Guns comply with Standard 1910.95(a) limits for continuous 8 hour sound level exposure.
Which brings us to the topic of this blog: How exactly did THEY (our customer who used to use the thumb guns above) select the right Safety Air Gun, and how can we apply that to getting the right Safety Air Gun for YOU?
These steps aren’t all-inclusive, and they don’t necessarily need to be followed in order, but if you call an EXAIR Application Engineer about selecting a Safety Air Gun, here’s what we’re gonna talk about:
Ergonomics: We offer five distinctive styles of Safety Air Guns:
From small part cleaning by hand, to wide area blowoff, and all points in between, EXAIR has a Safety Air Gun for most any application.
Our thumb gun user (as I alluded to above) chose the Model 1210 Soft Grip Safety Air Guns (top right). They had a number of typical industrial applications where the operators had the parts or surfaces to be blown off right in front of them. They liked the integral storage hook and rubberized hand grip, but the VariBlast Compact (top middle) or Heavy Duty Safety Air Guns (bottom left) were also considered. The VariBlast Precision (top left) and Super Blast Safety Air Guns (bottom right) were too focused or more powerful, respectively, than needed.
Airflow pattern: Honestly, I could make a good case for this being the first consideration. Selection of any blowoff product – be it an Air Nozzle, Air Amplifier, Air Knife, Air Wipe, etc., will largely depend on the size and shape of the airflow.
variety of airflow patterns…and effective distances…are available from EXAIR’s comprehensive line of Super Air Nozzle products.
For the most precise, focused blowoff, our Atto Super Air Nozzle (top left) is a great choice. It’s available on:
Super Air Nozzle Clusters (bottom left) create higher force & flow, and still keep it in a more concentrated, tighter pattern. They can be installed on:
When stubborn, heavy, and/or LOTS of debris needs to be absolutely, positively blown off RIGHT NOW, our High Force Super Air Nozzles may be just what you need. Our largest; Model 1120 1-1/4 NPT Super Air Nozzle, is shown (above right). The High Force Super Air Nozzles are offered on:
Soft Grip or Heavy Duty Safety Air Gun (up to 3.3 pounds of force over a 6.3″ wide area @12″ away)
Application specific concerns: Everything we’ve discussed so far has involved aiming the blow off stream away from the operator, in the direction the device is aimed. In addition to wide variety of engineered Air Nozzles, EXAIR offers a number of options for these products:
If you’re looking for a portable, hand-held compressed air blow off product that’s quiet, safe, and efficient, look no further than EXAIR Corporation’s extensive line of Safety Air Guns. If you’d like to find out more, give me a call.
Russ Bowman, CCASS
Application Engineer EXAIR Corporation Visit us on the Web Follow me on Twitter Like us on Facebook
EXAIR Corporation manufactures quiet, safe, and efficient compressed air products for industry. We want our customers to get the most out of our products, and, in turn, their compressed air systems. To do that, we offer a unique service called the EXAIR Efficiency Lab. Here’s how it works:
An Application Engineer can arrange to have your existing compressed air device(s) sent in to our facility.
We’ll use our calibrated test equipment to measure the compressed air consumption, sound level, and force applied of those devices.
You’ll receive a detailed test report, along with our recommendations to implement an efficient, quiet, and safety compliant solution.
We’ll even send your tested device(s) back to you, at no charge, if you wish.
I recently had the pleasure of conducting just such a test on some air guns. The caller was the Environmental Health & Safety Director for a plastics manufacturer. The main concern was safety compliance…a recent audit had shown that some workstations were using handheld blowoff devices that did not comply with OSHA standard 1910.242(b), which limits dead end pressure of compressed air products used for cleaning to 30psi.
After discussing their typical uses for these (and other) air guns, they sent in a couple for testing. Here’s what we found out:
“Thumb guns” are especially popular for blowoff because of their compact size, ergonomic design. and low price.
The air gun with the 7″ straight extension (top) is a “textbook” example of non-compliance with OSHA standard 1910.242(b). Because it has an open-end discharge with no relief path, this one could cause an air embolism if it were inadvertently dead-ended into the operator’s skin – a potentially fatal condition. It also uses a considerable amount of compressed air, and is quite loud. At 80psig supply pressure:
Force applied, at a distance of 12″, is 13oz…same as theirs.
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).
The other one is OSHA compliant (it can’t be dead-ended…the cross-drilled hole provides a relief path, but it was still pretty inefficient and loud. At our standard test pressure of 80psig:
Compressed air consumption is 30.8 SCFM
Noise level is 94.8dBA
Force applied, at a distance of 12″, is 16.9oz
Although the force generated by the Model 1210 Soft Grip Safety Air Gun isn’t quite as high as theirs, it’s still our recommendation here. Oftentimes, the flow and velocity generated by the engineered Super Air Nozzle is more than capable of meeting the needs of the typical blow off applications these types of air guns are used in.
EXAIR Efficiency Lab testing proves that replacing these air guns with our Soft Grip Safety Air Guns (or at least replacing the tips with EXAIR Super Air Nozzles…we also have adapters for that) will result in compressed air savings of 66% and 55%, respectively, and lower sound levels to within OSHA standard 1910.95(a) limits:
All EXAIR Soft Grip Safety Air Guns comply with these limits for 8 hour exposure.
If you’d like to know more about the efficiency & safety (or lack thereof) of your current air blow off devices, give me a call.
Russ Bowman, CCASS
Application Engineer EXAIR Corporation Visit us on the Web Follow me on Twitter Like us on Facebook
