[Pepsimayn]

Figured I'd ask this here since its the most up the appropriate alley....

How much does it cost ballpark (most cost efficiently) to plumb a compressor for painting?

The path would be around 15-20' straight line from the compressor. How necessary is a dessicant system?

What do I want and how much will it cost?

What do you have and how much did it cost?

hopefully I will eventually be able to afford the whole shabang, but I'm just wondering what it will take to produce decent results and get me learning properly???

Thanks a ton gentlemen

 

[BarryK]

What your asking could start at $20 with just PVC pipe (not a good idea) and the sky is the limit.
I think you would be better off if different people just told you how theres are and cost.

Here is mine, compressor is outside and 5 Feet from wall mount inside.
From the compressor shut off valve I have 75' of 5/8 dia copper tubing rolled into a 4' dia coil and hanging on out side of garage.
The coper tubing goes into galvanized 3/4 dia pipe at the outside
of the wall with a 2 foot pipe drop and a spigot at the bottom to drain any collected water. 4 years never have had any as the copper cools the air good.
Inside The pipe hooks into a oil separator and than through 3 separate water trap's and than to the main regulator.
The oil and water traps are JR Technical / aka Arrow Ind.
I may have $800-900 dollars in whole thing, I should add there are 4 hose outlets at the regulator and I set this up with plans to
add the Devillbus #500 desiccant system to it but never had a water problem so left as is today.
The real expense is in the water traps you can buy them for 19.95 or $800 each for a real good water trap. The Devillbus 500 system is about $400 by its self, a refrigerant dryer $1500++++.

 

[julmer]

Barry, several people have found used refrigerant dryers on eBay for less than $100. I got one, just haven't had a chance to get it set up yet.

 

[starquest]

I just ran some piping for my new compressor.

I used 1/2" copper all sweated. Came from the compressor through a regulator (to limit my 175psi compressor to 125psi to keep from blowing up my filters), through a 6" flex line to copper. Straight up the wall about 4', then across the wall about 14' with a gradually decreasing slope. From there I have a T in which one side is a trap and the other side goes straight up for 3'. Then it slopes back along the wall to around the starting point and down to a final trap. About 2' before the final trap, I tapped in two other Ts which go straight up, curve and come down to two more traps. In the middle of these traps I have Ted in my taps (filter systems). On one tap is a filter/oiler, the other is a canister type filter. The oiler is for my tool work, the canister is for painting.

So far my results are fairly good. I haven't painted or blasted yet, thus haven't used the canister tap. But the other tap in works good. I do get some water after about 3-4 hours of constant use. What I think happens is that the air is cooling in the 75' hose I have coming from my filter to my tool. I don't have an inline filter before my tool. I'm hoping that with a shorter hose to spary, an inline filter, and the large canister filter will create zero water to the gun when spraying. I probably won't have a problem spraying because my compressor is 16cfm at 175psi (not sure exactly what it is at 40psi but it is much better than 16cfm) and a 60 gallon tank. However, blasting might cause some issues.

All of this cost me about $150-$200 and was very easy to install. The oiler and canisters were bought from harbor freight.

kev

 

[Pepsimayn]

Thanks,

do you have to solder the copper together? Cut pieces to fit or buy them in the desired lengths?

I spose thats it for now, thanks again.

 

[starquest]

I soldered mine together because it was cheeper and faster. you can use compression fittings too.

you can also use galvanized pipe and buy the section lengths you need. Or you can cut the pipe and thread it if you have the proper tooling. There are so many options, you just need to think of ways to cool the air and trap the water. It all comes down to pipe length/diameter, conductivity, and gravity.

1/2" copper soldered was the cheepest and quickest way I could find next to PVC but I don't trust PVC with high pressure. The copper is also a good conductor to rid heat. If I had more of a budget, I would have went with 3/4" galvanized pipe and tranversed my wall 4 times instead of 2, but that basically quadruples the price.

kev

Here is a site I used for ideas on my setup:

http://www.oldsmobility.com/air-compressor-piping.htm

 

[BarryK]

Barry, several people have found used refrigerant dryers on eBay for less than $100. I got one, just haven't had a chance to get it set up yet.

That was a steal!

 

[julmer]

imp: I know it. Finds like that make it easy to justify "wasting" time on eBay. I takes a while but you can find otherwise expensive stuff like freon recovery systems and TIG welders for not much money.