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A new question about the plasma cutter
gillis -
Saturday, June 14, 2008 - 1:03pm
plasma cutting Hi again, We have talked before about 75 feet of pipe for the air to dry. I would like to know, as a temporary mesure if I could use a 100 feet of hose (compressor hose) as piping?. You see, soon I will move into a bigger shop. That why I'm asking... gillis  Another inexpensive option
visitor -
Monday, June 16, 2008 - 1:51pm
One of the old time tricks used to dry air while filling tanks for scuba diving was to run it through a canister filter that had special charcoal to take out impurities, and then in the bottom several Feminine napkins like Kotex or equals. The napkins contain a product that absorbs huge amounts of liquid and for a welding unit will do the same for just moisture water. To a point they can also be redried and reused when exchanged. It is also an air drying system I use for paint spraying equipment when needed though I favor High volume / low air units anyhow. » reply  The active ingredient in the
Rich Waugh -
Monday, June 16, 2008 - 8:32pm
The active ingredient in the absorbent feminine napkins is the same stuff as in Pampers and other disposable diapers including Depends. One of the polyacrylate crystals, i think. Great at absorbing liquid water, but not much at absorbing water vapor, compared to silica gel. Silica gel is also reusable; just dry it in the oven for an hour at 250 degrees or so. If you really want super duper extra dry air, you need a refrigerated dryer. Liquid nitrogen works a treat. » reply A quick fix if your
Feral Metal -
Thursday, June 19, 2008 - 10:36am
A quick fix if your compressor produces a lot of moisture and you only have one water seperator is to coil your airline into a tub or tank of water to cool the air down, this condenses the moisture into droplets which the seperator can remove, mist on the other hand is harder to remove as it goes thro' the filter and you need a coalescent filter after the ordinary one. » reply |
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ArtMetal
Gillis, The air doesn't
Gillis,
The air doesn't really "dry" as much as it cools and the moisture in it condenses to a liquid state, dropping out of the air stream. Using rubber hose doesn't do the same ting as piping for two reasons:
1. The hose doesn't conduct heat rapidly enough to cool the air to condense the moisture before it gets to the point of use.
2. The hose will inevitably be coiled all over the floor and benches, etc, and will not allow any condensed water to drain back to the compressor tank. If any moisture does condense, it will pool in a low point in the hose until it accumulates enough that it suddenly horks up a hefty bolus of liquid right to your torch, trashing the consumables.
A better plan would be to go to the automotive supply house and get an extra coalescing filter and one of those 5 or 10 gallon portable air tanks, or better yet, a real air reciever from a defunct compressor. Run the air hose from the compressor to the tank, then put the coalescing filter right at the tank outlet and keep as short a line as possible form the filter to the plasma unit. As I noted in a previous post about this topic, one of the filters that uses a replaceable element is far better than the coalescing type, though harder to find locally.
I hope this clears things up a bit.