Welding Tips and Tricks

I just got this baby today. Holeee Schikes! It is a bad piece of equipment! It's the biggest air-hog I own. It's pretty much a "dead short" to the compressor, aka it's like just opening a 1/2" air hose wide-open, no restriction. It brought my 10HP Polar Air 35 CFM air compressor to it's knees fast!







Highly recommended!

Oscar wrote:I just got this baby today. Holeee Schikes! It is a bad piece of equipment! It's the biggest air-hog I own. It's pretty much a "dead short" to the compressor, aka it's like just opening a 1/2" air hose wide-open, no restriction. It brought my 10HP Polar Air 35 CFM air compressor to it's knees fast!

thats the trouble with compressed air, its just so inefficient.
10hp+ to run 1.5hp tool

tweake wrote:

Oscar wrote:I just got this baby today. Holeee Schikes! It is a bad piece of equipment! It's the biggest air-hog I own. It's pretty much a "dead short" to the compressor, aka it's like just opening a 1/2" air hose wide-open, no restriction. It brought my 10HP Polar Air 35 CFM air compressor to it's knees fast!

thats the trouble with compressed air, its just so inefficient.
10hp+ to run 1.5hp tool

Tell me about it. Honestly, to properly satisfy this grinder, I'd need a 15HP compressor and about 15-20 more CFM!

Oscar wrote:

tweake wrote:

Oscar wrote:I just got this baby today. Holeee Schikes! It is a bad piece of equipment! It's the biggest air-hog I own. It's pretty much a "dead short" to the compressor, aka it's like just opening a 1/2" air hose wide-open, no restriction. It brought my 10HP Polar Air 35 CFM air compressor to it's knees fast!

thats the trouble with compressed air, its just so inefficient.
10hp+ to run 1.5hp tool

Tell me about it. Honestly, to properly satisfy this grinder, I'd need a 15HP compressor and about 15-20 more CFM!

if you can get 10% useable power out of the air system thats incredibly good. the pro's tell be most setups would only get 4% useable power out of the system.

What would be the advantage of an air tool like this then? I get the uses of the smaller 1/4 hp air die grinders, I use those all the tim, but what about these bigger ones. More power than electric? Cheaper? Better speed control?

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JayWal wrote:What would be the advantage of an air tool like this then? I get the uses of the smaller 1/4 hp air die grinders, I use those all the tim, but what about these bigger ones. More power than electric? Cheaper? Better speed control?

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Can't burn out the windings.

One nice thing about the "air" operated tools....they will STOP when they get caught in something. An old friend of mine had an electric grinder that sounded like a Ford 427 at idle when he would just squeeze the trigger...couldnt stand the NOISE when he gave it full throttle. The electric tools "coast" to a stop and by the time everything does come to a stop, the electric cord is wodded around your writs, arm and legs and a whole new vocabulary is designed.

I've been switching to electric in my shop. Anything new, electric or bust.

I was at the local pharma shop a few weeks ago and the guys there showed me tools that had just come in ups while I was there. Eh, they are real nice, and they gave me some catalogs for the ridiculous priced tools. But unfortunately for me, I'm not looking for ways to empty the checkbook like they seem to. They might be real nice and all, but I can grab a dozen at HF and throw em in the garbage any time they need oil, and I'd still be ahead money.

This was one of the items they had just received. They had several of em. Said they were really nice! Yea, I bet they are!
https://www.zoro.com/dynabrade-air-belt ... /G3606827/




Here's more of the stuff.
https://www.zoro.com/search?q=&brand=DYNABRADE

No doubt the Dynabrade air tools are great, the last shop I worked at had them. That belt sander tool is great, but there are electric versions and other brands available

JayWal wrote:What would be the advantage of an air tool like this then? I get the uses of the smaller 1/4 hp air die grinders, I use those all the tim, but what about these bigger ones. More power than electric? Cheaper? Better speed control?

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they handle dusty environments a lot better. they run cold. they are a lot smaller. better speed control (tho electrics have caught up on that front)
there is advantages to having air tools, but you need to be aware that they cost a lot to run. over here its very rare for a home shop to have a 15hp air compressor.

golden rule of thumb is don't use air tools unless you actually need to.

Look ma'! Twins!

What would be the advantage of an air tool like this then? I get the uses of the smaller 1/4 hp air die grinders, I use those all the tim, but what about these bigger ones. More power than electric? Cheaper? Better speed control?

I've found that the main reason for air operated tools is, when they get caught up or jammed, they will stop without taking your wrist apart. By the time an electric tool stops, you already got the wire wrapped around your arm. my opinion because I've had some pretty large electric drills with wires around my arm and parts flying in circles on presses.

BillE.Dee wrote:What would be the advantage of an air tool like this then? I get the uses of the smaller 1/4 hp air die grinders, I use those all the tim, but what about these bigger ones. More power than electric? Cheaper? Better speed control?

I've found that the main reason for air operated tools is, when they get caught up or jammed, they will stop without taking your wrist apart. By the time an electric tool stops, you already got the wire wrapped around your arm. my opinion because I've had some pretty large electric drills with wires around my arm and parts flying in circles on presses.

Definitely not cheaper!

I like the compact-ness of pneumatic tools.

Triplets!

My opinion on one of the main advantages of a air tool is they simply don't die if they're made well and kept oiled.

You can run them in much more hazardous environments with no worries

I've got a quite a few air tools out of the 60's. Two of the industrial ones I have even have grease zerks on them and are trucking along just fine for me.

And on the note of electric not stopping quickly some companies have actually integrated clutch brakes into there grinders that'll stop the wheel within 2 seconds or less if they feel a jam up.

Those new 3m's sure do look nice though Oscar.

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Toggatug wrote: You can run them in much more hazardous environments with no worries

thats the big advantage of them. run in dusty conditions, the air flow blows crap out.
electrics usually suck air in for cooling and foul the contacts with dust and gets interesting when that goes bang.

what tends to kill air tools is moisture, especially as most home shops don't have moisture removal. oiling helps but you have to be careful you don't blow oil out onto your work and stuff up your paint job.

At an industrial level the cost of compressed air to electricity usage also plays in.

Poland308 wrote:At an industrial level the cost of compressed air to electricity usage also plays in.

thats the big downside to air tools.
compressed air is a huge cost compared to electrically powered tools.
its a case of don't use compressed air unless you have to.

I guess our shop is in that sweet spot for amount of air usage since it seems rather cheap to run our air system.

I keep in mind though we have multiple massive receiver tanks to keep up with he volume demands our flushing and blasting systems take from the system.


But then again I've never done one of those fancy cost analysis of what one charge up of the air system actually costs us. Or maintenance of the compressors and driers runs us annually.



Oh and one huge benefit I've forgotten is most air tools will have a smaller size compared to their electric equivalents which allows access to places electric couldn't dream of getting into.



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I once worked in a shop that also used a lot of air for the shot blast. The two hoses were 4”. Lots of air demand. Because of that they also ran all air tools. About 100-150 guys. Air tools definitely took the abuse better. For instance when you lean into it on an 8” air grinder you just bog it down. But if you lean into it with an 8” electric you overheat it and cook the windings.

Poland308 wrote:I once worked in a shop that also used a lot of air for the shot blast. The two hoses were 4”. Lots of air demand. Because of that they also ran all air tools. About 100-150 guys. Air tools definitely took the abuse better. For instance when you lean into it on an 8” air grinder you just bog it down. But if you lean into it with an 8” electric you overheat it and cook the windings.

Well that shop was definitely waaay bigger than mine.

I've always been curious what it's like to work in the big shops.

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Toggatug wrote: But then again I've never done one of those fancy cost analysis of what one charge up of the air system actually costs us. Or maintenance of the compressors and driers runs us annually.

i think thats really common. people simply don't work out what it costs to run.
also, like my work, our air use is fairly small so who cares about the running cost. its not worth spending the money to make it more efficient. plus with our machines there is no alterative anyway.
but as you creep up in size the running costs start becoming a major factor.

all it needs is to get one of the air crowds to set up the power monitoring data logger on the compressor and that will give how much power your using. usually have flow and pressure output logging as well so you can tell how efficient the setup is.

How do these eat up steel with a cubitron fiber disc compared to say a semi hefty 13 amp corded grinder?

sbaker56 wrote: ↑Wed Aug 25, 2021 9:25 pm How do these eat up steel with a cubitron fiber disc compared to say a semi hefty 13 amp corded grinder?

I don't have a 13A corded grinder, so I can't say. All I can say it that they are badass. The true 12k RPMs really makes it sing! I have other "12k" air grinders, but I have a feeling they actually fall short compared to these babies.