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Condensate-is-a-problem!
And free water and water vapor in your air lines can cost you thousands of dollars in unneeded maintenance to downstream air valves, air cylinders, air motors - all kinds of air operated actuators and equipment with a negative reaction to water or water vapor in the compressed air.
Yes, water generated by compressing air can create huge problems. Here are what some of the problems are and how they can affect your air, your air-lines, and the tools, valves and actuators that you use in your plant.
Condensation
The air mains in your plant find themselves as an ideal depository for the water vapour that condenses into free water as air from your compressor cools.
But, free water is not all that’s likely to end up in your air-lines and into your air line components as a result of the water created by compressing your air. That water causes big problems!
Rust
The mains themselves are likely black pipe. If we had made the decision for you, the higher cost of copper pipe would see payback over time, as black pipe rusts in contact with water or water vapour! Rust particles will travel along the mains with the water slurry, pour down your drop legs from the overhead mains, and slop into your air equipment.
It's when your equipment has been idle for a while, and that rust slurry dries, that the problems really start as your valves stick, insides of your cylinder barrels score with the abrasive rust, and so on. Rust is a real problem created by water in your black pipe air mains.
Oil
As your air compressor is working, the components that actually compress the air are often bathed in, or operate in, a bath of oil.
Despite the best efforts of air / oil separators, and particularly if the compressor has seen significant use, older piston types in particular, the amount of oil that carries over to your compressor receiver and from there into your air lines grows.
Unless your compressor is an oil-less type, meaning that in this type of compressor no oil contacts the compressed air, lubricating oil inside the compressor will inevitably make it onto the compressed air side of the compressor.
What is the problem with compressor lubricating oil? We sometimes lubricate our air line components, don’t we?
Additives
There’s a word we're sure you’ve heard before.
The additive chemicals that make up the formula for the lubricating oil for compressors are by and large negative to the Buna rubber type of seals found in most air line components. Most compressor lubrication oil will either dissolve the Buna seals, or, cause them to bloat, creating problems for the valves and cylinders and other equipment downstream from the compressor.
I’m sure that the lubricating oil manufacturers would love to have lubricant formulae for compressors that was seal-safe. While we have nothing but anecdotal information to confirm this, we would suspect that that nature of the environment inside the compressor requires the seal-aggressive additives to be in the lubricant to allow it to function properly, and the absence of the seal- aggressive components would instead allow damage the compressor, a cost problem of greater magnitude.
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Soup
Why is the water, and the other unwanted elements migrating into your air lines a problem?
The combination of water and the soup of contamination from the receiver, couples with any contaminants in the main air lines (rust from the pipes / pipe dope, etc.) to send a slurry of crud down the air lines, possibly migrating through your air valves, to the actuators, or into your air tools.
When the equipment stops, and when the operating-elevated temperatures cool, the soup dries. It hardens into a varnish-like consistency that effectively stops the operation of some of your control and actuator equipment. Next time you want to start the machine, it won’t!
This costs you money in lost production, time for maintenance staff to diagnose and resolve the problem, wasted components due to shortened life expectancy.
Even if it’s just water that’s moving down the lines, that will wash out factory lubrication in the various air line components, hastening their demise!
You can't stop your compressor from introducing gallons of water into the receiver. You really want to try to prevent water from the receiver from getting into your air lines, and it's in your best interests to ensure that any water that does migrate to your lines from the receiver, doesn't get to your end applications.
There's lots of information about dealing with that here.
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