Intercooled Air Compressor

[Timberwolf]

So since moving to FL I've had a big probelm with mositure in the air compressor. The gulf is about 200 yards away so it typically stays pretty humid. Finally got around to putting the the intercooler on the compressor. Having some problems brazing copper to aluminum but I may just order some 1/2" aluminum fuel line and tig it to the cooler. I still also need to find a fan to mount on the cooler. For the bracket I was originally going to buy some aluminum and fab it up. However with a 1x1x1/8"x8' stick of 6063 at $23 a piece, I decided to use some scrap steel angle I had laying around. Just need to paint it all up now, but I had to get it together quick since function trumps asthetics and I needed the compressor. O well, here's what I've got so far

[geezer]

If you need to join copper to aluminum etc. then you should try Durafix , watch the video's at this website : http://durafix.com/ and you will see it could be the answer to your problem.

There are little motors complete with fans off of the better old fridges, that could be mounted underneath your radiator and improve it's efficiency, have used them for other projects, they are terrific little motors can run for ever and don't draw much juice. The price is right as they can be salvaged from the old fridges.

I don't have much humidity where I am so I can imagine how much you have. water in the compressor is always a problem

[Timberwolf]

I tried some of the hobart brazing rods which i tried initially and got all buy 2 small holes filled on the outlet side. Using the most unorthodox method of a torch and TIG to make it stick. I have a fan that is pretty much useless for anything around the house but is almost too big for this. I may end up fabbing something up to use it....aint really decided just yet. I'd go to a junkyard but there aren't any close to me. Makes me miss home haha

[jakeru]

That's pretty cool. I'm interested to hear how much it helps with keeping water out of your air tools. Water in air tools is quite a nuisance.

I'd probably do the same thing to my 115V compressor, if I were more committed to keeping it longer term, but for now I feel like I am kind of just putting up with it.

I put a drop of air tool oil into my die grinders air inlets before each use each day, and try to drain the water every so often. It seems to be working - I haven't had to service the die grinder in quite a while, and its still running strong. I realize south-eastern humidity may be a completely different story though! The die grinder is the main air tool I use with my medium/small size compressor.

Is the blue canister looking thing a water trap?

[Timberwolf]

ya the blue thing is a filter and water trap. Glad I got it done...should save my consumables from all that moisture. I'm still adding a filter to the output side of it too just in case

[jakeru]

My air compressor (a cheapie, and noisy vertical harbor freight 120V unit) went down the other day from an electrical switch failure, so I went to giving it some long needed attention today. I previously added an electric cooling fan that I turn on whenever the compressor gets hot. This fan allowed the compressor to run at 100% duty cycle, but had a separate cord I had to manually plug in. Now I hooked it up to the compressor's power cable. Whenever the compressor is plugged in, the electric fan is on. One fewer cord to have to manage... sweet.

But even better, I tried getting rid of an inline air regulator /filer/moisture trap I had previously hooked up "permanently" to the air outlet (originally thinking I'd use it to adjust pressure as needed.) It was not a very large unit, it just had 1/4" NPT inlet and outlet ports. Well man, that was the source of pressure drop I've been looking for so long to get rid of! All the sudden my air tools have *way* more power now. They used to spin up briefly, then settle down to a lower RPM. Now they just run like a scalded cat. I can use a 3" sanding disc on my die grinder now, usefully. Before all I had the torque to spin were the smaller 2" discs. I wonder if I might even be able to use my 3" metal cut-off wheel now, that I never could get working satisfactorily now. Maybe my impact wrench will finally be useful too! I'm totally happy, it's like I just got a new more powerful compressor! (It is still noisy though, but at least its working!)

By the way, the electrical switch failure was easily remedied by a minor re-wiring of the switch. The switch was a dual pole switch, I think so it can handle switching 240V motors. Switching the neutral of the 120V circuit just seemed unnecessary, so I hard wired the neutral and just left the switch to switch the hot (black) lead. So that was a fairly straightforward fix too!