Rotary screw drive compressors thingy...thoughts?

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gamble
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Rotary screw drive compressors thingy...thoughts?

Post by gamble »

screwless, screw drive, rotary screw, piston impaired whatever it's called.
what do you guys think about these? Never used or seen one in person. I hear they are quiet
Do they have less moisture? Is the maintenance schedule make them a bitch to own?

Eastwood has a 30 gallon one coming out next month that is "under" $1000. I'm not an eastwood fan but the price seems right and if it's as quiet as they say and if I can hid it under a table it may be worth it for me.

Currently I'm using a 29 gallon harbor freight compressor for close to 4 years now. Aside from a broken regulator and a ton of moisture and using a lot of oil the thing is a tank and no issues. Its gone through 2 bottles of oil and I added a $12 regulator to replace the broken one. No real complaints at all about it. Plus it runs on 110v which is what I need
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Re: Rotary screw drive compressors thingy...thoughts?

Post by djreiswig »

I think what you are looking at is a scroll compressor. It sounds like they are oil less. You would still want an air dryer. I don't know anything about scroll compressors, but it sounds like capacity could be an issue. You'd want to look at the CFM needed for your application and see what the compressor is rated for.
We are running an IR two stage from Tractor Supply. It was around the $1000 price range. Trouble free and it doesn't have any problem keeping up with the PM65 cutting 3/4". It is a tad loud, but it's on the other side of the shop.
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Re: Rotary screw drive compressors thingy...thoughts?

Post by gamble »

Yea that compressor. They say it's 30 gallon but flows like 60. Looks like they deleted it from their website and will post it later.
the 29 gallon paired with my PM45 has been great. I get 60seconds of cutting before it kicks in. Never have I ran out of air yet but I don't do long long cuts
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Re: Rotary screw drive compressors thingy...thoughts?

Post by motoguy »

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Re: Rotary screw drive compressors thingy...thoughts?

Post by see&see »

We bought an Ingersoll-Rand UP6-15CTASIP Air Compressor 15HP 480V/3P CTAS 150psi 120-gal Tank. This is when it was first mounted on the wall, floor space is always a premium in a shop.. I ran a 1" loop air line around the shop, about 200'.. I used Rapid-Air line along with AL-Pex.. What ever is the cheapest with quality and easy to string up.

The compressor is quiet like a sewing machine and makes tons of dry air. There's numerous ways to adjust the on-off timing of the pump in the panel, some shops leave them run all day when using a bunch of air.. The NY CNC video motoguy posted is long but gives a good idea on using the high volume quiet screw compressor.

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Last edited by see&see on Tue Sep 26, 2017 7:21 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Rotary screw drive compressors thingy...thoughts?

Post by Econdron »

Rotary screw compressors are designed, and intended to be run non-stop. The oil they use needs to get hot in order to take the moisture out of the air, and in order for that to happen, it needs to run either non-stop, or close to non-stop so the oil can't cool down. In industrial settings, you'll either see the compressor running all the time, or they have huge storage tanks for air so that when the compressor kicks on, it stays on long enough to heat the oil while it's filling the tank.

You can use them intermittently like a regular air compressor, but I don't think you get the dry air effect that you're supposed to get with them. I've even heard some people go as far as saying you get less life out of the compressors if they aren't constantly on because they're designed to be run with hot oil, but I can't confirm that.
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Re: Rotary screw drive compressors thingy...thoughts?

Post by see&see »

Technology on screw compressors has improved quite a bit in the last few years. IR lets us adjust the perimeters on the total air model compressor in the pict above from 30 seconds idle to as long as 10 minutes with a duration dial control on the circuit board showing seconds and minutes.

For the air usage we have now I leave it set at 3 minutes idle and that cools the oil down before shut-off. The refrigerated dryer in the total air system takes 95% of the moisture out. Most of the remaining moisture I remove with a Motor Guard filter going into the plasma cutter. But there is no such thing as perfect 100% dry air.
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Re: Rotary screw drive compressors thingy...thoughts?

Post by gamble »

I asked Eastwood the same if I can run it 10 Min one week or 10hours one week and they said it didn’t matter.
We will see what happens
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Re: Rotary screw drive compressors thingy...thoughts?

Post by hsolve »

Rotary screw Is very different to scroll. Rotary screw is 'like' loosely compared to a supercharger. It spins quite fast around the 8000rpm to generate the air. A scroll is a spiral inside another spiral, elliptically moving. The advantage of the scroll is there is no pulsation in the discharge and it is quiet. The down side the output is not so great, unless things have changed. For large and or contineous air supply it's normally rotary screw. The moisture thing is normally controlled by a refrigerated or descacant dryer
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Re: Rotary screw drive compressors thingy...thoughts?

Post by robertspark »

What about a membrane dryer?
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Re: Rotary screw drive compressors thingy...thoughts?

Post by gamble »

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