Mine's getting tired, considering the following.
Air compressors
- Thread starter johnbryanpeters
- Start date
high volume CFM is nice, but do you need that huge storage tank?
i inherited a decent sized craftsman (older model) when my FIL died. for how often i really need it i couldn't imagine spending over a grand on one, but your usage needs may differ from mine.
I "inherited" a small-ish Craftsman from my neighbor. It's a nice compressor.
@johnbryanpeters i guess it really comes down to how much you use it/what you use it for. i have a smallish craftsman 125psi/4 gal/.75hp pancake compressor that was a fraction of the cost of that thing that suits my needs just fine....
I bought one very similar to it when I bought first house about 14 years ago. The guy loading it at Home Depot broke the pallet broke due to his lack of forklift skills and dropped it on the roof of my Toyota. It was totally his fault but I told his manager the pallet failed. It was a junkyard truck anyway. I had a friend right up a quote a hundred bucks less than HD limit. Got the air compressor, my truck fixed and 700 bucks.
Compressor still works great and always kept up with air tools, even a due grinder and my plasma cutter. I do have it under cover. It is a noisy fucker though. I used the breaker as a switch so it wouldn’t bug me at random times. Some fancier ones have automatic water drains which I always thought was cool.
I always drain the tank after I use mine. I want some storage volume for blowing out water lines in the fall, and have some air tools that the current compressor, a single cylinder portable, can't keep up with. It's also continuously pissing air from one of the controls, haven't managed to isolate it.
[random story bro] air leaks are one of the biggest forms of wasted energy in our plants.... Lots of time is spent measuring, finding and fixing the leaks...
I’m curious how that’ll work blowing out the water lines. I have one I planned to use for that but my neighbor shows up with a trailer mounted type used with a jackhammer.
I added an extension before install to make draining the water easier.
I used to do energy audits in manufacturing plants and that's one of the first things we'd document.
I got this model a few years back and haven't had any issues with it. https://www.northerntool.com/ingersoll-rand-electric-stationary-air-compressor-5-hp-230-volt-1-phase-60-gallon-vertical-model-ss5l5-1592047
That looks awesome, I'd love something like that.
My memory sucks but we used to overhaul truck compressors and I think a lot of the efficiency came back by just taking the head off and flattening whichever surface the reed valves sealed on.
We got one in the workshop today off a merc so I should have a look to refresh my memory.
I have a similar compressor with porter cable name on it. When I DiD mY oWN rEsEarCh, I found that many of the larger brand compressor use very similar components and I happened to find the “porter cable” on sale. I’ve had mine 10 years, I wouldn’t want any smaller of a tank when running air tools.