DrRob Posted June 6, 2012 Share Posted June 6, 2012 Chaps MM are doing a well cheap compressor: http://www.machinemart.co.uk/shop/product/details/air-compressor1-5hp-24-litre-oil-free Have done some searches on here and I reckon she'll be good for the odd bit of waxoyl spraying etc. Your thoughts? Cheers Rob Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
daveturnbull Posted June 6, 2012 Share Posted June 6, 2012 I have one of a similar size. Great for blowing up tyres and cleaning filters etc with the blow gun. Useless for running any tools that require continuous air (e.g. grinder / drill etc..) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
simonr Posted June 6, 2012 Share Posted June 6, 2012 I used to use a similar one in the workshop. You can use it for anything - just you have to wait for it to fill up the reservoir more often than a bigger compressor. The only thing it did not cope with terribly well was my Plasma Cutter - which does use a lot of air. For everything else inc spraying and air tools it was fine - if a bit stop-start. Si Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrRob Posted June 7, 2012 Author Share Posted June 7, 2012 Cheers for the comments. I can live with stop-start as it's only for hobby use. Primarily a bit of waxoyl spraying with a schultz type gun and canisters and perhaps an airline..... I feel a purchase coming on...M Mart is beckoning Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yalan Posted June 7, 2012 Share Posted June 7, 2012 I feel a purchase coming on...M Mart is beckoning Not until their next VAT free deal I hope. They used to just do VAT free weekends 3 or 4 times a year but it seems to be almost every month and for a week at a time now. Get yourself on their e-mail database and you're inundated with opportunities to spend..... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
UdderlyOffroad Posted June 7, 2012 Share Posted June 7, 2012 Can I just throw a spanner into the works? When it comes to compressors, by the largest (in terms of HP) you can afford. Whilst you may think now that your use will be limited – that will change! An air compressor is one of those ‘how did I manage without?’ tools. Frankly, for around £100 you could get a new 2.5 HP unit delivered from the bay off E – do a search and sort by buy it now, price + P&P lowest first. Stretch to £150 and you get a lot more for the money. There’s a chap selling factory-refurbed Sealey 3HP units for >£200 – I will grab me one of these before I start to do spraying. I used to be a fan of MachineMart, but these days, even with the VAT off emails they send through you can usually get a better deal for less £££ delivered from the likes of Amazon and Ebay. However they have now started opening on Sundays, which is useful if there’s one near you…. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrRob Posted June 7, 2012 Author Share Posted June 7, 2012 Mainly driven by space constraints to store it....cheers for info though. I get the MM VAT emails so patience in order Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
g90 Posted June 7, 2012 Share Posted June 7, 2012 I waxoyled my chassis with my 25lt machine mart compressor, as previously mentioned its a stop start job. I tried using it for spraying but it didn't really cut the mustard so borrowed my mates larger 50lt. Try a local air/hydraulic specialist for a good second unit maybe? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
simonr Posted June 7, 2012 Share Posted June 7, 2012 Can I just throw a spanner into the works? When it comes to compressors, by the largest (in terms of HP) you can afford. I reservedly agree with this - although an additional reservoir added to the MM compressor will help a lot. I ended buying a recon Hydrovane compressor without a reservoir and attached it to the 25l reservoir from my cheap one. The reason for this was just to drive the Plasma and be able to cut without the air pressure varying. The other consideration was noise. The Hydrovane is almost silent - at least compared to a piston compressor. I felt that the old compressor was upsetting my neighbors! Si Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cynic-al Posted June 8, 2012 Share Posted June 8, 2012 I have a similar 24litre JCB compressor at home, I think i paid £70 for it with a nail gun from Argos , couldn't go any bigger really as I need to be able to lift it in and out of the car and carry it around and I didn't want to kill myself. It does everything I want. It runs the plasma cutter ok, i think because it only needs 4 bar its able to keep up, but it never stops pumping whilst i'm using it so I don't know how long it would live if I did a lot of work. The thing it really struggles with is the impact gun, you only get full pressure for the first few seconds, if you haven't shifted the nut by then then you have to wait for it to charge again as the torque gets less and less with every knock. To be fair to it though I have an old 200 litre 3 phase stuck down in the back shed at work which I sometimes use and the impact gun makes that work. It would also be useless for shot blasting, I did some down at a friends who has a clarke 200 litre with 2 single phase pumps on and they never stop whilst your blasting. I would recommend getting a water trap at the compressor outlet and one of the small inline lubricators that fit on the back of your tool, that way it keeps your lines oil free for if your ever spraying Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
robertspark Posted June 9, 2012 Share Posted June 9, 2012 Dr Rob, I know you're sorted, but this may be of use to others who are likely to use a little more air (sand blaster.....) My solution was to buy two compressors... First one I bought from MM (3hp, 35L, paid a small fortune, about 8 years ago), it was ok to good, but the short cycling (frequent starts) I don't think was helping it, For the plasma, it was fine (Hypertherm pac25 from memory, but probably not the same production load that Si does...) and when I got to the point of doing sand blasting (at first one of the suction types.... avoid, save your money and buy a pressure pot type), it would just about cope, but required very frequent stops, and as the nozzle wore down (larger) it became hopeless.... So, after looking about for a bigger one, I came across a few examples on U-Tube of guys that had bought 2 or 3 smaller ones and linked them in parallel to increase the cfm delivery rate... So I bought a second 2.5hp 50L one from flee-bay, about 1/2 the cost of MM delivered (3 years ago), so long and the short, you can always buy a second and run it in parallel if you need to increase your airvolume, pressure is not normally an issue as the tools normally only require about 40-60psi from my findings. The higher the pressure, the more air the reservoir stores before having to start the compressor, that is fine for equipment that uses high airflow for a short space of time, but when you get a near constant load like sandblasting an axle etc, reservoir volume means very little, you need cfm delivery volume. With regards to plasma cutters, the key is air quality... needs to be clean and oil free, more so than other applications, the more muck in it the shorter the tips will last and they are/can be expensive if you are using it a lot. With regards to equipment that requires high airflow (sand-blasting), I would say that yo need to look at the fittings you use, quick hose connectors are good, but if you buy the standard MM ones, they have a very high resistance (high resistance = restriction in free airflow (cfm)), so considering a decent pipe bore there is very little restriction caused by the pipe (very little turbulence), but I changed all my quick disconnect fittings to PCL XF fittings which have a very very low resistance. You may want / need an air dryer from time to time (reusing media for sandblasting), the cheap solution is a long length of copper tube in an ice bucket or bucket of water that will help dry your air out (there are a few posts on the net elsewhere about this backyard hack) The above may be of use to someone. Rob Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yalan Posted June 9, 2012 Share Posted June 9, 2012 and when I got to the point of doing sand blasting (at first one of the suction types.... avoid, save your money and buy a pressure pot type), it would just about cope, but required very frequent stops, and as the nozzle wore down (larger) it became hopeless.... I bought a MM cabinet and it was pretty poor. I've modified the lighting and exhaust system and things are much better but the suction system is still pretty poor. So a week or so ago I bought a pressure pot blaster. But I don't want to loose all the beads over the back garden. Any suggestion as to how to combine the two systems? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
robertspark Posted June 9, 2012 Share Posted June 9, 2012 yalan, the solution is very simple.... Ditch the MM sandblasting cabinet (I need to get rid of mine as it's just taking up space, what a load of rubbish, I wanted one for years, and now I got one all I do in it is glass bead blasting (fine polishing work + aluminium cleaning) Setup 1 I built an enclosure using timber and some MM tarpaulins nailed together and a 150mm inline extractor fan (you need something such as this to remove the dust) and a long length of flexible ductwork out to the garden, I also bought a sandblasting air fed helmet (best thing I bought + the pressure pot baster), look about you can find ones for a lot less than the scorpion ones. The timber enclosure was a PIA as I need the space in the garage from time to time to assemble things etc and I couldn't be taking it down and putting it back up... Setup 2 I then stumbled across a solution on the internet.... the magic of PVC push fit drainage pipes and plastic sheeting, you can expand and reduce the enclosure as you require take it down in about 10mins and erect it in about the same time. You will need either 32mm drainage pipes (I bought 40mm for a bit more rigidity so I could stand up in the enclosure + get a bulkhead in it) and however many push fit fittings you need. A good extractor fan (150mm Vent-Axia Powerflow, albeit you can find a cheaper one), + flexible ductwork. 1000 gauge polythene sheeting (screwfix) worklighting on a stand for inside the enclosure air fed blasting helmet + plastic visor screens ( I bought a pack, but you can buy plastic overhead projector see through plastic and cut it to size, I did this with the MM blasting cabinet, bought A3 50 sheets works a dream). Blasting media..... don't use sand (respiratory problems > cancer), I use garnet, bought 3 25 kg bags and reuse it, have an old dyson that I use to collect it and put it back in the pressure pot. That's my setup anyway (I'll add pictures if anyone is interested). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrRob Posted June 11, 2012 Author Share Posted June 11, 2012 I'm heeding the advice on here and perhaps spend a bit more spondoolies.... What's the major difference between the red range and blue range at Machine Mart? Cheers Rob Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cynic-al Posted June 11, 2012 Share Posted June 11, 2012 That sounds like a pretty nifty setup, we just hung a sheet over a couple of sets of steps The worst bit is sieving it and putting it back in. Infact no, the worst bit is all of it, it's a horrible job! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrRob Posted June 11, 2012 Author Share Posted June 11, 2012 Choice: http://www.machinemart.co.uk/shop/product/details/tiger http://www.machinemart.co.uk/shop/product/details/ranger-24 Oil free or not oil free? That is the question. Please can someone explain the difference and why choose with or without? I will be using the compressor for tyres, blowing, waxoyling, impact gun etc. NOT for paint spraying. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cynic-al Posted June 11, 2012 Share Posted June 11, 2012 A compressor with oil uses it in the same way as oil in the car engine, to lubricate the bearings etc. Your likely to get some of it into the air line. Not really a problem for what your planning to do, although I guess strictly you don't want to get oil in tyres or be blowing it onto something your trying to clean. You do need to remember to top up the levels & maybe give it an oil change from time to time. The oil free ones are built to run without the oil, I guess they use self lubricating metal for bearing etc. Maybe has graphite or something it it? Maybe they don't last as long? I know the sealed for life bearings we use don't last as long, that is assuming you remember to grease the normal ones Looking at those two the blue one has a higher flow rate, the red one is oil free, so I would go blue. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrRob Posted June 11, 2012 Author Share Posted June 11, 2012 Cheers for reply. Food for thought...... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fozsug Posted June 11, 2012 Share Posted June 11, 2012 I would go for a bigger reciever( 50ltr) like this for the same price http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Warrior-50LTwin-Outlet-Air-Compressor-240v-/170857727726?pt=UK_Air_Tools_and_Compressors&hash=item27c7ea06ee Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrRob Posted June 11, 2012 Author Share Posted June 11, 2012 Thanks Tony....not just price but being able to lift it into garage attic when not required is a prime driver in choice.....going to suss all options out = MM, ebay etc. PS Ali boot floor now in! Looks superb if I say so myself...! Used mixture of roof tek screws and rivets with butyl sealant with the support kit from AL Services, Poole (makes life so easy). Sills and arch to weld then back on the road....welding skills improving steadily. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fozsug Posted June 11, 2012 Share Posted June 11, 2012 Thanks Tony....not just price but being able to lift it into garage attic when not required is a prime driver in choice.....going to suss all options out = MM, ebay etc. PS Ali boot floor now in! Looks superb if I say so myself...! Used mixture of roof tek screws and rivets with butyl sealant with the support kit from AL Services, Poole (makes life so easy). Sills and arch to weld then back on the road....welding skills improving steadily. :i-m_so_happy: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
robertspark Posted June 11, 2012 Share Posted June 11, 2012 DrRob -> Red & Blue range is i think their "professional" (red) and "hobby" (blue) range, they also do a "contractor" (yellow) range. I'm not saying that they are or are not fundamentally different (other than the price tags). The bits to look at are whether it has a direct coupled compressor and motor or an indirect (belt) driven. The belt driven ones (MM + others) seem to be the more none-hobby type as I suspect that because they are normally cast-iron instead of aluminium in construction they probably have a higher duty cycle (the period that they can run, i.e. short duration or continuous). The indirect also appear to be lower pressure rated (as I said above in reality it doesn't make much of a diff). I did not go with oil-free, but you need to consider what you want to use it for. For general use, oil-free is not required, if you are using it for respiration (air fed helmet) or spray painting, oil free is best. Oil free is also more expensive. Note, in that a non-oil-free compressor does not mean that the air is oiled, just that it contains traces of oil, not enough to oil your tools + equipment, I would suggest that you still use a local oiler on the tools that require lubrication. I am not an expert at anything, just a backyard mechanic ... so don't take the above as gospel just personal research. You can always add a receiver if you air system grows, like adding a second compressor. One of the most useful air tools I have is a nailer (yes difficult to use on a landrover....) but wow, it was quick + easy to use to nail batten up to support insulation between my rafters in the garage + the house when hanging on a ladder with one hand holding the batten, and nail together the occasional bookshelf + shoe rack made to measure etc as requested. Never use a hammer + nail / staple on wood again. doesn't require much air at all though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
landroversforever Posted June 11, 2012 Share Posted June 11, 2012 One of the most useful air tools I have is a nailer (yes difficult to use on a landrover....) but wow, it was quick + easy to use to nail batten up to support insulation between my rafters in the garage + the house when hanging on a ladder with one hand holding the batten, and nail together the occasional bookshelf + shoe rack made to measure etc as requested. Never use a hammer + nail / staple on wood again. doesn't require much air at all though. OT I know, but I have a friend with a gas nailer... best tool I've used. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cynic-al Posted June 12, 2012 Share Posted June 12, 2012 Nail guns are ace We have a pneumatic pallet nailer at work which belt feeds coils of nails, its not like the home ones where you have to push it on the workpiece, pull the trigger and get one nail, you can keep your finger on the trigger and just bounce along the wood, if your too slow you get two or three nails in the same spot. It goes off like a machine gun. You also have to be careful, if the woods not 100% it comes out the other side and straight into your shin Topic ruined Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
landroversforever Posted June 12, 2012 Share Posted June 12, 2012 Nail guns are ace We have a pneumatic pallet nailer at work which belt feeds coils of nails, its not like the home ones where you have to push it on the workpiece, pull the trigger and get one nail, you can keep your finger on the trigger and just bounce along the wood, if your too slow you get two or three nails in the same spot. It goes off like a machine gun. You also have to be careful, if the woods not 100% it comes out the other side and straight into your shin Topic ruined Built a deck recently, I missed the joist with one nail and it disappeared into the earth beneath Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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