With our increased usage and the hot and humid weather we are having I am having trouble with moisture in the lines. Our air compressor units do have air cooled after coolers on them. Like these http://www.castair.net/after-coolers.html I am needing something more. I am thinking a water filter at each machine. Is there a particular style or brand that works better? Thanks!
Follow along with the video below to see how to install our site as a web app on your home screen.
Note: This feature may not be available in some browsers.
Largest Manufacturing Technology Community on the Web
Stay Connected:
Air Compressor Water Filters--What Works?
- Thread starter munruh
- Start date
- Replies 35
- Views 6,859
DavidScott
Diamond
- Joined
- Jul 11, 2012
- Location
- Washington
I have tried both water and air aftercoolers, the water one works much, much better. Best of course is a refrigerated dryer.
Look for combination units with coalescent elements. Start with reading the BINKS description and then work to your budget.
scojen
Stainless
- Joined
- May 21, 2004
- Location
- Zellwood, Fl.
rons
Diamond
- Joined
- Mar 5, 2009
- Location
- California, USA
What you need is a coalescing filter. This filter allows the aerosols passing through it to form into heavier droplets
that fall to the bottom of the filter bowl due to gravity and can later be drained away. You can read about it here.
http://teamtechnical.com/html/Parker Basics of Coalescing.pdf
SMC, Finite, and Parker are good brands. What I prefer as a first stage in the coalesce process is a bronze sintered element filter. It hardly needs no maintenance and can be washed and reused. I use it in a filter body that has a glass vial that displays the depth of the water in the bowl. I have a second filter by Finite. I modified the inside so that I could wrap a length of "Flow King" brand reusable filter cloth around a center post in the Finite filter. The Finite filter does get hit by oil and particles that pass through the first filter. I think I have only had to clean it a few times in the last 10 years.
Combo units are sold by outfits that sell paint guns. A combo unit will have the coalesce filter and a regulator.
that fall to the bottom of the filter bowl due to gravity and can later be drained away. You can read about it here.
http://teamtechnical.com/html/Parker Basics of Coalescing.pdf
SMC, Finite, and Parker are good brands. What I prefer as a first stage in the coalesce process is a bronze sintered element filter. It hardly needs no maintenance and can be washed and reused. I use it in a filter body that has a glass vial that displays the depth of the water in the bowl. I have a second filter by Finite. I modified the inside so that I could wrap a length of "Flow King" brand reusable filter cloth around a center post in the Finite filter. The Finite filter does get hit by oil and particles that pass through the first filter. I think I have only had to clean it a few times in the last 10 years.
Combo units are sold by outfits that sell paint guns. A combo unit will have the coalesce filter and a regulator.
Refrigerated dryers are the most effective. The process is to cool the compressed air, causing water vapor to precipitate, drain off the liquid water, leaving air containing very little water vapor.
Lots of ways to "improve" your moisture problem (depending on you specific circumstances) but a proper refrigerated dryer, of appropriate capacity, will cure it.
Do you want to fiddle fart around with home brew heat exchangers (lots of threads here on PM and elsewhere) or make chips?
EDIT; Every piece of equipment specifies "clean, dry air". My advice addressed the "dry" part. If your compressor pump is puking excessive oil into the system or the plumbing is rusting and generating particulate contamination, those problems need to be addressed also.
Lots of ways to "improve" your moisture problem (depending on you specific circumstances) but a proper refrigerated dryer, of appropriate capacity, will cure it.
Do you want to fiddle fart around with home brew heat exchangers (lots of threads here on PM and elsewhere) or make chips?
EDIT; Every piece of equipment specifies "clean, dry air". My advice addressed the "dry" part. If your compressor pump is puking excessive oil into the system or the plumbing is rusting and generating particulate contamination, those problems need to be addressed also.
Bill D
Diamond
- Joined
- Apr 1, 2004
- Location
- Modesto, CA USA
Easy way since you already have an aftercooler is to cool the intake air. Either place the intake inside an air conditioned space or use my new idea of a buried pipe say 4" diameter at least a foot or two deep and tens of feet long. Same idea as ground source heat pump. If it is a plastic water proof pipe it will not pick up ground water.
Bill D.
Bill D.
Bill D.
The scheme of cooling air by pulling it through an under ground pipe has no merit. The incoming air needs to be DRY, not cool, and in the case of a 150psi compressor, the incoming air would need to have a Relative humidity of less than 10% in order for the tank not to have liquid water.
It is MUCH easier to remove the water from the output of a compressor than the input. Please, do the math!
The scheme of cooling air by pulling it through an under ground pipe has no merit. The incoming air needs to be DRY, not cool, and in the case of a 150psi compressor, the incoming air would need to have a Relative humidity of less than 10% in order for the tank not to have liquid water.
It is MUCH easier to remove the water from the output of a compressor than the input. Please, do the math!
72bwhite
Titanium
- Joined
- Sep 26, 2012
- Location
- California, Ventura county
The after cooler is a good start, but you also need to cool the air coming out of the tank,
at least 20 feet of black steel pipe with a low spot with a drain.
might need an auto drain on your tank.
refrigerated dryer is the best way, for high volume air use.
and then a coalesce filter to get the oil vapor and residual water out.
at least 20 feet of black steel pipe with a low spot with a drain.
might need an auto drain on your tank.
refrigerated dryer is the best way, for high volume air use.
and then a coalesce filter to get the oil vapor and residual water out.
Bill D
Diamond
- Joined
- Apr 1, 2004
- Location
- Modesto, CA USA
I guess we are in very different climates yesterday it was about 11% Humidity and a little over 100 degrees in the afternoon. Normally the humidity is more like 20-30% in summer. That is why I thought cooling the intake would help. I thought he had a refrigerated air dryer. Turns out is is just a cooling loop
Bill D.
modesto, CA
A properly laid out distribution system is it's own "cooler".
I had always wondered if the filter coalescers would handle 'dripping" wet air....... Until I went to Miami and set up an entire aviation modification and repair facility. Yep, if one has a properly designed and maintained piping system (drained daily) the Binks units are good enough for first class paint spraying operations.
A Chiller at the compressor end is NOTHING BUT GOOD!
I had always wondered if the filter coalescers would handle 'dripping" wet air....... Until I went to Miami and set up an entire aviation modification and repair facility. Yep, if one has a properly designed and maintained piping system (drained daily) the Binks units are good enough for first class paint spraying operations.
A Chiller at the compressor end is NOTHING BUT GOOD!
DavidScott
Diamond
- Joined
- Jul 11, 2012
- Location
- Washington
With my water cooled aftercooler I don't get any mist when using the air gun, when it's 110 outside and I am running the piss out of my compressor. The water in the aftercooler tank is around 70 degrees in the morning and 78 at the end of the day, when it's 110 outside and I am running the piss out of my compressor. With only an air aftercooler I start to see moisture when using the air gun at 80 degrees outside, even though I have a new, big coalescing filter. Water will always be cooler than air, at least in the summer. Yep it is cheap Hispanic engineering but no moving parts and it does a good job of cooling the 200+ degree air coming out of the compressor.
How do I build or where do I buy a water-cooled aftercooler?
Jim McIntyre
Hot Rolled
- Joined
- Jul 16, 2006
- Location
- Indiana
Exactly. I was thinking the same thing about a nanosecond after I read that recommendation...
DavidScott
Diamond
- Joined
- Jul 11, 2012
- Location
- Washington
I will take some photos tomorrow and describe what I did. It's not pretty but it works.
PriddyShiddy
Cast Iron
- Joined
- Mar 1, 2011
- Location
- anaheim, ca
Much as I hate to even say it... I bought a HF refrigerated air dryer 2 years ago when money was tight after purchasing the haas and moving into a bigger shop. Been 2 years running 2 machines off a 5hp Ingersoll Rand 80 gal that cycles several times many hours when running air to clear chips, some powder coating, lots of part dying etc. Lil bastard is still ticking. Thing was $400 and has run 24hrs a day for 2 years. I was planning on upgrading when it died, but after 2 years I've never seen moisture in the air and the dryer bottle on the has hasn't accumulated an inch of water in 2 years (evaporated faster than fill I imagine).
Aren't many things I'd recommend from that toy store but that $400 dryer is a winner by a mile. 4 decent dryers will be more than $400.
Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk
Aren't many things I'd recommend from that toy store but that $400 dryer is a winner by a mile. 4 decent dryers will be more than $400.
Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk
Short of a refrigerated drier, put a coalescing filter right after the cooler. The colder you make the air, the more inclined it will be to drop out the water. That might be where the suggestion to pass it through and underground pipe is about. Get it cold and you can get it to shed water easier. The refrigerated air driers are little more than an apartment sized refrigerator with the cold coil around the air pipe, and a coalescing air filter for the water to drop out in.
If you try to home brew something, remember that the refrigerated units use the cooled air to cool the incoming air, once the moisture is removed.
Once the moisture is gone, no need to keep the air cold. Big savings in power required.
I recommend the refrigerated dryer. And the auto drains on the "wet" tank, and the dryer itself.
Modelman
Titanium
- Joined
- Sep 12, 2007
- Location
- Northern Illinois
It has even more effect than that. Cooling the air to its dew point makes it drop water... but if you cool the air further (such as when it expands through an orifice, such as a spray gun or blow gun) more water will condense out. By running the output air through an air-to-air heat exchanger with the incoming air, it heats it well above the dew point, so if it's cooled again by expansion, it still stays above the dew point, and no more water condenses out.
Dennis
